Breathing Fire

1991
Breathing Fire
5.1| 1h24m| R| en| More Info
Released: 15 July 1992 Released
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Synopsis

Michael, a Vietnam vet with two kids, pulls off a bank heist with his gang, which includes the bank's manager. To ensure the loyalty of everyone involved, Mike makes a special set of keys, so that the hiding place for the loot can only be opened if all the members are present. The bank manager, however, gets cold feet and tries to back out, so Mike and his buddies kill him and his wife. His daughter, however, gets hold of the key and runs for help to David, one of her father's old friends who also happens to be a Vietnam vet and a former comrade of Michael's. Will David be able to protect his friend's daughter?

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Comeuppance Reviews Breathing Fire is the family saga of the Moore clan. Michael Moore (Trimble), who is the original Michael Moore and not to be confused with the noted unappealing and unpleasant blowhard who stole his name, masterminded a bank heist and stole plenty of gold bars. He has one White son, Tony (Eddie Saavedra in unfortunately his only movie role) and one Vietnamese son that he brought back from 'Nam when he was serving there, somewhat distastefully named Charlie (Ke Quan). Both sons are Martial Arts enthusiasts and compete in local tournaments. When a young girl named Annie (Hamilton)'s parents are killed by Michael Moore, she goes on the run with Michael's brother David (Neil), who also served in Vietnam. They end up at Michael Moore's house, where David reluctantly trains them in his fighting style, and many baddies, including Thunder (Yeung) are fought against in the quest to unravel the truth about a highly-valuable piece of plastic pizza. You're just going to have to watch to understand, which you should do today...Usually when a movie is credited to three directors, that spells trouble. Just look at Slaughter High (1986). But in this case, it means silly fun for everyone. With its wacky and youth-oriented spirit, Breathing Fire wouldn't be out of place in the canon of Ted Jan Roberts. Instead of Ted Jan, we get Mark-Paul Gosselaar lookalike Saavedra, who gives us his own personal vision of what a Zack Attack should be. The movie also strikes a blow for the Americans with Disabilities Act, because it features a boy with a speech impediment (Ke Quan) in a fight scene with multiple midgets (excuse me, "little people"), and doesn't dwell on or exploit the fact. And any movie with a cross-dressing Bolo Yeung simply demands to be seen.The movie is chock full of great line readings, fascinating T-shirts, training sequences (a lot of which could easily be mistaken for torture), Vietnam flashbacks, and much more. There's a killer disco sequence, the token female baddie of the gang is of course here, and it all concludes in - you guessed it - an abandoned warehouse. And let's not forget the time honored "young person/people have to prove they're worthy to the great master before he'll work with them" subplot involving Ed Neil, not to be confused with Ed O'Neill (though both are Martial Arts masters - O'Neill is a practitioner of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. Why Al Bundy himself hasn't been cast in any Breathing Fire-type movies remains an open question). Ed Neil should have done more as well. A team-up with Ed O'Neill as Karate-kicking cops would have been amazing. It's never too late.Despite, or perhaps because of, the three directors, there are plenty of humorously abrupt cuts, and other...what look like shortcuts, on display. It all adds to the entertainment value, and the fight scenes have that Hong Kong-style fast energy. While that style of fight scene is more than welcome, it almost seems out of place in this kinda-sorta-quasi-almost kids movie. The whole "brothers in 'Nam" idea was an interesting concept, and could have been developed into a movie in its own right. But in the end, Breathing Fire is a wacky good time, with both Bolo and Trimble at their absolute best. (Side note: watch out for the Code of Silence (1985) poster at Tank (Wendell C. Whitaker in unfortunately his only movie role)'s house. )Breathing Fire has got the fights you want, the silliness you need, and the "totally 90's" vibe you can't get enough of. And the DVD is dirt cheap. What's not to love?
lemon_magic Well, the cast looks really good, in a tanning-bed, dipped-in-plastic way, and most of the fight scenes are at least energetic and creative (most of the fighters are in splendid shape, limber, flexible and extremely well toned and they can kick head high effortlessly). But the plot makes very little sense,(the final "brother against brother" scene is offensively stupid - since when are high school kids allowed to fight full contact in a sport karate tournament with killing techniques?), most of the dialog seems to have been written by someone who learned to speak English by watching soap operas and all the "Karate Kid" movies, and there is some pretty aggressive non-acting going on whenever people aren't punching and kicking each other. There are a couple scenes where the two older male leads ("David" and his brother the gang leader) are talking to each other and they obviously have no idea what to do with their hands.The young Korean guy from "The Goonies" and "Indiana Jones" has a prominent part in this, and in spite of some terrible lines of dialog, he still comes across as a likable young man, but he (and his good looking "older brother") are pretty much wasted in this movie. Hell, Dakota Fanning and Halley Osment couldn't make most of these scenes work. So even if you live for kick boxing movies, this one might have too much kick-boxing for you, and any scene that doesn't involve kick-boxing involves scenery-chewing and badly delivered lines. Still, I got this DVD for $1 at Wal-Mart, and it's not the worst such reissue from Digiview Productions I've seen. Worth seeing once if you want to see absolutely everything Jerry Trimble or Bolo Yeung has ever appeared in...I guess.
Space_Mafune Annie, a young teenage girl who was a witness to the murder of her parents by cold-hearted bank robbers seeks out David Moore, her father's old buddy from their fighting days together in Vietnam for protection as her father had warned against going to the police. David takes her to his brother Michael's house, not realizing Michael is secretly the leader behind the bank heist and the murder of Annie's parents. Michael also has two sons, one natural and one adopted from Vietnam, who befriend Annie and eventually receive martial arts instructions from David so they can aid him in her protection.They say if you cannot say anything good, don't say anything at all. If I were to abide by that rule, I'd have very little to say with regards to this one. Jonathan Ke Quan actually does a decent job as Charlie Moore who really is the only truly likable character in the film in that's he's funny and likes to have fun making him feel more real as a character than any other person in the movie. Also the training scenes and the fights are surprisingly well executed.It's too bad that the plot is filled with gaping plot holes (the worst of which is characters disappearing from the scene for long periods of time with no adequate explanation as to their whereabouts), the rest of the acting cast is atrocious and the fights, while shot nicely, are hardly convincing in reality especially in the case of the Moore brothers showdown with Bolo Yeung, who's all but wasted here as another faceless henchman.Forgettable.
duaneshouseofpizza I watch this movie every weekend because of the sheer humorous acting and the brutal fighting. the fighting is alot better than most recent movies...but, story cannot play out correctly due to really bad acting. I bought this movie for $5 on DVD at K-mart and it's possibly the greatest 5 bucks I've ever spent. There are some scenes where I'll just break out and laugh at because Data from "The Goonies" (Jonathon ke quan) beats the tar out of a 300 lb muscle man. If's you find this movie,by all means buy it. It's one of the funniest movies i've ever seen...sadly, it isn't supposed to be.