Dragon Fire

Bloodfist in Spaaaaaace! Well, it's Bloodfist in the future. Or it could be Bloodsport. With a hero from space. It's set on Earth, mostly. Or in some warehouses that are supposed to be a futuristic cyberpunk kind of Earth, but tend to look like places that were abandoned the night after a rave. Don't worry, it's more stupid-looking than confusing.
 
Dragon Fire features a guy named Laker Powers (Dominick LaBanca) as the protagonist. He looks nearly as goofy as his name, and wouldn't have been out of place as the token "tough guy" in a boy band. He's a pretty lousy actor, but he's not an entirely wretched  fighter. He comes to Earth to visit his gladiator brother but finds that his brother has been murdered. What's a tough guy to do? Enter a pit fighting tournament and kick ass, obviously! Along the way he'll make an incredibly upbeat stupid goofy friend (and sleep with his stripper sister), see numerous women in various states of undress, get punched and kicked a lot, and experience the most obvious plot twist possible!

There's not really a whole lot more to the plot than that. Anyone who's seen more than two martial arts movies will probably have seen the plot of this one before. Will the goofy sidekick take a serious beating so that our hero can avenge him? Will our hero get the girl? Will Bolo Yeung Billy Blank's brother (Michael Blanks) be the final contender in the Kumite Junkfight? Who is the mysterious villain? If you haven't guessed how the whole film is going to play out almost from the beginning you probably haven't watched a lot of movies. If you're watching Dragon Fire for the plot or dialog you're going to be pretty miserable anyway.

There's not much reason to watch Dragon Fire other than the fights, so let's get to the heart of the matter. This is an early 90s US martial arts flick. The fights as a whole aren't spectacular, but they are on par with most of the Bloodfist films (which Dragon Fire really does resemble), and better in some cases. There are quite a few of them too, so people who like that sort of film will find something to enjoy here.

Anyone who's familiar with the Bloodfist series will recognize the 90s trend of prominently displaying karate and kickboxing champions in the opening credits, as the filmmakers let the viewer know that instead of actors you're in for serious fighters getting down to some serious fighting. I find it fortunate that at some point someone realized that being good at fighting in the ring didn't necessarily translate well to looking good at fighting on the screen. I didn't bother to research any of the fighters involved in this film to see if they were really any good at fighting back in the 80s/90s; the quality of the movie doesn't really warrant following up on anyone's career.

Only recommended for die-hard fans of 90s US martial arts action.