CrawlerChunky In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

Hadrina The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

Neive Bellamy Excellent and certainly provocative... If nothing else, the film is a real conversation starter.

Anoushka Slater While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

Phil Hubbs With a title like that its gotta be an 80's action flick, you just don't get titles like that anymore huh. Based around some popular pulp stories which are themselves quite dated now (early 70's), this film was apparently meant to be the first part in a franchise which never came to be. I remember watching this as a kid and loving it, had it recorded on VHS and used to rewatch it over and over. Looking back now I'm not really sure why, despite the fact the film was released in 85 you'd think it was 75 because my God its so quaint and dated looking! The whole gist of the thing is pretty much your light-hearted James Bond angle mixed with a dash of 'The Karate Kid' really. A top NY cop has his death faked unwillingly so this undercover government agency can recruit and train him to be a killing machine. The funny bit is he is trained up by this 'Mr Miyagi' type character which you may think is me just using that cliché...but I'm totally not. Only difference is this Mr Miyagi is from Korea and is played by an American in heavy, yet very good makeup...racial issues cast aside!The film isn't a violent film at all despite the assassination theme at the core of the films story. Remo is a highly skilled ex-Marine and thusly was chosen to be an undercover agent, but like some Bond flicks the violence is minimal and what there is has been edited so you don't see much. In this sense it almost feels like a spy movie for kids or young teens, that along with the cringeworthy humour that has been injected into the film for whatever reason. Most of that humour comes from Mr Miyagi (yes that's what I'm gonna call him) as he behaves in the same uber spiritual, disciplined way with little dialog but lots of cheeky philosophical quips. That is countered by Remo, played with much swagger by Fed Ward, who at first is of course cocky, loud mouthed and rebellious to his instructions...whilst being clumsy accident prone and the butt of many Miyagi quickfire put downs and movements. Together they make a cute couple and it is amusing watching the absurd techniques used to train Remo...which he manages to conquer quite quickly. Dodging bullets huh we don't actually see how he is trained for that but he manages to do it in the end, ditto running on liquid or soft material.Its a strange action film truth be told because it never really feels like an action film. Most of what we see is dialog between characters, either the good guys who are always snooping around and planning, or the bad guys who are always driving around in black limos and also planning. The action we get is very tepid and short lived, the only real thrill is seeing Remo fight against some construction workers atop the Statue of Liberty (did the bad guys actually just pay some blue collar workers to kill someone they don't know by booting them off the top of the Statue of Liberty?? who would accept that? surely you'd get the sack for gross misconduct lol!). The stunts are very good throughout the film I can't deny, its all very Bond-ish as said, but the film does rely on those stunts to get it through the run time, not much else going on.The whole final act set within this forested military base is very dull, more dull than the rest of the film! Again there are stunts here and there which are reasonably impressive but its hardly epic, what the hell was that log on a cable thing? what was that?!. We never really see Remo using any of his special skills until right at the very end, we never really understand who and what CURE are suppose to be or do accept eliminate people they think are bad, plus there are only three members of CURE including Remo?!I can't complain about how unbelievably old this looks (it is really really dated!), but I can moan about how boring and daft it is. I'm not really sure if it was meant to be an adult franchise, I don't know anything about the books but I'm kinda guessing its more for the older person? really can't tell with this film though. It swings from sweaty palm thrills (no don't even go there) to a sniff of actual possible visible violence to complete childish tomfoolery, all this set around some of the most mundane looking sets and locations you've ever seen (apart from Liberty Island). Plus points for Ward who is good fun as the bent nosed tough guy Remo, Grey as Mr Miyagi and a very early role for Kate 'Captain Janeway' Mulgrew who actually looks quite tasty. Man I tried to enjoy this, believe me I did, it was a part of my childhood...but the rose tinted lenses have been sat on by a popcorn scoffing troglodyte.5/10

FlashCallahan A cop who answers a call is ambushed. The next day he is buried. But in reality he is in a hospital and his appearance has been altered.He is then told by a man named McCleary that he now belongs to "them". "Them" being CURE an organisation whose job is to battle corruption.They give him the new name of Remo Williams. He then meets the head of CURE Harold Smith, who spends most of his time sitting in front of a computer and perusing over reports of individuals that have to be dealt with.They then give him to Chiun, a Shinanju master, which is the art of killing someone and making it seem like an accident or natural causes.Chiun's regimen is hard on him. Smith then discovers a man named Grove, who is a defence contractor. It seems that whenever there's a case against him, the key witnesses and investigators disappear....Plot wise, the film isn't very original. It's the same old story about good guys who behind closed doors just want money, blah, blah...But thanks tho the chemistry between Ward and Grey, this film excels in the training scenes, which are the heart of the film.The banter between Chiun and Williams is priceless, and at first it's because they dislike each other, then toward the end of the film, it's out of a father/son relationship.It's a shame that the rest of the cast are so very poor, and add nothing to the rest of the film.Set pieces are good, the statue of liberty scene is filmed amazingly, but what else would you expect from a director of so many Bond films.It drags a little toward the end, but it's well worth two hours of your time.

