Originally released on the HBO network, Fortress is an Australian film starring Rachel Ward as Sally Jones, an elementary school-teacher. Cornball (and vaguely homoerotic) training montages, bizarre slapstick, inept dialogue: No Retreat, No Surrender is bonehead cinema at its finest. Both are more easily described as straightforward ‘action’ pictures, but neither comes close to matching the harebrained original. Released in the summer of 1986, No Retreat was a modest hit and spawned two sequels. More than anything, though, it’s hilarious.
Furthermore, the fight scenes are fairly well-choreographed and Cory Yuen knew how to keep things moving his film is brisk, lively, and fun. As far as so-bad-it’s-good goes, this is top shelf material. No Retreat, No Surrender provides more genuine laughs than most intentional comedies.
Standing in Jason’s way are an overweight neighborhood bully (Kent Lipham, easily the film’s best performance), cocky rival martial artist Dean Ramsay, and an organized crime syndicate seeking to control all dojos in the country. He’s aided by his pal RJ, a breakdancin’, rappin’ cliche straight outta 1987, and the actual ghost of Bruce Lee (who, weirdly, is kind of a jerk). The (wildly derivative) plot involves Jason Stillwell, a teenaged Bruce Lee fanatic who desperately wants to win a local Kickboxing tournament. That’s the kind of film we’re dealing with. We then cut to a shot of their car passing a roadside sign, ‘Welcome to Seattle’, and next a shot of the world-famous Space Needle, accompanied by a title card reading, ‘SEATTLE’. Example: the main characters discuss an upcoming move to Seattle. Upon viewing the finished film, none of this comes as a surprise.Īs entertaining as No Retreat is – and trust me, it’s an absolute blast – it’s very poorly made. It also marked the on-screen debut of Jean Claude Van Damme, and practically everybody else in its cast. The writer, an American named Keith Strandberg, had never before written a screenplay (by his own account, he hadn’t even read one). It was the debut stateside effort from Hong Kong actor/director Cory Yuen. No Retreat, No Surrender was a ‘first’ for many involved in its creation. The final shot will stay with you forever. Movies in this particular genre don’t get much better. Unquestionably the finest feature ever released by Cannon, it’s one of the best action films ever made. It suffers from a few minuscule flaws (Rebecca DeMornay’s character is 100% disposable), but they don’t keep Runaway Train from being a towering classic of cinema.
Runaway Train is a class act, across the board. No CGI, real metal and steam, real locations, a legitimate heap of hulking metal barreling towards the camera you can practically feel the heat from the diesel engine. The action scenes, unbearably tense and impeccably crafted, are as riveting as those in any other film. Runaway Train didn’t short its characters in favor of non-stop excitement, but its careful to deliver both. Voight and Roberts (both of whom received Oscar nominations for their work here) create two extremely compelling characters, and their dialogue is wonderful.
By comparison, Buck is youthful, excitable, talkative, possibly holds some glimmer of hope in his future: he’s Manny’s polar opposite. Manny is a hardened, ruthless bank robber, respected by his fellow criminals and destined for grand failure. What truly sets Runaway Train apart from other 80’s action films (particularly those from Cannon Group) is a strong emphasis on story and character. Ryan) who is dead set on recapturing his two escaped prisoners. The film hops between Manny and Buck on the increasingly dangerous train (eventually joined by a stowaway railroad worker played by Rebecca DeMornay), transit authorities frantically trying to stop the out-of-control machine, and an angry warden (John P. Moments after the locomotive begins its journey, the conductor suffers a heart-attack and the train furiously plows ahead, overriding the automatic stop mechanism and gradually picking up speed. The script (co-written by Djordje Milicevic, Paul Zindel, and ex-con Edward Bunker) was based on an original screenplay by Akira Kurosawa, and the directorial reins were taken by Andrei Konchalovsky, a distinguished Russian filmmaker who had frequently collaborated with the great Andrei Tarkovsky.Ī riveting mixture of American blockbuster action and intimate art-house sensibilities, Runaway Train tells the story of Manny (Jon Voight) and Buck (Eric Roberts), two incompatible prison escapees in Alaska who board a four-car train, destination unknown, stowing themselves away in a rear compartment. Runaway Train flaunts quite the pedigree.