Canadian Hookers and Kung-Fu in Harlem
By Rich Bruso
January, 2005
You know, before last week I had never heard Alvin, Simon, and Theodore perform Gregorian chant. It's not nearly as soothing as you'd think, and probably wasn't the best choice to enhance the mood of a satanic mass.
This scene was the finale of The Hooker Cult Murders, which I originally intended as this month's review. And there were hookers, but those scenes weren't nearly as interesting as they should have been. The same goes for the cult scenes, as well as the murder scenes, most of which were filmed in flashback. And the filler scenes weren't anything to write home about either, so I won't.
Instead I'll offer up a movie that doesn't have any hookers, but does talk about murder and has a vaguely cult-like group, the followers of Sho’Nuff, the Shogun of Harlem. I bet you didn't know Harlem even HAD a Shogun, eh? Well, it does, as well as a martial arts dojo overseen by a guy called Bruce Leroy, a dance club run by Vanity (of Prince and the Revolution fame), a Chinese fortune cookie factory, several bad videos by El DeBarge, and a vaguely Lex Luthor-type character intent on taking over Harlem's lucrative music video scene.
The movie is, of course, Berry Gordon's immortal The Last Dragon, and combines Kung-Fu, break dancing, William H. Macy, former Prince backup singers, and music videos with a soundtrack of, well, El DeBarge. I think this was supposed to be a vehicle to get his career off the ground. Too bad the vehicle was a Yugo.
The movie was also actively rejected by my VCR. I've never seen anything quite like it. It would be playing fine, right up until a particularly cheesy scene, when the VCR would shut itself off. Yes, completely off. I can only assume it felt so much shame that it decided suicide was the only option. Fortunately, when your VCR pulls its own plug, you can always plug it in again.
Anyway, back to Sho’Nuff, the aforementioned Shogun, and the baddest of the bad in the fierce Harlem martial arts scene. He's so bad, nobody even comments on his progression of larger and larger shoulder pads, culminating in a set of football-style pads near the movie's end.
There's only one thorn in his side, the pacifist Bruce Leroy Green, master of a local dojo, who, in turn, is the student of a master more full of, ahem, fertilizer than a diaper pail. As an example, the master sends Leroy off on a mystic quest for a nonexistent guy armed with nothing more than a golden belt buckle. Yeah, he's a serious master.
Fortunately the belt buckle attracts Vanity (the singer, not the sin), which drags Leroy into the seedy video game/music video scene, currently under attack by the megalomaniacal Eddie. Trust me, this doesn't make any more sense even if you do see the movie.
For ultra mega cheese, look no further than Leroy’s little brother. Captured by the bad guys, he is left tied up from head to toe in a stout looking rope. There is only one way to escape such a predicament in a Berry Gordon movie: The Robot. Yes, the classically overused break dancing move most recently seen in a Geico commercial. Way to go, cheesemongers!
So, a gunfight, a piranha attack, a kidnapping, and several bad break dancing sessions later, Leroy finds himself trapped, unable to avoid fighting Mr. Nuff. Halfway through the battle, Sho's fingers begin to glow red, leaving sparkly trails through the air and draining the special effects budget at an alarming rate. Bruce Leroy counters by repeatedly slamming his face and stomach into Mr. Nuff's fists, which isn't a sanctioned fighting style.
As punishment, he is dunked into a convenient tub full of special flashback water, allowing him to realize, in traditional movie cheese style, that he has become the master. As anyone familiar with Dragonball-Z could tell you, this realization allows him to begin glowing yellow. No, I'm not kidding.
So, final battle, good beats evil, blah, blah, blah. With Sho’Nuff defeated, Leroy is triumphant, until Eddie (yeah, the video game guy) pulls a gun and, aiming it at Leroy's head, asks, "Can you dodge a bullet". At this point, several things happen simultaneously: Eddie pulls the trigger, Vanity looks scared, Leroy prepares himself, my VCR shuts off in self defense, and I utter a naughty word.
Yes, once again, the VCR refused to play, this time choosing death over the absurdly cheesy "catching the bullet in your teeth" scene. After some cajoling, I convince the poor machine to continue, but all that is left is the end credits and more music by El DeBarge, which just isn’t worth the effort.
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