bob the moo A "dead" police officer finds himself recruited into a tiny and secretive organisation which seeks to fight the criminals that the justice system cannot reach. Renamed Remo Williams, the officer is trained in ancient martial arts by master Chiun while Harold Smith using his impressively connected computer system to track the actions of George Grove – a connected and powerful man in the military but also incredibly corrupt. With Remo still in training, Grove's men start to get close to Smith's operation, forcing Williams to move quickly to bring down Smith before he can get to them.Recently a colleague of mine was watching some old 80's movies and asked for some DVD's if I had any. My contribution was Breakin' and the sequel (Electric Boogaloo) because he suggested he wanted cheesy and "bad" films. In return he lent me Remo Williams – a film that rang bells because I can dimly recall seeing it about 15 years ago on a Friday night on BBC1. I watched it again of course but I did so preparing myself for a "bad" film. Sure, the internet is full of praise for it but I assumed that was on the basis of it being a "cult" film – fans of any "cult film" generally not being the best people to get advice from in regards the actual quality of the film. The knowledge that this didn't lead to any film sequel and that a TV pilot flopped as well didn't change my mind either.What a great surprise then to find that, while not being a really good film, it is certainly not a bad one either. "Solid" perhaps doesn't do it justice either but it is a robust piece of fun entertainment for viewers happy to just go with it and get the entertainment value from it. Indeed I did enjoy it – and not just in a "this is so silly" way that I expected to (although parts were) – I actually enjoyed it for what it did. The majority of the film is the introduction and the training sections and the final third is Remo's first target. The first two parts of the film really set it up well. It produces one great set piece that was actually shot on the Statue of Liberty and serves as a well-shot and exciting section but also a nice nod to Hitchcock in its use of monuments. It also has a great sense of fun – nobody is taking it too seriously and it allows some of the sillier stuff to work for what it is without it detracting from the material; hence, for example, guard dogs managing to keep up with Remo is "funny" rather than "dumb".The final third of the film is not quite as good but only because the plot is a bit clunky and it does lose a certain amount of its energy. It is still good but it is carried a little bit by the superior first two thirds. The film benefits greatly from several good pieces of casting. Fred Ward is a tough and likable character who works best in b-movie hero type role (see also Tremors for future proof). His square jaw, good looks and charisma hold him in good stead here. Wilford Brimley does the role he has done for decades now (while looking more or less the same) and he is a crotchety good support. Grey's character could maybe be seen as non-PC but it is such a comic turn that it is easy to ignore this. His master personae is so wonderfully clichéd and filled with nonsense (the constant posing, the daytime soaps etc) that he contributes to the sense of fun in the film. The problems in the cast are part of the ending being weaker. Mulgrew is unnecessary while Cioffi is not at all what was required – he never seems to be a threat and he is only made to look worse by the presence of the ever-menacing Patrick Kilpatrick. Outside of the cast direction is actually pretty good. OK some scenes play very wooden and a bit daft but the set pieces look great and are well filmed. Likewise the theme music is great fun.Overall Remo Williams is not what you have heard – mainly because you have probably either heard it is brilliant or that it is rubbish and, in some cases, may have heard both at the same time from the same viewer. The truth is that it is actually a pretty solid movie produced with good set-pieces, a great sense of fun, solid performances in key places and an engagingly rough charm that matches that of Ward. It is nonsense but it is fun and quite thrilling nonsense and I really enjoyed it a lot more than I expected to. Oh, and retrospectively now I can bore people by saying that this did "bullet time" decades before The Matrix did.

DMCourt11-1 The movie wasn't very good. The producers made it too bland, with a generic villain and without a lot of the wild humor of the books.A few years after the movie they made a pilot based on a short story Murphy and Sapir had written for Inside Sinanju, a reader's guide to the series.So, while the actors are still so-so, the plot itself is, I thing, better than the movie.Encore's Action and Wam channels are showing it in July and August. The first time, to my knowledge, that it's been seen since it aired during the summer of '88.Air dates are: All Times ET/PT Tuesday, July 7th Encore Action 7:15am Tuesday, July 21st Encore Action 5:10am Friday, July 24th Encore Action 10:35am Tuesday, August 4th Encore Wam 1:45am Friday, August 21st Encore Wam 3:15am Wednesday, August 26th Encore Wam 4:30am Sunday, August 30th Encore Wam 3:05am