Savage Dog: No Bark, All Bite

Evidently, there is some truth to the historical urban legend about the fugitive National Socialist coming to Indochina as a member of the French Foreign Legion. However, he is not the only dodgy foreign national taking advantage of the power vacuum left after the French retreat. With the American military yet to arrive in force, a veritable United Nations of thugs and mercenaries will fight among themselves in Jesse V. Johnson’s Savage Dog (trailer here), which opens this Friday in Los Angeles.

Sure, there is a plot to Savage Dog, but there is no question the film’s real attraction is getting to see Scott Adkins square off against Cung Le and Marko Zaror. We will not have to wait long to see the wanted IRA hitman Martin Tillman display his skills. Steiner, an ex-German Foreign Legion officer turned warlord, quite profitably keeps him as his personal pit-fighter. Eventually, Tillman earns his freedom, but he voluntarily returns to Steiner’s employment, because it is really the best work available in the 1958 Indochinese jungle.

Tillman unleashes his inner demons in the pit, but the beautiful Isabelle appeals to the better angels of his nature. She is the illegitimate daughter of Steiner and a local woman, whom the Nazi Bond villain has never acknowledged. Tillman starts to fall in love with her while temporarily working as a bouncer at the tiny tiki bar owned by Valentine, an American expat. Inevitably, Steiner and his Spanish enforcer Rastignac will rudely interrupt their brief respite with a violent power play. They will leave Tillman for dead, but he won’t be dead enough.

There is no question Adkins is currently one of the best in the martial arts cinema business. Throughout Dog, Johnson has the good sense to step out of the way and showcase the chops of his cast. The fight between Adkins’ Tillman and Cung Le playing a corrupt cop in Steiner’s employ is pretty impressive, but the climatic face-off against Rastignac (portrayed by Zaror with gleefully sinister flare) is a no-holds-barred barn-burner. While the ending of the Cung Le fight might slightly disappoint purists, the Zaror battle builds to a deliriously over-the-top got-to-see-it climax.

Arguably, Adkins has the sort of quiet brooding charisma of the great 1980s action stars. He also develops some rather touching romantic chemistry with Juju Chan’s Isabelle. However, it is somewhat frustrating Savage Dogs fails to capitalize on Chan’s real-life talents as a martial artist, merely casting her as a damsel in distress, much like the Roger Corman-produced Fist of the Dragon. On the plus side, Keith David (narrator of Ken Burns’ Jazz) comes to play as the flamboyant-in-a-cynical-world-weary-kind-of-way Valentine.

Basically, the purpose of Johnson’s narrative is to get Tillman from one fight to another. It works well enough and the period setting adds an intriguing dimension. Of course, all that really matters is the degree to which Adkins, Zaror, and Cung Le tear it up. Highly recommended for action fans, Savage Dog opens tomorrow (8/4) at the Arena CineLounge Sunset in LA and releases the following Tuesday (8/8) on iTunes.

The Man with the Iron Fists: Kung Fu Hip Hop from RZA

Thaddeus the Blacksmith is a builder not a fighter.  Nonetheless, the Lion Clan is messing with the wrong tradesman when they chop off his arms.  Yes, it is time to rumble in Nineteenth Century China.  Kung fu, Hip Hop, spaghetti westerns, and blaxploitation will be mashed-up in the RZA’s The Man with the Iron Fists (trailer here), which really did open this week in New York—honest it did.

The Lions were not always so bad.  That was before the Emperor sought their services to help secure his shipment of gold.  Succumbing to greed, Silver Lion and Bronze Lion betray their respected clan leader Gold Lion, with the intention of hijacking the imperial gold.  Of course, they will have to take care of one loose end: Gold Lion’s son, Zen Yi, who has left his mountain retreat and lovely wife for some old school revenge.  Unfortunately, he is no match for Brass Body, the Kung Fu equivalent of the X-Men’s Colossus.

Stripped of his armor, Zen Yi is rescued from certain death by the Blacksmith and his lover, Lady Silk, one of the “employees” of Madame Blossom’s house of pleasure.  Troubled by the death and destruction wrought by his handiwork, the Blacksmith throws his lot in with Zen Yi.  Needless to say, this leads to a rather nasty encounter with Silver Lion, Brass Body, and a very sharp blade.  Yet, as the title indicates, he still knows his way around a forge.  He also has an unlikely ally in Jack Knife, the opium addicted British ex-pat serving as the Emperor’s secret emissary.

If you’re looking for Oscar bait, Iron Fists probably isn’t your cup of tea.  Not exactly subtle or refined filmmaking, the RZA basically just lets the chaos fly.  He “borrows” liberally from scores of previous martial arts films, even including Enter the Dragon’s oft imitated finale.  Still, its energy is admirable.  Corey Yuen’s fight choreography is consistently inventive and there is plenty of eye candy.  In fact, the large supporting cast brings all kinds of genre credibility, starting with the Cung Le, sporting the Yahoo Serious coif as Bronze Lion.  On-the-brink-of-stardom Grace Huang (so cool in the short film Bloodtraffick) also kicks butt convincingly as part of the duo known as the Gemini Killers.

Probably the biggest surprise of Iron Fists is Russell Crowe’s rip-roaring scenery-chewing portrayal of Jack Knife.  He obviously understood what sort of film he was making and was willing to just go with it.  As Madame Blossom, Lucy Liu essentially reprises her turn from Kill Bill, but that is not necessarily a bad thing.  Frankly, the RZA isn’t terrible as the Blacksmith, brooding well enough.  The villains are more of a mixed bag though.  Former wrestler David Bautista certainly looks the part of Brass Body, but Byron Mann’s Silver Lion is more flamboyant than menacing.

Look, what do you want from a Kung Fu smackdown directed by a rapper, even if it is “executive produced” by Quentin Tarantino?  It might be chocked full of genre clichés and clumsy flashbacks, but if the prospect of watching RZA beat the Lion Clan silly while Crowe cavorts with a bevy of Asian prostitutes strikes you as entertaining than Iron Fists totally delivers the goods.  Let’s call it a guilty pleasure and leave it at that.  It really is currently playing in New York, above 34^th Street, at the Regal E-Walk.