recommended

not horrible nor great

Excellent but underrated film

Not sure how, but this is easily one of the best movies all summer. Multiple levels of funny, never takes itself seriously, super colorful, and creative.

A down-and-out American boxer (Scott Glenn) becomes involved in a feud between two Japanese brothers.This is one of those hidden gems you never hear about. A great blend of American and Japanese cinema, some action and some grit. The film really ought to be a cult classic, and yet I feel like very few people have ever heard of it. Most surprising to me is how the film did not seem to get a bump after the Netflix series "Daredevil" took off. In some ways, Scott Glenn's character on that show is very much a continuation of his character here.Thanks to Kino, the film is available on Blu-ray though it does not seem to have any features. That is too bad. I am always ready for an audio commentary.

As samurai epics go this one certainly plums all the typical Japanese stereotypes. There is the obsession with honor, there are still samurai running about in Japan, they just wear business suits now instead of hakama and kimonos. Oh and corporate take overs are more reminiscent of a battle between feudal lords than the modern corporate buy out. Hostile takeover indeed.This isn't really a great movie. It may be good. I was in the right mental state to enjoy it I think. What makes this movie a really interesting study to watch is Scott Glenn, and Toshiro Mifune. They are the core that holds this movie together. Glenn is excellent as a down on his luck boxer, and Mifune is equally good playing an anachronistic samurai warrior. This movie would have crumbled under the weight of its pretensions had these two fine actors not been involved. They made even the absurd bits in this film believable.If you watch the credits you will see that Steven Seagal was one of the martial arts consultants for the movie. And I must say his touch is welcome here. Everyone looks very proficient. It is lamentable that Seagal would later go on to boast that he knew 10 times more about Japanese sword fighting than Mifune, but whatever, the films action holds up well.

I must confess to a particular fondness for thetwo films of John Frankenheimer's that he himself didn't seem to have much affection for: Prophecy(about mutant bears in the woods of Maine) and his one, The Challenge. I remember seeing this in theaters back in '82 and really digging it. The script by John Sayles moves along at a nice clip and Scott Glenn is well cast and well used ( for once) as the down on his luck American boxer who finds himself involved in an age old blood feud between two opposing ways of life in Japan; there is an interesting tension between the good guys and the bad guys: East/West as well as Modern/Traditional. (Clever fellow, that Mr Sayles.)The major character arc for Scott Glenn's American pug is not at all dissimilar to that later adopted by Tom Cruise in The Last Samurai. Not only does this film have one of the last major performances in a western film from that towering figure of Japanese cinema, Toshiro Mifune, but it boasts what remains one of the all-time classic modern sword fights in the climactic showdown in a giant gleaming glass and steel Japanese office building. Scott Glenn and Atsuo Nakamura slash each other to ribbons with samurai swords then resort to stapling each other's faces and shocking each other with severed computer cables during the final battle and it is choreographed, shot and edited, with a snappy sense of kineticism. Bravo to all involved.

There are certain movies on IMDB that are enigmas. The ratings are low, but the reviews are GOOD. Such is The Challenge. Frankenheimer, who had a string of masterworks in the early 60s with Seconds, Manchurian Candidate, The Train, and at least the race parts of Gran Prix stumbled badly on several films thereafter. This, and French Connection II, helped get him back on his feet. So which is right, the low ratings or the high comments! Duh. Always go with the latter in this case. The Challenge will make you feel like you were in Scott Glen's shoes, immersed in an alien culture that you come to respect and even fight for. And any film with a Goldsmith action score is already a plus.