SHOWDOWN IN LITTLE TOKYO is a movie I have long enjoyed (here is a pretty dumb review of it I wrote 13 years ago). It’s a buddy cop movie starring Dolph Lundgren (between COVER UP and UNIVERSAL SOLDIER) and Brandon Lee (between LASER MISSION and RAPID FIRE), so any possible deficiencies are easily overcome by their great charisma and the unrepeatable novelty of their team-up. Watching it in the context of these other ’91 movies it does seem slightly primitive; it’s a Warner Bros. movie, but the budget was $8 million, which is less than DOUBLE IMPACT – or even non-action stuff like DEAD AGAIN, THE COMMITMENTS, BINGO, RETURN TO THE BLUE LAGOON and LIFE STINKS – let alone the new state-of-the-art represented by POINT BREAK and TERMINATOR 2. Fortunately it’s in the capable exploitation hands of director Mark L. Lester (STEEL ARENA, CLASS OF 1984, FIRESTARTER, COMMANDO, CLASS OF 1999), so it has heavy doses of The Good Shit. He always gives you something extra.
Just as MYSTERY DATE has its two leads getting into trouble with gangs in Chinatown, this is about two guys fighting a Yakuza drug ring in L.A.’s Japanese district. In this case that’s in their job description as members of the LAPD Asian Crime Taskforce. Dolph’s Sergeant Chris Kenner gets the kind of introduction all his characters deserve: he single-handedly raids an illegal fighting circuit by climbing through a skylight, swinging into the ring on a rope and saying, “Haven’t I told you this is illegal, and it pisses me off?” Then he’s announced as the new challenger and has to fight the guys in the ring. (read the rest of this shit…)
Summer of ’89 had the movie about Batman, summer of ’90 had the one about Dick Tracy, and summer of ’91 had a very good period-set super hero movie that I reviewed a few years ago in the Summer Flings series. But THE ROCKETEER, for whatever reason, was unable to capture the zeitgeist, and I would argue that the movie to fill that BATMAN/DICK TRACY slot in the summer of ’91 was actually ROBIN HOOD: PRINCE OF THIEVES. It wasn’t based on a comic strip and didn’t have minimalist, symbol-based advertising art (not counting the silhouette logo on the merchandise), but it did fill that role of the well known old timey adventure hero repackaged as a thrilling modern popcorn movie.
And like those other two movies, its hero was played by a major movie star who was far from the obvious choice: Kevin Costner (MADONNA: TRUTH OR DARE), who was universally mocked for only barely trying a vague English accent. (Costner wanted to do one, director Kevin Reynolds didn’t want him to, and Reynolds mostly won.) But he was near the peak of his stardom, having done THE UNTOUCHABLES, BULL DURHAM and FIELD OF DREAMS in the last four years and coming immediately off of best picture winner DANCES WITH WOLVES. His antagonist, the Sheriff of Nottingham, was played by Alan Rickman, only a few years removed from the glory of Hans Grueber. And for the appreciators of locker pinups they threw in young Will Scarlett played by Christian Slater fresh off of YOUNG GUNS II and PUMP UP THE VOLUME. (read the rest of this shit…)
I reviewed THE LAST BOY SCOUT (1991) once already, 15 years ago. Though I think I described some things about it pretty well, I was at somewhat of a snooty wiseass stage in my critic’s journey, and I was more dismissive of it than I should’ve been. Despite that I remembered it being a pretty good movie, and I’d been wanting to rewatch it for a while, so this last November, when BWolfe asked in the comments, “Can you re-review this? I feel like you’d give it a much better shake now,” I knew he was right.
(Bruce)
This Joel Silver production is a collaboration/clash between director Tony Scott (coming off of DAYS OF THUNDER) and screenwriter Shane Black (after being replaced on LETHAL WEAPON 2). Those guys making a Bruce Willis movie is about as all-star action as it got in 1991, and had Bruce and Silver known how the release of HUDSON HAWK was gonna go earlier in that year they would’ve been even more eager to sow they could still blow people through the back walls of theaters. (read the rest of this shit…)
Hey, have you guys ever noticed how alot of these so-called action movies they do now days make no effort to show any action in their action scenes? I think I might’ve mentioned something about that before, not sure.
