Film

No Retreat, No Surrender (1985)

Director: Corey Yuen

Movie review

From Time Out Film Guide

McKinney, a Bruce Lee freak, is disappointed when his karate instructor dad opts out of a confrontation with some dumb heavies and moves the family to Seattle. There McKinney chums up with break dancer RJ (Fails), who shows him the town's most famous slab of marble, covering the grave of the late Bruce Lee; and as the new boy in town, he becomes a choice victim for the bully boys who frequent the hamburger bars. Drawing upon the spirit and skills of his deceased mentor to quell the local populace, he also gets even with the bad guys who chop-sueyed his father. No Retreat, No Surrender borrows heavily from the likes of The Last Dragon, Karate Kid and even Rocky IV, but makes them look like masterpieces by comparison. Some fancy dan karate and a good cameo performance from Van Damme as a Russian heavy might have made an enthralling ten-minute video; otherwise it's just more proof that the real thing died with Bruce Lee in 1973, even though the corpse keeps twitching.

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