During the early 90s i watched a lot of martial arts action movies at my local VHS rental store Videomix. It didn't matter if it was Jean-Claude Van Damme, Brandon Lee, Chuck Norris, Jackie Chan or other action stars such as Don "The Dragon" Wilson, Billy Blanks, Jet Li, as long as I got to see lots of kicks and gun battles i was pleased. Who cared about the plot of each film? It was the action scenes that really mattered where the fighting scenes made the biggest impact. Martial arts action movies during this period of the 90s was very popular on VHS. If we were lucky you would get to see at least 6 different new martial arts movies coming out in one single month, where most of them were low budget martial art films from Cannon Group, PM Entertainment or at some occasions a bigger studio like Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer would finance the film such as Death Warrant with Jean-Claude Van Damme. During the 90´s i bought VHS movies from England and one of the films i remember buying was the 1992 martial arts action film Rage And Honor. Directed by Terence H. Winkelness ( director of the 1987 classic boddy horror film The Nest ), this was my first introduction to martial arts action star Cyntha Rothrock. I had seen her name before on VHS covers but i was not familiar with her work. She turned out to be really cool as she does her own fighting scenes. She is not the lead actor of this film, that is martial art action star Richard Norton as the character Preston. Either way i just remember enjoying this film for being a pretty traditional cop action film. One advice, see the funny performance by actor Stephen Davies as the homeless Baby. He is completely hyped up and talks constantly. I did see some other films with Cynthia on VHS such as China O´Brien, Tiger Claws and Lady Dragon. Cynthia Rothrock never stopped making films and not that long ago she released her film Black Creek, that she was able to make thanks to fans of martial arts cinema through an Indiegogo campaign. You can still get a physical copy of this film on this page, if you would like to show your support. I got myself a physical copy to review this film and being a fan of martial art films in general. Is the western film Black Creek a must watch or is this unfortunately not as good as we were hoping it would be?
Rose Jennings ( Cynthia Rothrock ) return to her brother´s home where she finds out he have been brutally killed by the evil leader Damien Sinclair ( Richard Norton ) running a gang of outlaws. In the town of Black Creek it becomes clear that they don´t like Rose visiting, she is too nosy on what Damien and his men are doing across town. She swear to revenge her brother´s death as she gets help from her new friend Xiyang ( Don "The Dragon" Wilson ).
Ever since the idea of Black Creek came out on social media i was looking forward to this film. Seeing several martial arts action stars united together in a western action film did look good on paper. So, does this film manage to pull this concept through? For the most part i would say yes, i have some smaller issues with Black Creek but let´s get into the good. Actress Cynthia Rothrock knows exactly how to deliver martial arts entertainment, even if shes over 60 years old she can still punch and kick ass, i wouldn´t mess with her in a desert bar. Cynthia deliver a solid performance as her character Rose and i like the fact that she does not try and make her character too rough. There is a good side within Rose and you get a sense of that. I also like the cotume design on Rose, it seems that they knew exactly what clothes she could use to do her martial arts scenes and still keep the western influences look authentic. Now, there are especially two other characters in this film that definetely deserve to be talked about so let´s begin with the character Damien ( played by legendary martia arts actor Richard Norton ). Damien is the perfect evil leader of a film such as this and Richard Norton really prove himself that he knows how to potrait this character. The next character i have to mention is the character known as Xiyan ( played by legendary martial arts champion, and actor Don "The Dragon" Wilson ). This could perhaps be the best acting performance i have ever seen from Don Wilson, he should really do more western films in the future. His scenes with Cynthia Rothrock are the best acting scenes in this entire film, they have a very special screen presence together. The fighting scenes in general look as good as i was hoping for, they are well made and you can tell they don't cut down on the violence. The negative note on this film is the length, there are some very long dialogue scenes and they are not terrible, they just go on a little bit too long. Otherwise i think this is a good looking western film and the combination of martial arts match well with the story. To see legendary martial arts actor Richard Norton in a final fighting scene together with Cynthia before he passed away is beautiful, and Black Creek becomes a tribute to both martial arts and the western genre. Directors Shannon Lanier and Mike Möller have made one of the better martial art films this year, you should definetely check out Black Creek this upcoming Christmas.
Rating: DDD
