Directed by: Adrian Carr
The Sword of Bushido stars Richard Norton, one of the true martial
arts legends, the man who has so many black belts that he probably needs two
separate rooms to keep them all. Richard may not be as famous as Steven Seagal
or Chuck Norris, but unless you’re Jackie Chan (and you are probably not) you
should get the out of his way. In real life, he has worked as a bodyguard for
many famous rock stars and he’s constantly improving, learning new skills,
speaking on various martial arts seminars, etc. And he even co-created his own
martial arts system (called Zen Do Kai or something). The point is – if for any
reason you decide to mess with Richard Norton, you can choose from various ways
in which he can kick your ass. You have been warned.
OK, anyway – The Sword of Bushido is a really nice B action/adventure movie in
which Richard Norton plays Zac Connors, a former Navy Seal (or some such thing)
who goes on a quest to find the truth about the disappearance of his
grandfather. His plane was shot down three days after the end of the World War
II and his fate remains a mystery. Well, not quite, because the very first
scene shows him being captured and about to be killed by the Japanese, but
Richard doesn’t know this, as he’s not able to watch flashbacks.
Richard demonstrates his skills with those knives made famous by Raffaello in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
Some blonde girl, who happens to be an information officer or something (and Richard’s real life wife), finds that the plane crashed somewhere in Thailand, and as a reward Richard lets her make love to him. After that, he travels to the said place and discovers the remains of the plane (and his grandfather), but he and his guide are attacked by a ruthless gang of bastards and they kill everyone except Richard. And just as they are about to kill him too, he’s rescued by a brave gang of nearby villagers, led by Suay (meaning: beautiful), his future love interest. Together they kill the gang members and Suay tells him about the terrible situation in the region – gangs of looters and robbers and killers and mercenaries and drug smugglers and gun runners and bad students and stuff are freely roaming and attacking innocent villagers and the government is powerless.
Together they get back to the
village, but to their horror they discover that it had been attacked and some
people are dead, including Suay’s mother (notice how many people die in this
movie). Richard stays in the village for some time. Actually, discovering the
remains of his grandfather was just a part of his real mission – you see, he
(grandpa) has stolen a legendary sword from the Japanese and Richard’s giri is
to return it to them. The reward is 2 million dollars, but he’s such a nice man
that he doesn’t care about the money.
That’s about the first half of
the movie – what follows is more deaths, more adventure, more action and some
nice fighting scenes, just to keep you entertained right till the end. In fact,
what I love about B-movies is that you can have so many different cool things
in them. For example, here we have a car chase scene in which Richard drives a
go-kart. Then there’s a really cool scene when a ninja attacks him in the hotel
room, Richard kicks his ass, throws him out of the window and then the poor guy
suddenly gets hit by a bus, in a scene that foreshadows Final Destination movies.
There’s also a hilarious Japanese bad guy, whose English is so mindblowingly terrible that half the time you can’t even tell whether he’s speaking English or Japanese. Speaking of speaking, there are some funny dialogs, but when it comes to one-liners it doesn’t match an average Arnie or Lorenzo Lamas movie. My favorites are Suay’s description of the situation in the jungle, when she mentiones “bad students turning into killers”, and the cheesy pick-up line Richard uses to get her to bed (“You have got to let yourself love. If you don’t – you have lost the war anyway.”).
Long hair - not cool!
As for acting, it’s mostly
terrible, with that Japanese guy taking the cake. Richard is certainly not a
bad actor, but he fought hard with the American accent and he generally lacked
the coolness and charisma of Lorenzo Lamas. I prefer his bad guy roles (see for
example the brilliant Jackie Chan Movie Mr.
Nice Guy, where Norton simply shines). On the other hand, the fighting
scenes are great – you won’t see something like this in an A movie, where the
main roles are played by people like Keanu Reeves.
I recommend The Sword of Bushido
to any B-movie fan. You have action, adventure, swordfights, sex, good music,
exotic setting and Richard Norton. What more could you possibly want?
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