Pushed to the Limit (1992)
Magnificent Mimi is a woman with a destiny and a bright future ahead of her. She is the world's greatest female wrestling champion, she has a loving boyfriend and loyal family members who care and love her. But things take a turn for the worst when Mimi's boyfriend Nick is wounded and her younger brother is shot to death for trying to stiff local druglord Harry Lee. Lee is the toughest and meanest criminal figure in all of Southern California and if you double-cross him, you won't live to see the sun set. Not only does Lee rule his own empire, he also runs the Kumite, a gladitorial fight ring where warriors battle to the death. Mimi knows the police can't touch Lee with a ten foot pole and so she enlists the aid of her martial arts friend Master Vern to teach her kickboxing and tai chi so she can prepare for combat. Vern doesn't think Mimi is ready for Kumite, as it is a place where only one warrior can be left standing and breathing and the one who loses dies.
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Instead, you get a movie that's enjoyable enough, but leaves you feeling like it could have been much, much more.
At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.
The first must-see film of the year.
I didn’t really have many expectations going into the movie (good or bad), but I actually really enjoyed it. I really liked the characters and the banter between them.
The movie is pointless, and I'm not very clear, who and why wanted to shoot this thing anyway. It looks like, somebody decided, Mimi Lesseous is good actress, and decided to do a movie about it. Well, it didn't work out. The only interesting (in a way) thing in this movie is method of female villain, Mimi opposing. She flips already knock outed guys (girls in this case)takes their arms and legs and crashes their spine. Sadistic method, must I say. I'm not sure you'll going to watch movie just for that, so you can skip to fighting (which is not taking too much of time) and forget the rest. Good luck next time, if there will be any.
Mimi Lesseos plays a wrestler (now that's an acting stretch!) who enters an illegal kickboxing tournament to get revenge on the man who organizes it - the man who is also responsible for the killing of her brother and the wounding of her boyfriend. Conceived perhaps as a female version of Van Damme's "Kickboxer", "Pushed to the Limit" fails to deliver. The dramatic parts are insufferably slow and stilted, and although Mimi is a talented fighter, particularly when she applies wrestling / grappling moves, her talents are often obscured by the editing or by the simple fact that the camera focuses on other things instead of the fighting. For a movie centered around a fighting tournament, there is a surprising lack of long, continuous fight scenes here. If you feel like you need to see every Mimi Lesseos film then go ahead, but if you just want to see one, try "Beyond Fear" instead. (*1/2)