Deadly Target (1994)

Hong Kong detective and master martial artist Charles Prince (British Kickboxing Champion Gary Daniels) arrives in L.A. to extradite a notorious Chinese gangster back to Hong Kong for trial. But it seems Prince has arrived too late -- his suspect has escaped. With the help of renegade cop Jim Jenson (Ken McLeod) and beautiful Pai Gow dealer Diana Tang (Susan Byun), the detective tracks the ruthless gangster down. Martial arts mayhem mixes with L.A. action as Prince, Jenson, and Tang get caught in the middle of an explosive Triad Gang War that leaves Chinatown drenched in blood and littered with bodies. Product Description

a bit off target

Its kinda hard to rate this film, as it has both good moments and some bad ones. I rather liked the cast, as many of the faces (especially the Asians) are familiar, and appear in many other martial art films. The action is satisfying, when it occurs, which is only abundant at the beginning and ending of the film. The story however, is not original and quite predictable. It gets slow at times, and even strays away from the focus of what its actually suposed to be about.

The positive things about Deadly Target are the cast and the action. Gary Daniels not only plays lead, but shares the role with Ken McLeod (Showdown, Street Fighter) who is also skilled in martial arts. As for the baddies, there are only two that really get to show off some skill. Ron Yuan is one of my favorite martial art movie villains, and once again makes an appearancein this film. He has probably been in more movies than almost anyone else I know, including titles such as Ring of Fire 1 & 2, White Tiger, To Be The Best, Bloodfist V, and Street Crimes to name a few. The other guy in this movie I am not familiar with, but he gives the Ken McLeod charcater a coupld of good one on one fights in this movie. Ron Yuan, by the way, has 2 fights against the Gary Daniels character, and is even involved in a lengthy car chase. Unfortunately, the action is onyl abundant in the beginning of the film and end. Both are quite exciting scenes, but in between there isn't anything worth while expect to kill time.

As for story, that is where the movie begins to fail. A Hong Kong cop (Daniels) comes to L.A. and teams up with a local cop (McLeod) to bust a triad drug operation from H.K. They fail, and that leads to an hour of runaway story that eventually comes back to the predicatble, yet somewhat exciting, conclusion. We get to see memebrs of the triad throughout the film, bit scarcely at times, and you wonder when the bad guys will even show up again. The acting is actually somewhat decent, but as far as camera work and editing, they goofed on many action scenes, making things appear too rehearsed.

I thought Gary Daniels has actually had some better performances in movies such as White Tiger and Rage. His role here is decent, but a bit bland at times. Overall, this is enjoyable, but the movie may loose your interest in between the good stuff. It has its flaws, and comes out as an average martial arts film in the end. July 17, 2007

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