Street Warrior (2008)

Sick Product of a Sick System

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

STREET WARRIOR is one of many TV action films getting buried in the heaps of similar flicks that have sat around movie store shelves before heading towards the bargain bin. With a story that's not very inventive and fight scenes that were mediocre even at the time of its release, this is a watchable but totally overlookable addition to an already cluttered subgenre that will only truly interest fans of particular performers.The story: Discharged war veteran Jack Campbell (Max Martini) returns home to find his brother comatose after being drawn into an underground fight club controlled by a wealthy sadist (Nick Chinlund). Seeking revenge, he finds himself trapped in "the Gauntlet" as well when a family member is taken captive.The movie's biggest asset is its strong cast: though these roles could just as easily have been played by lesser-known performers, the effort put forth by Martini, Chinlund, sidekick Max Pehrlich, love interest Valerie Cruz, and a couple others is noticeable and keeps the movie watchable in lieu of a more compelling story or interesting fights.As tends to be the case with low budget action pictures, the problem with these fights is how they're shot and edited. The camera-work could be worse, but it still stays too close to the performers most of the time, making a lot of the action tough to follow. Further hindering the cohesiveness of the brawls is how clunkily shots are shoved together, oftentimes with considerable gaps in the action. Max Martini does a decent job at playing a fighter, and the martial cast is a decent mix of better- and lesser-known film fighters (including a surprisingly large Sidney Liufau as the champion), but their physical prowess can't save these mostly-bad thirteen matches.Chances are you reached this film's page because you're an action fan to begin with, and if this is the case, let me assure you that you've probably seen this movie many times before with different covers and a slightly tweaked storyline. Unless you're building a collection of underground fight flicks, this one's not worth the prices of purchase. There's just nothing new here.

Jack Campbell (Martini) is a soldier who gets a dishonorable discharge for beating up his commanding officer. He goes back to his old stomping grounds and finds out his brother has been severely beaten by a steroid-enhanced punchfighter named Isaiah. So he infiltrates the underground fighting circuit called "The Gauntlet" in order to get answers. So after meeting a bunch of crazy characters, the evil fight promoter Pope (Chinlund) kidnaps Jack's brother's pregnant wife so Jack will keep fighting in the tournaments. Does this plot seem familiar? The meatheads that Jack must fight include: Jersey Devil, Farm Boy, Zeke, Isaiah, and the Nazi Baldus, who, when he wins a fight does the Nazi salute AND the goose-step. The fights in the film are haphazardly edited with a bunch of quick cutting.Chinlund as Pope looks like a cross between Barry Williams, Ray Liotta, David Hasselhoff and Ryan Seacrest. He puts in an over the top performance, screaming all his lines, including the oft-repeated "LET'S SEE... SOME BLOOD!" Max Martini mumbles all his lines and the DVD has no closed-captioning to help you out. In the obligatory bar fight scene, he beats someone up with an 8-ball from a pool table and proclaims "8 ball in the corner pocket". Another understandable line: "I'm okay with trouble".It seems "Street Warrior" was made in the wrong decade. It should have been made in the late 80's/early 90's when direct-to-video punchfighting movies were king. It's good that this one comes so late in the game, but it is unclear whether we are to take it seriously or not. One minute it is serious, and the next, there are some ridiculous moments, characters and one-liners. In old-school punchfighters, you can actually see the punching. Here, there is incomprehensible, ADD-addled editing which hinders the final product."Street Warrior" is an enjoyable-enough latter-day punchfighter, but, but despite its many flaws, we are happy that they are still cranking out movies of this subgenre. We should be grateful.

Street Warrior was super kick butt. What I hate about most reviews on IMDb are knuckle heads that spew bile on low budget movies. I tried to watch huge budget WANTED and was bored in 2 minutes. A video game is not a movie. I have much love for movies like Street Warrior that entertain without trying to be overly artistic. This movie has a strong dose of action you can main line. Camera work was amazingly sick. It was like 3D when punches came at the tele. I very much felt like this was a Seagal or Norris movie movie. Fight parts were incredible. I can only hope other more open minded movie watchers give this a chance. I would watch this any day over WANTED.

I saw this movie only just a few minutes again and wow I was definitely impressed with the portray that Max Martini put out as his character Jack Campbell, He still played the role as well as he did when he was in The Unit as Mack. He was always well at putting out a character who was a 'Hero' but yet he was still able to pack a punch so to speak. Jack Campbell was that man, He was the 'Hero' but didn't consider himself one. Also Nick Chinlund portrayed a villain amazingly well, especially when it got a certain scene of him fighting. This movie reminded me slightly of Jet Li in Unleashed, He had to fight for his Life also but he broke free as did one of the men in this although I wont reveal that because its a slight spoiler. All you need to know is that this Movie is definitely worth-watching if you enjoy a blood-sport related movie, Two men, One arena, One survivor. Hope you enjoy it!