Skunkyrate Gripping story with well-crafted characters

SpecialsTarget Disturbing yet enthralling

Dorathen Better Late Then Never

Brenda 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

westside-surfer I love cheesy 80s action cinema. But even with my heavy bias, this movie sucked. First off, there isn't a single charismatic character. Brandon Lee lacks anything remotely qualifying as a personality as he dully recites badly written lines. His partner, a father-figure cop who fails to convince anybody of that, spends the entire movie telling cliché' "you can do it" lines. And the two main bad guys are boring as stale turds.They could have saved this movie by cranking up the bad acting--it's worked for countless actors who can't act: Van Damme, Schwarzenegger, Lundgren, etc. But the audience can forgive their lack of Oscar winning performances if they are at the very least memorable. After the credits roll, everyone in Rapid Fire is rapidly forgotten.According to IMDb, John Woo was Brandon's first choice for director. It's truly sad that a potentially awesome movie was butchered into mediocrity by an incompetent director.The fight scenes and shot outs are fairly decent. Don't expect any spectacular stunts or awesomely choreographed battles. Some of the fights were outright disappointing considering they play up Brandon as a martial arts bad ass. The gun play is enjoyable at best.The story was total garbage and Brandon couldn't pull off a single convincing emotion or joke. The dude was a mannequin with six-pack abs. And don't get me started on that godawful love story they tried to shove up our asses at the last second (face palm). With so many awesome 80s movies to watch, take my advice: Look elsewhere.

Nick7080 I watched this film after several people recommended it to me, and i must say, i enjoyed it quite a lot. Action scenes are very good, specially fight scenes. Brandon Lee is not only good fighter, but good actor as well. His roles in Rapid Fire and The Crow are his best and my personal favorites when it comes to his movies, even if there is only few of them. I wasn't fan of his acting in movies such as Showdown In Little Tokyo, but i would't call him a bad actor and still he had good sense of humor in that movie. I'm sure that he would be even better if he didn't die, which is quite sad cause he really did have potential. After watching workprints of The Crow, i could see that there were few takes of his scenes that were originally quite bad acting wise, but watching the movie again it's obvious that he was just getting started at this point of his career and that he would be better as long as he had good directors to give him some advices. As for his role in Rapid Fire,instead of being one of those unstoppable heroes that his father often portrayed in his movies, Brandon's character Jake Lo is normal human who is put into dangerous situations and has to use all of his skills to survive. By the end of the movie he really is pretty beat up and tired after all that he's been through, which is not something that you normally see happening with heroes of some average action movies. Powers Boothe and Kate Hodge were also good, but at the same time not usual cliché cop characters. Soundtrack is solid as a rock, Hardline songs really fit the film and they are used in right scenes. Score works in action scenes, specially in fight scene between Brandon and Al Leong. Script and story might be cliché, but it's nothing worth of ranting. In the end,very good action movie, and with Halloween 4 and Marked For Death one of my fave movies from director Dwight H. Little, and i think that it should have some better DVD/Blu-Ray release cause it has it's fans, and there is enough interesting behind the scenes stuff and deleted footage that should be included.

Paul Andrews Rapid Fire starts in Los Angeles where Chinese student Jake Lo (Brandon Lee) is invited to a fun raising party in aid of helping those in his own country, while at the party a drug trafficker named Carl Chang (Michael Paul Chan) is murdered by Californian drug lord & mobster Antonio Serrano (Nick Mancuso) which Jake is witness to. Jake manages to survive Serrano's attempts to kill him at the party & is placed in protective custody as the only living eye-witness, various Government agencies have been after Serrano for years & it is felt that Jake's testimony could put him away for life but after being handed over to the FED's in Chicago another attempt on his life is made but again using his wits & martial art skills Jake manages to survive. Unable to trust anyone & with nowhere to go a cop named Mace Ryan (Powers Boothe) manages to convince Jake to trust him. Ryan has been after Serrano for ten years & sees Jake as the key to nailing him & together they team up to being Serrano down & those who grow & supply the heroin...Directed by Dwight H. Little this incredibly formulaic action thriller is perhaps most notable for featuring Brandon Lee the ill fated son of martial arts legend Bruce Lee in his final completed film as he would be accidentally killed while shooting his next film The Crow (1993), to be honest Rapid Fire is completely unremarkable in every aspect & while it's not terrible it's pretty forgettable & far from special. Rapid Fire just feels like it has been thrown together using every action thriller cliché going, the fish out of water hero, betrayal, one good honest cop willing to do what's right while those around him are corrupt, an American mobster, drug deals gone bad, Chinese gangsters & lots of men in grey suits who walk around trying to look tough. The whole script feels like it has been cobbled together trying to use just about every action thriller cliché & stereotype that it all became a bit of a blur & it was all too familiar. On it's own the familiarity wouldn't have been so bad if the action made up for it but even this is routine & predictable. The dialogue is pretty bland, the bland character's do little to life Rapid Fire above average either, there are many better action films out there with even the generic sounding title Rapid Fire not inspiring much interest. The script does try to inject a little human tragedy & give it's main character a little bit of background as the massacre in Tienanmen Square is featured but this angle is quickly dropped as is Lee's quest to find out the truth about his dead father.I suppose the biggest disappointment with Rapid Fire was that the action scenes are so dull, virtually every one is not much more than people shooting at each other & no-one seems able to hit Brandon Lee obviously even though they are a few feet away. When Brandon Lee does get to show off his martial art skills the film livens up a bit but they aren't used enough & over too quickly. There's not much other action, a car blow's up, a truck overturns & there's a fire at the end but not much else. The best sequence is at the end as Brandon Lee fights the Chinese drug lord on train tracks which leads to an obvious death for the bad guy but it's as good as the film gets really. The film looks alright but has no great visual style or substance.With a supposed budget of about $10,000,000 this has decent production values but even back then that wasn't a lot of money for a big action flick. The acting is alright, Brandon Lee is watchable enough while Powers Boothe doesn't seem that interested.Rapid Fire is as routine & forgettable a 90's action thriller as there is, Rapid Fire is the type of film that you think you have seen before & you definitely have except with different actor's as there really isn't an original moment in the entire 95 minute duration.

chrichtonsworld "Rapid Fire" is without a doubt Brandon Lee's best movie. I know that if he were alive now he would have exceeded this with ease and improved himself as an actor! He was on his way to stardom, I am sure of that. In "Showdown in little Tokio" he already showed that he was a good actor. In my opinion it was an insult that they gave the lead role to Dolph Lundgren. Brandon Lee was more charismatic than him and he was the reason for me to watch that movie. In that movie is also apparent that he is the better martial artist. But anyway in "Rapid Fire" he has the lead role and literally explodes. His presentation of martial arts skills was wonderful. I knew that he had learned jeet kun do (bruce lee's invented style) but I never realized that he was this good. The things he does is just a tour of force. His skill as a martial artist combined with his skill as an actor made him a serious threat to other actors in this genre. He would have been one of the greatest action stars. Due to his tragic death we are denied to witness this. Other reviewers complain about this being an average story with good action. Well hello,isn't that the point. The plot is not important. It is all about the action and it is a plus if the story is exciting! The acting (Powers Boothe,Nick Mancuso) is more than great and gives this action movie an extra flavor. This movie is a marvelous action movie which you will enjoy!