Okay, it’s getting old for me to write about, and I’m sure it’s even worse for you to read about. But I feel like if we stop mentioning it it’s like we’re saying it’s okay. Whether it’s Michael Bay’s ridiculous edits or Paul Greengrass’s wobblecams that opened the floodgates, something happened, and old fashioned notions like geography, coherency, and visual storytelling got buried. The language and standards of action cinema that have evolved and developed over generations have been thrown out the window and it’s become acceptable to just have a quick smear of photography that sort of loosely implies the fights and chases that audiences used to pay money to actually see with their own eyes. I think there’s gonna be a backlash against this type of movie pretty soon, and it’s bubbling up in this new wave of DTV action we’ve all been enjoying. But still, you can’t just let it go. You gotta say something. (read the rest of this shit…)
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Recent commentary and jibber-jabber
burningambulance on F1: “My dad was an F1 fan (surprising for an American, I know) so I would occasionally see him watching these…” Jan 28, 14:05
A.L.F. on The Smashing Machine (2025): “I do feel it deserves to be said that I was correct about these people – that it is now…” Jan 28, 13:31
Crudnasty on F1: “I had a dad, I am a dad, and this movie just looked like “Toxic Masculinity and Gross Rich People…” Jan 28, 13:12
Mr. Majestyk on F1: “I think you need have grown up with a dad to want to see this movie. My dadichlorian count is…” Jan 28, 09:07
BuzzFeedAldrin on F1: “I felt this was sort of the opposite of The Smashing Machine which I also saw recently, but both left…” Jan 28, 08:41
Bill Reed on F1: “I really enjoyed this one. Sturdy chassis, well-oiled, fine-tuned, aerodynamic, good around the corners, etc. Yeah, it’s about an old…” Jan 28, 08:12
Skani on F1: “Hard for me to take the Oscars seriously as anything other than a highly skewed, highly I political (in every…” Jan 28, 07:58
Numpty on 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple: “Liked it okay, not as much as the last one, rolled my eyes at a few bits, but the shaky-cam…” Jan 28, 06:31
Edgard on F1: “I regret that i did not see this one in theater as it was made for that experience… I am…” Jan 28, 04:31
Mike on F1: “As an F1 and film fan, I liked it. The other drivers, cars and even commentators are all the genuine…” Jan 27, 09:15
Llamakazi on The Killer (2023): “The Killer also gets caught on camera on the way up the elevator to the billionaire’s home. Since the heat…” Jan 27, 00:30
Alex R on Train Dreams: “Sanding off Robert’s edges seems as much a symptom of being afraid to fully grapple with Denis Johnson’s tone as…” Jan 26, 16:35
Matt on Train Dreams: “Alex R – I really don’t understand the revenge killing, I suppose. I’m not sure what it was trying to…” Jan 26, 15:55
Alex R on Train Dreams: “Matt— I agree with you on almost all of this, especially the Malick worship, though I liked the revenge killing…” Jan 26, 15:14
Matt on Train Dreams: “Has anyone here read the book? It is very, very good, and perhaps my familiarity with it colored my experience…” Jan 26, 13:11
“Y’know – this is a weird part of town.”
Just as MYSTERY DATE has its two leads getting into trouble with gangs in Chinatown, this is about two guys fighting a Yakuza drug ring in L.A.’s Japanese district. In this case that’s in their job description as members of the LAPD Asian Crime Taskforce. Dolph’s Sergeant Chris Kenner gets the kind of introduction all his characters deserve: he single-handedly raids an illegal fighting circuit by climbing through a skylight, swinging into the ring on a rope and saying, “Haven’t I told you this is illegal, and it pisses me off?” Then he’s announced as the new challenger and has to fight the guys in the ring. (read the rest of this shit…)
June 14, 1991
Summer of ’89 had 
I reviewed THE LAST BOY SCOUT (1991) 
Hey, have you guys ever noticed how alot of these so-called action movies they do now days make no effort to show any action in their action scenes? I think I might’ve mentioned something about that before, not sure.
