DVD cover

Showdown in Little Tokyo

1991

Director: Mark Lester

Stars: Brandon Lee, Dolph Lundgren, Tia Carrere, Cary Tagawa, Philip Tan, Roger Yuen

This is just a really terrible movie. Dolph plays "an American samurai" teaming with Brandon as a "valley dude quipster with lots of fight in him" (the box description's exact words) to take on nasty Yakuza Tagawa, who seems to have cornered the market on playing nasty Japanese dudes in cheap US movies. There's very little action, and what is in there is truly awful. If you think Brandon Lee was as good as his dad at kung fu, watch this movie. He moves about as fast as a snail on quaaludes, and is about as stiff as a cranky old man. Dolph looks even worse, especially since he spends most of the movie wearing an open leather jacket with no shirt underneath and some Zubaz (really garish workout pants). Most of the time of the movie's thankfully scant 78-minute running time is taken up with bad jokes and scenes of the un-dynamic duo driving around Los Angeles.

Some people, myself included, enjoy "good" bad movies, but Showdown in Little Tokyo is so horrible you won't even want to waste your time trying your best "Mystery Science Theatre" impressions on it. The only -- and I mean only -- reason you might want to watch this (at least from a guy's point of view) is to see the lovely Tia Carrere briefly nude.

RATING: 2

A review of the DVD for this movie can be found here

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