TrueJoshNight Truly Dreadful Film

Breakinger A Brilliant Conflict

Micah Lloyd Excellent characters with emotional depth. My wife, daughter and granddaughter all enjoyed it...and me, too! Very good movie! You won't be disappointed.

Griff Lees Very good movie overall, highly recommended. Most of the negative reviews don't have any merit and are all pollitically based. Give this movie a chance at least, and it might give you a different perspective.

Leofwine_draca Straight-to-video hero Don "The Dragon" Wilson was never going to be one of the big time martial arts stars, but he does well enough with BLACKBELT, a film which may be the best of his career. BLACKBELT is a non-stop assault on the senses of extreme violence, bone-breaking brutality and bloodshed, with a wafer-thin plot that doesn't get in the way of a fight scene every five minutes or so. This is definitely one of the most violent fight flicks I've seen in a long time, and despite heavy cutting on release (both in the UK and the US) it still remains a gruesome exercise in stage blood and bone-breaking sound effects.The plot is nothing special: imagine a hard-assed version of THE BODYGUARD with Wilson replacing Costner and you'll be halfway there. The female leads are non-actresses but attractive enough in their roles, and although Wilson is typically wooden as the hero he packs a wallop in the fight scenes and kicks ass more times than I can count. Matthias Hues (DARK ANGEL) is surprisingly good as the psychopathic killer and I love the flashback scenes which explain his mental disorder. It's a shame the shaggy-haired hardman hasn't appeared in more flicks and has been typecast as the villain; I for one would like to watch him as the hero for a change.BLACKBELT offers one adrenaline-charged fight scene after another during its running time, all battles excellently choreographed by Wilson himself. The budget is low and executive producer Roger Cormaan seems to have played a part in assembling an American-looking Filipino cast to fill out the smaller roles, up to his old tricks again by the look of it. The wealth of action that BLACKBELT offers is impossible to dismiss and this film hits the mark where many others fail. The finale is a class act and his final one-on-one unmissable entertainment.

Comeuppance Reviews Jack Dillon (The Dragon) is an ex-cop turned martial arts instructor. He also does favors on the side for people that need help but can't exactly go to the cops. When up-and-coming singing star Shanna (Imershein) receives a severed finger in a box, she turns to Dillon for help. Shanna has other problems as well, as her "backer" is mobster Eddie Deangelo (Beymer). He's pressuring her to sign a new contract with him, and she doesn't want to. Naturally Deangelo focuses all his rage (and goons) on Jack Dillon, her new protector. Amidst fighting his way through the underworld to protect Shanna, Jack discovers that insane, murderous, psychopathic ex-mercenary killer John Sweet (Hues) is behind all the mayhem. Only a confrontation between Dillon and Sweet will determine the fate of Shanna, among other people. Who will win? As this is a Corman production, it seems he wanted to go with the Bloodfist formula of having real-life martial artists in the cast, and with their screen credit along with their name is their fighting title. Also it's 80 minutes, so right there we see the formula. But Blackbelt is truly Don "The Dragon" Wilson at his best. His lovably wooden performances are here in full, but he gets a ton of great lines (pretty much all of them, and they're almost all snappy one-liners). Wilson worked on the fight choreography, and in true early-90's fashion, the violence is simultaneously brutal and, at times, very funny. Both his, as well as Matthias Hues' entrances are both great and it's a treat to see them together, and their final fight doesn't disappoint.Hues also puts in a career-best performance as the Psycho (1960)-inspired Oedipal bad guy. Sure, Hues is always the baddie, but here he shows some depth as the ironically-named Sweet. Also, according to the plot, his blows are powerful enough to kill people. And his yells and grunts are priceless.Naturally, in a classic cliché, Dillon and Deangelo "go way back" - and it should be noted that even though Dillon isn't officially on the force, he has a partner, Sturges (Blumenfeld). There really should have been a Dillon and Sturges TV show. It would have been a great cop drama - the classic, dedicated but pudgy cop and the Karate-fighting ex-cop solving crimes. What's really criminal is that this was never made. But at least we have Blackbelt. (However, that title is somewhat misleading, as Dillon's, nor anyone else's) belt level is ever talked about, much less fought over.Not to be insulting to Miss Imershein, but the role of Shanna should have gone to someone just a little bit hotter, perhaps Wilson's Ring of Fire (1991) co-star and frequent Corman starlet Maria Ford. Then their relationship would have been more believable. But watch out for the posters of Shanna gracing the cover of "Rock" magazine (not meant to look like Spin, surely), along with Pearl Jam. Hey, it was 1992 after all. But all her accolades are certainly deserved once you see her perform the song "Love Rocket" - along with the background dancers who are so comatose they make Robert Palmer's "Addicted to Love" girls look like a row of Rip Taylors on speed.As for the VHS box: The story for the movie was co-written by Neva Friedenn (who also wrote for other Wilson vehicles) - and on the cover there is a quote: "The most action packed, sexiest kickboxing movie ever made!!" Note the two exclamation points. And guess who the quote is attributed to? Yes, Neva Friedenn! You can tout your own productions on their VHS boxes like that? Who knew? Additionally, they misspell "Matthias" when talking about the mighty Hues. Just shameful, really.It should also be noted that Ian Jacklin is in this movie for about one second. Despite that, this movie is still worth seeing, as it is an entertaining romp from the golden age with two of the genre's most beloved stars. What's not to like?For more insanity, please visit: comeuppancereviews.com

face_of_terror A Former cop (Don Wilson) is hired to protect a singer (Deirdre Immershein) from a psycho serial killer who's also a martial arts expert (Matthias Hues).I am a big Matthias Hues fan , and i must say that he looks as good as always in this movie. Although, after watching his movies, i see that they still cant set up a fight properly, because Hues is always gets beaten by weaker opponents. Same happens in Black Belt.I actually expected more from this movie. I expected the villain to be something like Van Damme's "Torch" in THE REPLICANT. In Blackbelt we have a serial killer, who is after a singer who looks like his mother, who abused him when he was young.Wilson on the other hand is trying to stop him , delivering his usual lines as a "good guy". His acting still needs a lot of work.Figh scenes are somewhat solid, but like i mentioned earlier, the final fight scene between Wilson and Hues looks ridiculous, as well as Wilson's fights during the movie.So if ur a Don Wilson fan, or you like seeing Matthias Hues as a villain, Blackbelt is worth a watch. Don't expect great plot, and great fight scenes.

pancakelizard This movie is amazing. Don the dragon Wilson is like the edward norton of martial arts, he can play any part you give him in a kun-fu movie. And his fast paced action style of fighting is reminiscent of the great chuck norris. God chuck why did you have to go to tv? Don't you know we miss you, please come back. Well at least you have brought the martial arts genre to tv. The best way to describe this movie is enter the dragon meets the matrix meets pulp fiction meets gone with the wind or something because there is a little romance brewing in the air. The first scene of the movie already has martial, arts murder, and brief(and classy) nudity. The movie only gets better from there as it goes on till the end. The end is sooooo good, I won't tell you what happens I will just say that it is like all this fighting and you aren't sure who's going to win and then it ends and you're like whoa no way, did you see that? But you did.