Starring: Mark Dacascos {Louis Stevens}, Stacey Travis {Dianna}, Geoffrey Lewis {Mr. Kerrigan}, Paco Christian Prieto {Silverio}, and Richard Coca {Orlando Aliveres}.
Year of Release: 1993.
Gene: Action/Adventure, Drama, Martial Arts.
Plot: When Louis Stevens, a Special Forces officer, returns from his time in the army training death squads on an island in the Caribbean, he pays a visit to his former high school in Miami and learns from his old teacher, Mr. Kerrigan that things aren't going so smoothly. A local gang runs the neighborhood and most of the students have a slim to none chance of graduating due to various reasons, which include family problems, drug usage, violence and a lack of interest in their studies. During his visit at the school, Louis gets the students' attention which the teachers have all tried and failed to do, and he makes a favorable impression on everyone there. Suddenly reanimated with the force of his new plan, Louis' former teacher talks the school principal into letting Louis teach some of the students how to defend themselves using Capoeira, a Brazilian musical form of Kung Fu in which Louis is efficient. They reluctantly agree and send Louis the twelve toughest and worst students in the school.
Undaunted, Louis begins instructing them and slowly, the people around them notice a significant change for the better in the students. One teenager, however, turns out to be more of a challenge for Louis and when he tries to get Orlando to come back to his class, he unintentionally confronts the youth's cousin, Silverio, who runs the local, troublemaking gang. At first, things seem fairly peaceful, but when Louis starts counseling Orlando to make his own decisions and not give in to his cousin's orders, trouble begins to brew and the school is ruthlessly vandalized and set on fire by Silverio and his gang members. Knowing that he is the cause of the tragic fire, Louis gets out his fatigues and takes the fight to the villains and battles them on their own turf for control of the neighborhood.
Likes/Dislikes: The villain, of course, has a foul mouth but since this is an older movie, the language isn't quite as bad as the modern stuff Hollywood is turning out. For instance, there is no F-word snuck in anywhere. This being a movie about fighting, there is some blood and Louis does get knocked around a bit but there is nothing graphic shown. There is one short kiss between Louis and the main girl but nothing beyond that and the best part of the movie is that there are no bikini clad females wandering around anywhere, even though it takes place in Miami! All in all, this is one of the best films of this category that I've seen in awhile and I certainly recommend it.
Rating: PG-13 and up, mainly for the fighting content. Wouldn't want to give any already energetic six year olds any bad ideas, now would we? I don't know what the original rating is.
Date Report Written: March 23, 2011.
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