Lady Dragon – 1992

Lady Dragon is an action movie from 1992 starring Martial Artist Cynthia Rothrock. She might not be the best actor ever even during her 80-90 films when she was kind of a C action star. She was doing the same character over and over again. There was either a woman caught in the underground fighting scene or a cop infiltrating one. I’m exaggerating of course, but if you boil it down to the essentials, that’s essentially the facts. But she did way better than when I last saw her, in the more recent The Last Kumite, where she was horrible.

During her heyday

But Lady Dragon is a movie made during her heyday so she has a little more to work with here. She has the lead part and in the Last Kumite, she did a very small part, maybe because she once was a name in the martial arts film industry. I enjoy her fighting style and her kicks. She’s very agile. You can tell it already from the teaser fight. Which she, of course, wins.

Robert Ginty

We’re also already introduced to Gibson, portrayed by Robert Ginty in this teaser. I guess he’s mostly known for the cult classic The Exterminator where he seeks revenge for the people who killed his best friend. I have seen him in other movies as well, but the titles slip my mind right now. At some point, I know he did an obscure occult horror movie titled The Alchemist and I remember seeing him at the end of a ninja movie, just before the end fight between the antagonist and the protagonist. Being on the bad guy’s side.

Apart from them, I see many familiar faces but I’m pretty bad at connecting the dots between faces and names. They’re not major stars anyway, such actors don’t associate themselves with movies like Lady Dragon. The storyline is very simple. On her wedding day, Cynthia Rothock’s character’s husband gets shot. It’s a hit connected to this local gangster. Who, by the way, seems to be a very sadistic dude who beats up women and rapes them for fun. At the first encounter she fails and is critically injured. This leads us to the next part which is kind of mandatory for this kind of martial arts revenge movie. At least it’s a formula seen in other movies.

The Old Master

She ends up being rescued by an old master where she recovers. He teaches her a lot of that Eastern mystic stuff that’s always there. That the soul and the body are connected and that impossible to heal one part without the other. That kind of stuff. He also has very odd methods of making her strong and being able to fight again. You all know what I’m talking about. You don’t have to look further than Kickboxer or for that matter the extremely charming ripoff King of the Kickboxers from 1990. But you don’t really have to go any farther than Karate Kid with its wax on and wax off.

About halfway through I come to the conclusion that Cynthia Rothrock is not the worst actor in the movie. Not by far. Some are really horrible. Compared to them Cynthia is a brilliant Academy awarded actress. I really like her signature kick as well. She uses it in many movies but I have never seen anyone else pull it off. She’s capable of kicking above her head. That is if she’s held from behind with both arms around her. She can still make a forward kick that hits the opponent in the head. It’s a very impressive kick.

Charming

I think Lady Dragon is a very charming movie and I’ll be watching Lady Dragon 2 shortly. I like the cheap settings and the mediocre acting. It gives it some charm. I guess it’s her presence and the very simple plot that does the trick. There are some really bad stunt scenes, where it’s obvious that Cynthia is not involved but the fighting scenes are good and believable. I realize that it’s not full contact of course. If it were, all involved would be dead after all those kicks to the head.

But I’m curious about one thing. Lady Dragon is supposedly set in Indonesia, yet there is a Volvo in almost every shot where there’s a car. Are Volvos’ really that common in Indonesia? Maybe they are, but I later realized that even the cops drive Volvos. A smaller variant, I don’t know the exact model. As a Swede it doesn’t seem so realistic, but what do I know? I’ve never been to Indonesia nor am I planning to go there any time soon. But to be honest there are other cars as well. A Mercedes at least.