Bullet Points: Rage and Honor
By 1992, Cynthia Rothrock and Richard Norton were no strangers to one another having worked together in a number of movies including Magic Crystal, Lady Dragon and China O’Brien.
The Rothrock and Norton combination was a proven winner with martial arts movie fans so it is no surprise that their working relationship continued in 1992’s Rage and Honor.
- Two for One: We get our first taste of our heroes in action with concurrent scenes… Teacher/martial arts instructor Kris Fairfield (Cynthia Rothrock, China O’Brien) finds herself the target of some daring daylight muggers who surround her at a made for the movie Automated Teller Machine (ATM for those in the know). Kris shows no fear, puts the money she just withdrew on the ground like the proverbial line in the sand just daring these scumbags to try something. The scumbags try and FAIL! …Australian cop/professional bodyguard Preston Michaels (Richard Norton, Cyber Tracker) after safely getting the rock band Skab Faktory from their sound check to their limo, spots something shady going on in a nearby alley. Preston interjects himself, showing off his fighting skills and helping a woman who was being harassed by two miscreants in the process. But when the cops show up, they arrest Preston! Something smells fishy about these cops…
- The Bump In: Once he is at the police station, Preston Michaels gets a real tongue lashing from Captain Murdock (Catherine Bach, The Dukes of Hazzard). Murdock reminds Preston that he is not a police officer in this country, if he sees a crime in progress he should call it in. Preston is released… but on his way out he bumps into Kris Fairfield, who hands him a flyer for a martial arts seminar she is conducting later that evening. Preston also meets Paris Armstrong (Patrick Malone), a student of Fairfield’s who spends most of his free time following Fairfield around with a video camera in hopes of catching her in action (he missed her ATM brawl by minutes) and getting paid $1000 by the local news for his newsworthy amateur video.
- Villains: If you are going to have two strong heroes, you need a strong villain. Rage and Honor got it right by casting Brian Thompson (Lionheart) as lead villain, Conrad Drago. We are introduced to a shirtless, mulleted and classical music loving Conrad Drago and his business partner/lover Rita Carrion. The dastardly duo use Carrion Pharmaceuticals, as a front for their illegal drug trafficking. If I have one major complaint about Rage and Honor, it is that they didn’t give Conrad Drago enough to do… here you have a fantastic villain, but instead of getting his hands dirty he is more of a puppet master and his only real action comes at the end of the film.
- Lady in Red: Preston Michaels decides to attend the seminar and he is there with several members of the LAPD, including Talbot and Rascoe, the two cops that arrested Preston and two guys Preston is suspicious of. After a fun exchange between Kris and Preston where they play a little game of one upsmanship in front of the class, Preston notices that Talbot and Rascoe have excused themselves from the seminar. Preston decides to follow them to see what they are up to, and Paris and his video camera decide to follow Preston in hopes of getting that $1000 prize. Both Preston and Paris would get an eyeful… Talbot and Rascoe are dealing drugs out of the trunk of their car… Preston, forgetting once again what Captain Murdock told him, decides to call the dirty cops out on their dirty deeds. That’s about the time Drago’s main squeeze Rita Carrion shows up and interrupts the proceedings… Rita berates Rascoe for his ineptness and Rascoe slaps her… and that ends up being the last thing Rascoe does, because Rita point blank shoots Rascoe in the head and she has her other dirty cop Talbot ready to arrest Preston for the cop kill… but then they all realize that Paris was up on the roof the taping the entire thing!
- Chaos Ensues: Now the shit has really hit the fan… Talbot goes after Paris so he can get the tape… but before Talbot can reach him, Paris manages to slip the tape to a homeless guy named Baby. When Talbot finally catches up with Paris and doesn’t find the tape, Talbot beats the crap out of Paris. By the time Preston finds Paris, he is near death and has to be rushed to the hospital. While Preston is at the hospital with Paris, he soon finds out he is now a marked man by both the bad guys and the cops… the police even put out an all points bulletin (that’s APB for those in the know) featuring one of the worst pictures in the history of all points bulletins.
- Tag Team: At this point, Preston manages to make his way to Kris’ apartment. Preston fills Kris in on what has happened to Paris and about the tape and the dirty cops. They both realize they need to find the tape before the bad guys do and that teaming up is the best option… and they’ll need each other’s help because in addition to having no idea where the tape is, having to navigate the seedy underbelly of Los Angeles, having the cops are after Preston, they also have to deal with everyone that Drago throws at them. This included the third person talking Hannah the Hun, the leader of a gang of Amazonian types who are looking to take out our heroes and collect a handsome bounty.
Rage and Honor featured a lot of things you’d expect from a movie like this… like the rocky start to Kris and Preston’s relationship, that would eventually see them share dark moments from their pasts and become a formidable team and of course finally getting to see Kris and Preston tangle with Drago in the movie’s finale.
But Rage and Honor also threw in a big and unexpected twist that gave the movie a much needed boost and saved Rage and Honor from being one of the more forgettable Rothrock/Norton team ups.
No unexpected twist here, let’s wrap this review up with some Bonus Bullet Points…
- One Question: Is it too much to ask that the photographs used on a movie’s DVD release are actual photographs from the movie? Check out the DVD cover above… yes, Cynthia Rothrock is in the movie, but that is not how she looked in Rage and Honor. This reeks of laziness.
- If You Ever: …wanted to hear Cynthia Rothrock’s valley girl impersonation, then Rage and Honor is the movie for you.
- Familiar Face: I immediately recognized Rita Carrion’s henchman Chan Lu (played by Toshishiro Obata) from his work in Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
- The Sequel: Cynthia Rothrock and Richard Norton would reprise their roles for 1993’s Rage and Honor II.
