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Released by: New Concorde
Released on: May 30, 2000.
Director: Paul Ziller
Cast: Don 'The Dragon' Wilson, Catya Sassoon, Amanda Wyss, Kale Browne, Liz Torres
Year: 1992
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The Movie:
When you figure this movie was directed by Paul Ziller, who, okay, has turned in junk like Collision Earth but who also made Back In Action with Roddy Piper and Billy Blanks, and when you figure this movie stars Don 'The Dragon' Wilson and Gary Daniels, it's got to be awesome, right? Surely awesomeness leaks out of every frame, this has to be the type of movie that'll put hair on your chest.
Well… when it starts out a guy in a hoodie is stealing a car from a fat ginger in a bathrobe. Turns out hoodie guy is Danny Holt (Don 'The Dragon' Wilson) and he's a repo man. Once he gets whirled around in the air by the fat guy he makes his escape with the vehicle and then heads to pick up his kid so he can drop her off at school. With that out of the way, he heads back to the agency for his next assignment - head out and repo another car. So, fine, that's what he does, he heads out, tracks down the car and gets into a fight with… SCARFACE (Gary Daniels). It's pretty rad but a bit short.
So Danny wins the fight and then lifts the car completely unaware that this sweet ride is full of chocolate candies. Not just any chocolate candies though… these chocolate candies belong to some German terrorists and they secretly house nuclear triggers. Obviously Danny has gotten himself into some trouble here and the terrorists are so pissed that they show up at Danny's office and kill everyone there. Danny's out at the store buying junk food when this happens but when he gets back, he's pretty mad.
To make matters worse, the FBI figure he might have something to do with this so they head out looking for him, someone has kidnapped his daughter and the hot chick named Shannon (Amanda Wyss) won't give up the booty. This should be super great. Don 'The Dragon' Wilson is buying snacks and fighting everyone, Gary Daniels is fucking SCARFACE and has a crazy mullet and also running around fighting everyone and Tina from A Nightmare On Elm Street is just sort of hanging out not fucking Don 'The Dragon' Wilson but still looking good.
Unfortunately it never approaches super great and is instead just occasionally great. It does, to the filmmakers' credit, build to a pretty great conclusion but seriously, this is a movie where nuclear triggers are hidden inside… chocolates? What kind of low rent jack off terrorist to you have to be to hide them in chocolates and THEN leave those chocolates in the car? What if they melted?
Lots of people take off their shirts and punch each other, lots of people grunt and kick one another in the face but there are long stretches where there's no action and instead we're 'treated' to a romantic subplot between Don 'The Dragon' Wilson and Amanda Wyss that has more to do with vegetarianism than anything else. Worth seeing for a few laughably ridiculous moments and the two fights between Don 'The Dragon' Wilson and Gary Daniels, but not exactly essential viewing unless you feel the need to see everything that Don 'The Dragon' Wilson has ever done (and for the record, I do).
Video/Audio/Extras:
The video presentation on this DVD is fullscreen, which is fine because it looks like the film was composed that way as there doesn't appear to be any picture information missing on the sides. Picture quality is decent overall; it's clear and colors are represented well with minimal spotting and grain on the print. It's not amazingly sharp or mind blowing in its depiction of fine detail but for an older DVD release of a low budget movie, it's alright, just soft in the way that a lot of these older New Concorde DVDs tend to be.
The Dolby Digital stereo was fine, dialogue was easy to understand, and overall it was adequate. Not remarkable, but adequate in that the levels are properly balanced and there are no problems with hiss or distortion even if it's occasionally a bit flat.
New Concorde has supplied trailers for a few other properties, interactive menus, and scene selection.
The Final Word:
A bit of a disappointment after the sheer, unadulterated awesomeness of Bloodfist III, this fourth entry in the series does at least build to a pretty decent climax and offer up a few solid fights along the way. It won't convince those who aren't already converts to join the Church of The Dragon, but it's a decent timewaster if far from a B classic.
