Category: Italian Cinema

Bye Bye Vietnam (1988)

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You probably shouldn’t come out of a movie about Vietnam thinking that you would have rather really been in Vietnam than watched the movie. That just doesn’t seem right.

Then again, you shouldn’t come out of a Camillo Teti movie thinking that you would have rather really been watching his Cobra Mission 2. That’s just plain crazy talk. In fact Bye Bye Vietnam is probably the first Nam movie that will trigger post traumatic stress disorder in people who never fought there. Continue reading “Bye Bye Vietnam (1988)” →

Karate Warrior 6 (1993)

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As Karate Warrior embarked on his sixth, final and most majestically numbskull quest ever, I found myself overwhelmed with the enormity of it all. After six films, I had spent more time with Karate Warrior than I had with my own father!

Wrestling with the sense of loss now that this journey was finally ending, I found a semblance of peace as I recalled the words of one of the great philosophers of our time who said “here at last, on the shores of the sea… comes the end of our Fellowship. I will not say do not weep, for not all tears are an evil.”

And Gandalf the White was right! It was totally ok to shed some tears over Karate Warrior’s last adventure! Tears of laughter! Continue reading “Karate Warrior 6 (1993)” →

Karate Warrior 5 (1992)

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Karate Warrior’s girlfriend kidnapped and held for ransom! One of Karate Warrior’s closest friends and newly inducted member of the legendary Extra Large Club of America implicated! A monster of a man training relentlessly for a deadly showdown at the iconic second floor strip mall karate club (right above the “Wide Fashion” store) where all of Karate Warrior’s biggest victories have taken place! And Karate Warrior only has time to train for about 30 seconds with Sensei and hoping that Sensei’s patented Most Respected Sternum Punch can somehow overcome all the freaking odds of all previous Karate Warrior movies put together! Continue reading “Karate Warrior 5 (1992)” →

Karate Warrior 4 (1992)

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With no English-friendly version of this fourth film in a series of six Italian Karate Kid rip offs, it was left to an Italian language (with Greek subtitles!) DVD to finally tell this, the most afterschool special-ish of all Karate Warrior’s missions! But without knowing any Italian or Greek, could any of it make a lick of sense to me? Trick question! Even in English, I don’t understand half of what’s happening or why in these movies about a dweeb in a sissy yellow robe! Continue reading “Karate Warrior 4 (1992)” →

Karate Warrior 3 (1991)

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Director Fabrizio DeAngelis smartly positions Karate Warrior 3 as essentially Karate Warrior: The Next Generation as the Golden Kimono (while clearly hideous and more than a little sissy, but due to some ancient far east mumbo jumbo is inexplicably quite sought after) is passed from original Karate Douche Kim Rossi Stuart to Ron Williams.

And rest easy fans because in the acting and manliness department Ron is more than up to the task of being just as lacking in both categories as the suddenly departed Kim. (Don’t worry about Kim’s whereabouts. He parlayed his Karate Warrior fame into a part in Lamberto Bava‘s Cave of the Golden Rose series). Continue reading “Karate Warrior 3 (1991)” →

Karate Warrior 2 (1988)

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Karate Warrior goes to college. Is there any idea for a sequel that manages to simultaneously cause snickers, loose stools, and breathless anticipation more than the idea of the biggest dojo douche set loose on campus where he’ll likely get beat up at frat parties, beat up in between classes on the quad and beat up back in the dorms?

And all while struggling to maintain a D+ average because all his study time is spent standing in his backyard in silly poses while his kung fu master smacks him in the head for not using his spirit to fight instead of his strategy of deflecting his opponent’s blows with his overly feminine face? Continue reading “Karate Warrior 2 (1988)” →

Karate Warrior (1987)

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The road from Karate Wuss to Karate Warrior is an arduous one, requiring the sort of sacrifice and commitment not found easily in these days of miracle pills, quick fixes, and grade inflation. Truth be told, it was a lot easier to find a person willing to forgo the trappings of his earlier life back in the late 1980s after the success of The Karate Kid. And since this is an Italian movie, the karate kid here is Anthony Scott, a 17 year-old American with a dubbed 30 year-old voice that sounds like it’s coming from an alien trying to translate from its native language in real time. Continue reading “Karate Warrior (1987)” →