One-Percent Warrior

[Drunk Monk]

One-Percent Warrior

The lead of this is Tak Sakaguchi, a longtime stunt person and action star, best remembered for Versus. He's been in a bunch of stuff over the last almost quarter century but he's never really stood out until this.

Here he plays an aging action star who is into method acting. He's a student of 'assassin-jitsu' and developed his own style called 'the wave'. He wants to do a real action film where it's live fighting, not choreographed, but he's getting dumb wire-work roles that he detests because it's not authentic martial arts. The real masters - the top one-percent - are what it's all about for him. Turns out he is a very talented fighter who can dodge bullets. He ends up on a island where an abandoned zinc factory is to be the backdrop of his dream project indie film. But the yakuza is there too, hunting for a stash of cocaine. Let the sanguineousity rain...

The fight choreo is great. There's lots of clever exchanges with feints and complexity, lots of bone breaks including some clever monkey wrench fighting and and some blinding flashlight fights. It's thoughtfully brutal, and I caught myself snickering like I do when there's a new bit of ultravi satisfaction.

There's also an amazing drone shot - a oner that weaves through the complex zinc factory as the yakuza hunt Tai down. There's a one-legged psycho yakuza boss daughter that's particularly villainous. There's some clowns (Tak's film crew) for some good clown fights against the top yakuza hitman named Sensei. That final fight is solid work. There's also a decent twist reveal near the end but I won't spoil it. 

But it's really all about the fights. This is fight porn. Total gratuitous fight porn. 

D00M recommended. 

Seen on Hoopla.