Being a fan of Jim Kelly and his classic roles in films like One Down Two To Go and Black Belt Jones, I was not about to pass up on the opportunity to see a film that passed below my radar: Black Samurai. Jim Kelly stars as Robert Sand, an agent for some organization called D.R.A.G.O.N . Apparently, it stands for Defense Reserve Agency Guardian of Nations. I don’t think that was revealed in the film but I learned that this movie is based on a series of books by Marc Olden. You can find them on paperback at used book stores or online for a huge amount of money. I guess they have become collectors’ items. There were eight books in the series. I hear they were awesome.
Sand’s girl Toki Konuma (played by Essie Lin Chia) gets kidnapped poolside by a drug lord organization ran by the most unbelievable bad guy ever to be called a name such as The Warlock. Yes, The Warlock – a voodoo drug lord that has the worst mustached crew working for him. Played by Billy Roy, and also called Janicot in parts of the film, he may be the whitest lame bad guy I have ever seen. He also kidnapped Toki’s samurai father who by the way never makes an appearance on the screen as well as never rescued; though it’s implied.
So when the most generic agents bust up Black Samurai’s vacation during a tennis game with some broad to give him the assignment he isn’t too enthusiastic. Until he finds out his little Asian flower has been kidnapped. He makes sure his sweet car is delivered in the neighborhood where he has to go to find his girl and father immediately and takes the case.
Now here is where the fun begins. Somehow the criminals know he gets to town and the Warlock sends the greasiest henchman Chavez ( Roberto Contreras) to keep an eye on him.
While Kelly is practicing nun chucks and silly moves, another henchmen that looks like Freddy Mercury with a midget sidekick try to jack him but don’t succeed. This is the first of five midgets that are throughout the film. I kept saying, “Its another midget, holy shit this rules.”
While watching the credits, my buddy Brandon pointed out that two little people were credited: Little Tokyo (Himself) and Cowboy Lang (also himself). Was it cause they had such interesting names or were they popular in the little people community and I just am out of the loop? Well they were popular – they were famous midget wrestlers through the seventies and eighties and Little Tokyo even appeared at Wrestlemania III! Cowboy Lang ended up homeless before his death. I’m stepping to far away from the film!
Now allow me to give you some of the other best occurrences in this film that make this an instant classic:
1 -Kelly flies with a jet pack off a boat for no reason other than they had a jet pack so why not use it.
2 – There is a turkey vulture that gets kicked and comes back for some revenge later.
3 – Random voodoo jungle dudes that fight with Kelly in the woods – not a jungle.
4 – Random over dubs that really do not make a lot of sense. They are really out of sync and clearly misplaced.
5 – An authentic Mariachi Band
6 – Jim Kelly’s 007 style pen that shoots fire.
7 – Snakes that can’t escape a chamber with a metal iron barred door.
8 – A bad guy that looks like a gay Damon Waynes from In Living Color that Kelly gets into a fight with and saying, “Come on chump, Come on pussy…Come on muscle man…”
9 – Edited by a guy named Jim Landis (No relation to John!) – and after this movie he ended his film career.
10 – Directed by Al Adamson who made Satan’s Sadists, Dynamite Brothers, Dracula vs. Frankenstein, and Five Bloody Graves to name a few!
I loved this movie. For those who do not see the humor in bad cheesy seventies films, you will hate this flick. But if you are like me and embrace the ridiculousness of a serious film that ended up coming off extremely funny, Black Samurai is the ticket.
Here is the trailer to Black Samurai. Enjoy the mayhem!
