Balance of Power
Balance of Power
R | 25 June 1996 (USA)
Balance of Power Trailers

A martial arts expert who runs a dojo for under-privileged kids from a dilapidated warehouse is shaken down by gangsters demanding protection money. Then when one of his students is gunned down in the street by the gang, he swears revenge. Meanwhile the gang leader is setting up a death match between the best fighters and is forcing a former trainer to find a new champion by threatening his granddaughter.

Reviews
Redwarmin This movie is the proof that the world is becoming a sick and dumb place
Pacionsbo Absolutely Fantastic
Asad Almond A clunky actioner with a handful of cool moments.
Married Baby Just intense enough to provide a much-needed diversion, just lightweight enough to make you forget about it soon after it’s over. It’s not exactly “good,” per se, but it does what it sets out to do in terms of putting us on edge, which makes it … successful?
BA_Harrison Billy Blanks is a lousy actor, but the Tae-Bo superstar can sure kick major butt. In Hidden Tiger he stars as Niko, a martial arts teacher who runs a dojo for kids in the local ghetto. When the boss of the Asian mafioso threatens his school, he must enter the underworld fight circuit in order to save those he loves and destroy the enemy for good.Hidden Tiger isn't a great action movie by a long shot, but at least it avoids committing the sin of being boring. For although the acting is bad, the plot unbelievable and the script poorly written, the movie does succeed in being entertaining, albeit in a thoroughly cheesy manner. Action movie stereotypes abound: Billy Blanks's character is the all round good guy whose only interest is in keeping his kids on the straight and narrow, Mako is the wise mentor Matsumoto who teaches Niko the secrets of internal balance and control, Lisa Boynton plays Matsumoto's spunky daughter Jasmine, and James Lew is all-round bad guy fighter Takamura who will stop at nothing to win.Director Rick Bennett ensures that all of the expected clichés are present and rarely injects proceedings with any originality, preferring to take the road most travelled. Hence, we get the obligatory training scenes, the tragic killing of Niko's student by bad guy Takamura, the kidnapping of the Master's daughter and the final showdown between our hero and main villain; predictable, yes, but kinda fun too! A classic Martial Arts movie this is not, but enough enjoyment can be had to make this one worth a viewing.
mirtsyn2 This was not a good film.I think the fact that this film has a 4.1 rating on this website makes me ashamed to be a part of this community. Batman & Robin had a lower rating!This, by far, was the worst film i have ever seen in my life. PLEASE, DO NOT SEE IT.I saw it very accidentally on PAX or UPN or some semi-movie channel like that, and the only reason i saw it in its entirety was due to the fact that i was intrigued by its awful, awful acting. ( i was totally blown out of my mind... i just couldn't stop watching it... in horror)
gator1110 OK, I'm truly not trying to be mean, but this is the worst movie I've ever seen in my entire life. This movie is straight garbage, matter of fact to call this movie garbage would be complementing it. It's nothing more than a broke Karate Kid remake with unbelievable horrible acting. Whats going on with this old Chinese guy who looks like a broke Mr.Miyagi. This guy played the same exact role with a different name in the movie "Sidekicks". I'm not mad at him though, hey bills gotta get paid. Not one person in this movie can act worth a crap. I've seen better acting in Rice Krispies commercials. What were they thinking when they made this movie? I really want to know what they were thinking. Besides the predictable plot and god awful acting is the corny fight sequences. They try so hard to recapture "Enter the Dragon" or "Bloodsport" but fail horribly. The one scene that had me ready to stab somebody and jump out my window was: Billy Blanks character was in a room where steam was put in in order to suffocate him. No not in this movie, this dude starts yelling "No,NO,NO,NO,NO,NO,NO,!!!!!!!!!!" then he begins to punch the steam so he can breathe. Believe me for people who haven't seen this movie, this scene looks far more ridiculous than I can explain to you. All I can say is this movie is trash. Billy Blanks is having success with Tae Bo, so he better stick to that, because he never needs to act in a movie again if this garbage is going to be the result.
goldyjhu This can only be considered a horrible movie. Somewhere someone decided that they would use the basic plot of Bloodsport, put a well-known martial arts guy in it (Billy Blanks), and excrete it out onto VHS for others to accidently waste their time watching.The idea is that Billy Banks (Neiko) enters an underground fighting tournament that wealthy drug lords wager on. The final match of the tournament is to the death, and it is perfectly legal to kill any competitor if you get the chance. Neiko enters the tournament to both avenge a fallen student from his dojo and to rid the city of the evil drug lord.There are several horrible things about the movie. The student Billy is trying to avenge is shot like it is some planned event. Yet the kid is shot on a random corner, with Billy watching. How would they ever know the kid was there? Why not just have the kid get shot coming out of the dojo? These are the types of questions you ask yourself early and often during the thankfully short 92 minutes of the film.In the requiste cookie-cutter training sequence. Billy learns and trains in a remarkably short amount of time. Going from fighting with his anger to total monk like concentration in ..... 1 DAY. The other training is given a unmeasured amount of time and involves running on the beach and breaking wood. Things that you think a guy running a dojo and as ripped as Billy Banks was to start with could have already done easily.The acting is all-around shameful. The characters are sterotypical to the point of being almost racist. The worst part though is that the action sucks. I would equate the action sequences to first season Original Star-Trek action. Everything is very slow, with the standard "I hit you, you hit me" flow to every fight. I thought the flying jump kick, while the other guy stands there had been removed from modern action flicks, but it returns yet again....The most redeeming feature of the movie is that it might be so bad that it entertains you. The lines so corny you laugh, and plot holes so big they make you grin. This is the ONLY reason to watch this movie.