We here in Buffalo, NY are currently experiencing an actual blizzard. Everything is shut down, major roads are closed, and its pretty much a lazy day. I picked up the Roku remote and flipped through my recommendation list on Netflix. This list is usually pretty absurd due to the variety of things that get watched in this house but one thing caught my eye. You can almost guarantee that if you show me a sideshow of images and one of the images just so happens to be someone with mulleted curly hair and a Tom Selleck mustache doing karate, I’m probably going to look at that with interest. The film was called “Overkill”, and it was a colossal pile of awesome shit.
“A Tokyo cop is sent to Los Angeles to help an LAPD detective break up a yakuza (Japanese organized crime syndicate) ring operating in the city“- IMDB
You knew the movie was going to be awesome when the beginning sequence set the stage with a police chief narrating the introduction to the story with an over the top voice straight out of an old gangster movie. The movie basically revolves around this California cop “Mickey” who looks absolutely ridiculous. He is constantly either shirtless or wearing completely unbuttoned vests with no shirt on underneath. He occasionally wears this generic wind-breaker coat, but still ceases to put on any shirt under it. The best is when he is just casually doing work at the police station, as everyone else is adequately dressed accept for him. He looks like a male exotic dancer throughout the film. There is even a scene were he has to go undercover as a male stripper and performs. Any normal person filming this would have at least had him act semi awkward performing his dance, but this guy goes all out like he had been doing it for 10 years. His dance moves reminded me of when Slater used to break it down on “Saved by the Bell.” The guy clearly had dancing in his skill set.
Basically Mickey is noticing increased activity from the Yakuza (Japanese Mafia) and wants to put a stop to it. They make it clear that nobody else at the police station even cares about it accept for him. He states multiple times that he doesn’t want California to turn into 1920’s Chicago and that he would defend California himself if he had to. Mickey and his partner then break every law on the books to get information on the Yakuza. The movie is loaded with terrible action scenes where you barely get to see guns fire. The would do quick cuts and you would often see people bleeding from areas they weren’t even shot in.
Perhaps the most ridiculous sequence in the movie is the last 3 minutes (this doesn’t even really spoil anything). In about 3 minutes, Mickey quits the force. They show him walk into a karate school where he watched the sensei perform with a sword for maybe 20 seconds. Mickey is then shown in his living room, soaking with sweat holding the sword and yelling while doing simplistic strikes with it. Then Mickey is working at the Sushi restaurant of the kid he meets in the movie. It was like a terribly done montage to make Mickey “just a little Japanese”. They cap off this 3 minute sequence by having the kid that owns the Sushi Restaurant ask Mickey if he would ever be able to walk again (he was in a wheelchair). The scene quickly changes to the beach where Mickey places the paralysed kid onto a horse, and they literally go riding off into the sunset. A paralysed kid riding full speed on a horse…….
This is a great film to laugh at and wasn’t bad enough to make me turn it off. If you end up getting stuck home because of a blizzard, I would recommend this for a good laugh.
| “The Body Count is Overwhelming” |
