The Last Dragon 8/10

For years I've been looking for the next cool kung fu or martial arts movie to keep an eye out for in discount bins or to put in my netflix queue when I run out of good stuff, and I have, for years, continued to stumble across the movie the Last Dragon. I always figured it was a cheap Hollywood byproduct of the kung fu and karate boom in the 80's and would be pretty boring. And while it is indeed a product of kung fu's sweeping over pop culture throughout the 80's, the movie is never boring.

The plot of The Last Dragon is of "Bruce" Leeroy Green, a kung fu practitioner in Harlem as he searches for the true master. You get it? "Bruce Lee"roy. The whole point of the movie is to take the kung fu, karate, and ninja type movie themes and place them in New York, and its the reason this movie is so much fun.

The movie can best be described as a mix between vintage 80's John Carpenter and Walter Hill. You got the east meets west surrealism from Big Trouble in Little China, mixed with the attitude of Escape from New York and The Warriors. But more then anything else the movie feels a lot like Streets of Fire but good. I know The Warriors was from '79, but whatever, same thing. the movie is pure 80's fun.

At least the poster's cool.

The movie starts with a cool training scene, some general eastern enlightenment from a small Asian man, and the introduction to Leeroy Green, who may or may not be at all related to Leroy Brown.
The second scene has Leeroy in a Harlem movie theater watching Enter the Dragon. We see a bunch of colorful characters being colorful, like having people randomly break dancing before getting their ghethobuster smashed. Leeroy is just siting in the front row, minding his own business and eating popcorn with chopsticks when a gang of music video rejects enter the theater to make way for none other then SHO' NUFF, the mother fucking SHO-GUN of Harlem; not to be confused with the Duke of New York, A-number 1.

Who da MASTA?!?!

SHo NuFF, which is how I think his name would be spelled on the internet, takes no time in declaring himself a super-badass before sitting down to enjoy the movie. He's told that Bruce Leeroy is badder, something you just don't tell SHo NuFF, and sure enough SHo NuFF starts kicking ass and biting ankles.

So by now I already love this movie, and it continues on to deliver on being ridiculously hip, in an 80's way. Which for me is good. I like the 80's and even though it could be seen as dated, because it totally is, it serves a second purpose of being a period piece. All the dancing and singing and karate kicking around is what I remember about the 80's, having been born in 84 and growing up with cheesy music videos and ninja influenced television.

Haha, what the fuck?

The acting in the movie is what it should be. Which means that it isn't good, but it shouldn't be good, because good would ruin it. Taimak, the lead, does a pretty good job, and Vanity, the love interest, is pretty good looking, despite how crazy her hair is. Theres also a weird black kid that plays Leeroy's brother that looks like he's 12 but acts like he's a full grown man. Theres something weird going on there. There's also a student of Leeroy's that declares that he can get away with not knowing martial arts by simply being Asian and acting crazy. The fact that he doesn't really look Asian, and is obviously well trained in martial arts just makes it funnier.

Not Asian.... 

There's also a lot of great 80's music, this being Berry Gordy's the Last Dragon and all, which rounds the movie out and makes it enjoyable.

This is what Vanity looks like.. Not in the movie, but, you know, in real life...

In the end The Last Dragon is a "Cult Hit" that will one day be taken by hip film intellectuals and turned trendy and gay. Until that happens you should try your hardest to see it. Unless it's already happened, in which case I say fuck that trendy overrated shit and see Streets of Fire instead, because it will never be a "Cult Hit", because it sucks.

8 out of 10 glowing masters