An absolute waste of money

A Brilliant Conflict

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

A film of deceptively outspoken contemporary relevance, this is cinema at its most alert, alarming and alive.

Cirio H. Santiago seems to have been a bit of a legendary Filipino director from the period when many cheap and cheerful genre flicks were being knocked out in the Philippines. From the little that I have seen, his output seems to be a guarantee of a good time on at least some level. One thing I have noticed is that he is fond of throwing everything at the screen no matter how disparate, with Future Hunters (1986) for instance he combined a post-apocalypse, time-travel, religious artefacts, Shaolin monks, neo-Nazis, dwarfs and Amazonian women. With the earlier TNT Jackson (1974) he simply combined martial arts with Blaxploitation, which was a tactic he returned to with Fighting Mad, with the added bonus of a vigilante revenge story and Hell in the Pacific thrown into the mix as well. The story itself has a lot going on in it. Three Vietnam veterans steal a cache of gold and then two of them double-cross the third by killing him and throwing him in the sea. Trouble is he doesn't die and winds up on a tropical island inhabited by two Japanese soldiers who are still fighting World War II in the late 70's. They nurse him back to health and train him to be a martial arts expert and samurai sword master. He eventually ends up back home in L.A. and seeks out his ex-buddies - who are now crime lords - for a slice of violent revenge.It would be churlish to complain too much against a movie which has a synopsis like the above. In true Santiago style its attempt to mash genres up does result in something a little bit different for sure. It's full to the brim with fighting, training montages, heads and ears being lopped off, soul singing, 70's hats and Afros. So while it's not always entirely engaging stuff it tries its best to deliver a bit of stupid fun and you really can't argue with that too much.

My first Cirio H Santiago film! This one has a brain-meltingly random premise, Afros, cool music, is choppy as hell and even throws in a bit of gore at the end there.Russell is a Vietnam vet who's smuggled some gold with his mates Morrello and McGhee, who of course double cross him, slit his throat, throw him in the sea and head off to L.A to waste the mob there and become crime lords (as we see them blast their way through many gangs). McGhee also has the hots for Russell's wife, and periodically turns up to try and woo her (getting more aggressive with every visit).Russell, however, washes up on a desert island, where he meets two Japanese soldiers who have never surrendered (and never will). After becoming friends and indulging in some funny banter ("You should see Japan now!"), the ranking officer (great character) teaches Russell how to slice things up good with a samurai sword, which as you know will lead Russell back to LA where he can chop his buddies, and their hired goons (Hired goons?) into little pieces.Full of ridiculous situations, action scenes and funky music, Fighting Mad is a good bet for an exploitation fan. There's a good relationship between Russell and the Japanese officer, and just when I thought Russel would never get off that damn island, he does in a rather sad scene and the film picks up from there. Whenever the film bogs down in training sequences, Santiago just switches to L.A to show McGhee and Morrello taking on rival mobs.Once Russell arrives in LA, he becomes an unstoppable killing machine to get to his enemies. It looked like some of the violence had been cut from the version I watched (a leg being severed), but as there were several graphic decapitations at the end, who knows? This is good for a watch if you're like me, and just switch your brain off before hitting 'play' and just go with the flow. It's cheap and cheerful and action packed – what else do you want?

Now this is more like it! When two crooks decide to bump off their partner and pocket all the loot from a profitable crime, little do they suspect that our man not only survives their murderous attempt, but is washed ashore an island where he is nursed back to health by two Japanese soldiers who have been stranded there since the second world war and who in addition, don't even know that the war has ended! In fact not only do they nurse his wounds, but one of them additionally teaches him the way of the samurai thus paving the way for our man to return to the states and take a bloody revenge! This is a great little film and very much a product of its time featuring cool seventies fashions, proud looking afros, some soppy romantic scenes (in glorious seventies slow motion obviously!), a groovy seventies soundtrack and last but not least some cool and gory action throughout including our hero cutting off one of his enemies ears, and later sending the same guy his crime lord associates head in a box! Highly entertaining stuff and it even has a happy ending! What more could you possibly want?

Leon Isaac Kennedy is Doug Russell, an American who steals a shipment of gold in the Phillippines with two Vietnam War buddies, who cut his throat and throw him overboard. Russell washes ashore an island inhabited by two Japanese soldiers stranded there since World War II. They nurse him back to health and he is taught martial arts and the art of the samurai. Back in the States, his treacherous pals, Marelli and Maghee, use their loot and viciousness to muscle their way into Los Angels mafia turf. Maghee sets his sights on Russell's wife, Maria (Leon's real-life spouse at the time Jayne Kennedy), a lounge singer who can't get a gig because Maghee has her blackballed all over LA in his scheme to make her come crawling to him. Russell, samurai sword in hand, hitches a ride on a boat back to America and begins his search for his wife and son; he learns that Marelli and Maghee are the top men in town and he begins slaughtering their cohorts, working his way up the hoodlum food chain. Plenty of action and yucks, including a "touching" montage when Russell is reunited with his wife and son. FIGHTING MAD, not to be confused with the Peter Fonda revenge flick of the same name, is entertaining in a MYSTERY SCIENCE THEATER 3000 kind of way.