Chuck Power

 

 (imdb)

AN EYE FOR AN EYE-1981-After his partner Pierce (Terry Kiser) is killed in a shootout, undercover cop Sean Kane (Chuck Norris) resigns under pressure from his boss (Richard Roundtree). Pierce's widow Linda (Rosalind Chao) is a reporter who discovers a secret operation. Unfortunately, she's killed by a club foot Asian strongman (Prof. Toru Tanaka). Morgan Canfield (Christopher Lee), the head of a TV station seems helpful but acts suspiciously. Another reporter Heather (Maggie Cooper) helps Kane track down suspect Montoya (Mel Novak). Later Kane teams with Linda's father James (Mako). After he and Heather have sex, it's revealed that the whole drug shebang is headed by Canfield, helped out by Kane's corrupt cop friend McCoy (Matt Clark).

 Director Steve Carver (BIG BAD MAMA (1974), DRUM (1976)) worked with Norris again on probably his best movie LONE WOLF MCQUADE (1983). EYE isn't bad but what it needs more emotion from Norris.

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Martial Art Monk

BULLETPROOF MONK-2003-In 1943 Tibet a monk with no name (Yun-Fat Chow) is given the task of protecting a sacred scroll that could grant anyone who reads it great power. The Nazis invade  their temple and kill everyone except the monk who falls off a cliff after being shot at. 60 years later, the monk hasn't aged much and lives above a movie theater (run by Mako) in Toronto. He saves a young girl named Jade (Jamie King) stuck on the subway tracks with the help of a stupid thief Kar (Seann William Scott) who steals the scroll. After saving Kar from a street gang the monk decides to take the thief (who learned martial arts from watching old Shaw Brothers movies) under his wing. Strucker, the German who shot at him in the temple (Karel Roden) is now old but head of a huge corporation searching for the scroll with the help of his grand-daughter in the hope of it making him young again. After being pursued and hiding out with some other monks, the monk trains the thief to kind of be his replacement. When the monk is captured, Kar and Jade team up to save him.

 Chow is great in the title role and the fights, especially in the climax are well done. It's just too bad the thief character wasn't more likable. Video music director Paul Hunter does an excellent job in his feature film debut, a feat many others have tried and failed miserably at.

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Armed Response

ARMED RESPONSE-1986-In this crazed sometimes funny Fred Olen Ray action drama, David Carradine plays Jim Roth, a veteran tortured by memories of Viet-Nam who now runs a bar. His war vet father Burt is played by Lee Van Cleef! A Yakusa gang leader named Tanaka (Mako) is after a stolen statue. He dispatches two underlings, Thorton (Ross Hagen acting weird as usual) and one of Jim's brothers (David Goss) to deliver a million dollars to buy the statue from the comic duo of Laurene Landon and Dick Miller. Thorton betrays his partner and a bloody shoot out ensues. He beats it out with the money and the statue. Later Tanaka has another brother (Brent Huff) tortured with some kind of acupuncture. After he dies Jim and Burt go for revenge. Fights, shootings and explosions abound. Some of the dialogue is terrible but Tanaka's main henchmen are played by Michael Berryman and Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa.

Also with Lois Hamilton, Burr DeBenning, Conan Lee and Bobbie Bresee (in one quick scene). This was one of Lee Van Cleef's last roles. He died in 1989 of a heart attack at age 63.

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Nam Fu

ATTACK FORCE 'NAM-Similar to Chuck Norris' POW series, David Carradine is Col. Cooper who leads a group of GIs back to Vietnam to rescue POWs right before the Paris Peace Accord is signed. Mako plays a camp leader who takes Cooper prisoner but then wants a deal where Cooper will take him to Hanoi as his prisoner but he's really after some hidden gold.

It's cheaply made but has lots of action and also features Steve Jones as an army Lieutenant.

The DVD version I saw had a picture of Carradine from the original Kung-Fu series on the front and they back had credits for another movie!

Carradine and Mako were in Kung-Fu reunion TV movie the same year.

ATTACK FORCE played in theaters as BEHIND ENEMY LINES.

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