Blackbelt

Rating:
Summary: Don "The Dragon", the master of disaster.
Review: I can never seem to get enough of the martial arts genre, with all it's wonderfully told stories of battles between the representatives of good and evil, who don't like to use guns, but would rather decide the victor of the battle the old fashioned way, mano-a-mano.

BLACKBELT stars kickboxing champ/martial arts legend/blackbelt hall-of-famer Don "The Dragon" Wilson as Jack Dillon, a karate instructor and former police officer hired to protect sucessful rock songstress Shanna (Deidre Imershein) from a nasty relationship with her record producers, who plan to have her killed for refusing to renew their contract. But her biggest threat comes from John Sweet (Mathias Hughes), who wants to kill Shanna. Why? Well, kinda hard to explain, but it has to do with Sweet being seduced into a sexual relationship with his mother. Since Shanna looks like Sweet's mother, who Sweet later killed for loving another man, he seeks to kill this apparent re-incarnation of his mom.

BLACKBELT can best be referred to as GAME OF DEATH meets THE BODYGUARD. It has fantastic kung fu battles, and Wilson is not hte only martial arts king here. The cast is primary component is professional martial artists, and here there is a whole slew of gangsters judo punks who team with Sweet to take Dillon down, since he defeats them all in a barroom brawl.

There are guys here that are in several of Wilson's other films, many of them from his (better known) BLOODFIST films, so he has some buddies that he has to beat up, unfortunately. But then, that's what happens in a kung fu flick, KUNG FU FIGHTING!!!!! I think that the fights are well staged and edited, very realistic.

Of course, there's the madatory final showdown with Dillon and Sweet, and it's easily the best in this flick. It was, sadly, yet another of Wilson's direct-to-video movies (Only a few of his starring flicks have seen theatrical releases), but it deserved a big screen audience as much as the next action film. I'm telling you, you have to check it out. It a fabulous action thriller that prooves what his fans alredy know, which is, Don "The Dragon" Wilson Rocks AND Rolls, baby.