Golgo 13: Assignment Kowloon

Despite Golgo 13: Assignment Kowloon's shortcomings, Sonny Chiba remains an exciting, forward-thinking action proposition. His star persona, largely characterised (in the West at least) by his performances in the Street Fighter films is one of indefatigable violence. He's a maniac, an agony transmitter poised to bludgeon and puncture anyone who offends him or impinges on his particular brand of ruthless self-sufficiency. In this sense he's the perfect actor to embody Takao Saito's relentless, invincible hitman.

Duke Togo is total criminality, an untouchable murderer who exists so far outside the idea of basic dramatic stakes that typical narrative trends (like learning or positive, life-affirming, change) are rendered null. A significant amount of Togo's Big Comic stories only feature him as a phantom presence - the unflappable expert who steps from the shadows to exterminate whichever patsy has been unlucky enough to stray into his orbit. In deference to fidelity, Yukio Noda's film rustles up a second lead to fret and drive Assignment Kowloon, Callan Leung's Detective Smith.

Unfortunately Smith, and his knockabout policing, overwhelm Noda's film, subordinating Togo in ways that end up actually detracting from the character's mystique. Initially this demotion is expressed in terms of plot machinations, eventually though Smith is allowed to lay hands on the assassin, an outrage that goes unanswered. Smith growls, making threats that would never be explored in further films. Assignment Kowloon may belong to another but that doesn't mean Chiba is a slouch. A dockside fight pulses with real venom, Togo brushing off a gang of street toughs with a confident, louche cruelty. Elsewhere, Chiba's athleticism allows him to scramble around Hong Kong streets like they're a giant climbing frame - a fearless physicality that prefigures Jackie Chan's approach to the city.

Return of The Street Fighter

Second time around and Shigehiro Ozawa has fallen out of love with Chiba's raw prowling physicality, instead choosing to represent this fight sequel in as tight and immediate a way as possible. Fights are claustrophobic, hand-held wails rather than slow paced thumps as Chiba gets another mobster cob-on.

As in the previous film, the notionally mercenary Tsurugi finds himself at odds with his paymaster's evil agenda. It's a wonder anyone still hires him. This time around the money men plan to off roley-poley karate don Masaoka for sticking his nose into a mob buy-out of East Asian fighting schools. Unfortunately for the cash flashers, Tsurugi has a soft-spot for the incorruptible Masaoka - "He's the only man who understands me."

Ozawa tacks on a few of Bond's lifestyle magazine elements, presumably to give the sequel some broader appeal / economic pep. Tsurugi gets to growl at a lady in a lift, naturally she fawns all over him. Pickup sex quickly sours, turning into a nasty near-miss Verhoeven honey-trap. Turns out Tsurugi is also quite willing to sadistically snap the fairer sex into oblivion too. Return of The Street Fighter maintains its prequel's high standard of violence and bodily harm - a prison hit is the stand out - although it never quite exceeds the first film. There's nothing in this sequel to touch The Street Fighter's impromptu castration of a burly rapist.

Return is unfortunately dense with filler material too. Recycled footage from The Street Fighter pops up far too often in the brief 79 minute running time. These transposed scenes play out in their entirety too. Thankfully these second-hand additions include the fantastically pivotal flashback of Tsurugi's Father being executed - this time inspiring Tsurugi to down a bottle of cheap white plonk and spit it all over his body in some kind of demented pre-fight baptism.

Several specialist weapon masters get to show-off their abilities to amp up the antagonism. Each gets a couple of minutes to prove just how deadly their chosen style is against stationary breeze blocks. They look like they could be real trouble for our hero in the singular, never mind as a unit. We needn't have worried. When they eventually clash with our man Tsurugi, he punches their eyes out almost immediately.

Bloated and meandering, Return's saving grace is its dying minutes. Chiba relentlessly dogs the ratty, Mafia don responsible for corrupting Japan's martial arts sanctity. Chiba is not up against an equal this time. His prey is completely unable to defend himself against Tsurugi's unstoppable fury. Faced with a screaming, begging inferior, Tsurugi does what any monster would do - he tears strips off him then hurls his haemorrhaging body onto the cab of a petrol tanker. Said truck spins wildly out of control and explodes, taking the Mafia schmuck and an innocent driver with it. Tsurugi just laughs.

The Street Fighter

It's not about honour. It's not about pride. It's not about schools of thought, or nationality. It's not even about money. What it is about is grinding your opponent under your foot till their hip shatters into bone shrapnel, turning their guts into a pierced, fecal mess. It's about throwing men from balconies and watching their heads shatter into mush on the tarmac below. It's about tearing, clawing, ripping at any dangling weakness. It's about beating everyone into a hateful pulp. It's about victory.

Sonny Chiba fights like a cornered beast. Formal stances are replaced by either ducking opportunism or naked rage. Chiba's fighting style is ugly and mean, lacking any of Chinese Boxing cinema's balletic qualities. Grace is irrelevant - he's out to kill. Structurally, fighting in The Street Fighter is much like Bruce Lee's first few films. Not so much a match-up as an overwhelming pummelling. Chiba is not content to down an opponent either. Snap kicks are out. Howling, gouges, and swipes are in. He intends to cripple.

Chiba plays Takuma Tsurugi - an international bastard for hire saddled with Rakuda Cho, comedy sidekick whom he doesn't even seem to like. Tsurugi pisses off a load of gangsters by asking for far too much money. After annihilating dozens of their henchman, he decides to throw in with their quarry - a pretty young oil magnate played by Yutaka Nakajima - but not before putting several of her bodyguards in comas. Tsurgi is ruthlessly, effortlessly, immoral. Completely willing to sell debt flaunting moochers into sex slavery at the drop of a hat. A man completely and utterly locked into a personal martial arts doomsday by his father's psychotic parting wish: "never trust anyone". He doesn't Tsurgi senior. Never, ever. Mess with Chiba and he'll deform your skull with an X-Ray punch. POW!