ThreeThumbsUp
To say the acting in this movie was bad would be giving NO RETREAT, NO SURRENDER a huge complement. It was just about the worst I have ever seen, and I don't think it's even close. If you want a few laughs, put this one on -- it's as bad as it gets. Interaction between characters was a joke. The fight scenes were slow and predictable and contained no serious action or authenticity. But the the downright awful acting takes the cake. Just over-the-top terrible. Unbelievable.Van Dam doesn't show up until the middle of the film and plays a bad guy...what?
tomgillespie2002
After the success of The Karate Kid (1984), the martial arts film became a staple of Western mainstream cinema. Of course, the West was first properly introduced to this Eastern form of action cinema in 1973 through Bruce Lee, but the trend in American action cinema really kicked off (pun intended) after 1984. (It was of course exacerbated by the 1980's visual and political fad for hard, large bodies in action films - Stallone, Schwarzenegger, Lundgren et al.) Hong Kong actor and director, Corey Yuen, takes elements from The Karate Kid, throws in (and hugely insults) Bruce Lee ideologies and techniques - through the spectre of the master, - and produces an incompetent film that fails in both of it's sub-genre tagging of an action film with drama.The film opens in a karate dojo in Los Angeles, where a "crime syndicate" intrude on a lesson which is held by Tom Stillwell (Timothy D. Baker). Who knows why this crime organisation would antagonise a karate establishment, but they drive the family, not only from their training space, but entire city: The Stillwell's move to Seattle - conveniently the resting place of Bruce Lee, as the young Jason Stillwell (Kurt McKinney) is a devoted fan. With the gift of a broken leg, procured from the syndicates henchman, Ivan (an obvious reference to the previous years Drago in Rocky IV (1985), both Russian hardbodies, and played here by "newcomer" Jean-Claude Van Damme), Tom's son, Jason, is free to train in the garage, and quickly makes friends with the neighbourhood black stereotype, R. J. (J. W. Fails) - introduced carrying a ghetto-blaster (very 1986 - and "black"). The both of them become the target for the local angry fat guy, who is again stereotypically introduced with a cake in his mouth - like his fatness didn't act as its own visual signifier.After being humiliated in a Seattle dojo, Jason faces his martial arts incompetence by imploring rather loudly at the grave of Bruce Lee. Not only does the film think it has the right to get a tenth rate actor to spew garbage dialogue at the concept of Lee, but the film makers film these scenes in front of his actual gravestone. Having cried in front of Lee's grave, his training with the spirit (the ghost) of Lee. This is insulting on so many levels, but Tai Chung Kim who plays Sensei Lee tries quasi-admirably under the circumstances. Nothing much really happens between the bookended crime syndicate scenes (they only appear in the first and last scenes of the film). There's the ubiquitous training montage; a disco involving break dancing; a pathetic and infantile love interest, and a minute amount of fighting - a really small amount.Jean-Claude Van Damme's Russian fighter and his criminal gang's leaders reappear at the end of the film to challenge the Seattle-based karate dojo to a fight in the ring. Van Damme's Ivan against all three. Of course he beats them easily. Luckily, Jason, newly trained by the ghost of Bruce Lee, is in the audience, and ready to fight him. No Retreat, No Surrender manages to insult and bore its viewers in a multitude of ways. Everything about the film is incompetent. The acting is appalling, there is little to no dramatic tension or narrative complexity, and the characters are simplistic stereotypes of action/martial arts cinema. The big threat of the film, that crime gang that I guess is supposed to offer the characters tension and cohesion, only appear at each end of the film. Even the one thing that this type of film is supposed to offer, fighting, only really occurs at the end (with a few rubbish bits from beginning to end), but this doesn't really present anything interesting choreographically, and is easily outdone in thrill and action, even by mediocre fight films such as Bloodsport (1988).www.the-wrath-of-blog.blogspot.com
Glen McCulla
This film has long held a pride of place in my personal pantheon of classic '80s action flicks, alongside other luminaries such as "Bloodsport" and "Deadly Prey". In fact, i think a great night in with beers 'n' snacks with all three of these bad boys is long overdue - though i may well die from an overdose of pure unadulterated genius.Basic kung-fu revenge plot involves a young man called Jason (although for some reason for years i remembered him as being called "Dan"... i have no idea why, unless i'd somehow conflated this with "The Karate Kid". Which seems impossible, what with this being 5000 times better!) avenging the crippling of his karate sensei father (the appalling acting stylings of Tim Baker, take a bow!) at the hands - and indeed feet - of martial arts gangsters. The twist here is that the inevitable training montage in order to take vengeance is aided not only by bizarre break dancing Michael Jackson impersonator R.J., but by the ghost of Bruce Lee (played by Kim Tae Chung himself, the not very Bruce Lee Bruce Lee from "Game of Death")!!! After a gruelling training regime involving quality '80s music and some terrifying homoeroticism with R.J., Jason / Dan takes on the high-kicking, splits-performing Jean-Claude Van Damme himself. Though whether or not JCVD is playing 'Ivan Krezinsky the Russian' or 'Carl Brezdin' depends on whether you believe the dialogue or the credits!! Either way, Jason / Dan vs. Ivan/ Carl is a true clash of the titans that fans of hokey genius cannot afford to miss!!
Stuart McCormack
This is my absolute favourite BAD movie. I love it.The plot is ludicrous, the acting atrocious and the score is straight out of a Z-grade '60's Western. Barack Obama looks more like Bruce Lee than Tai Chung Kim.But it's the dialogue that makes this movie great.Who can forget Van Damme's immortal line: "So, it is you!"?To be fair, Van Damme looks great and speaks little and there are some good fight scenes if you can stick it out.This movie is so bad that I own a copy and watch it at least once a year. Laugh out loud from beginning to end.A must-see. Preferably with a few friends and a bunch of beers.
