tomgillespie2002 In Tony Scott's True Romance, from a screenplay by Quentin Tarantino, Christian Slater's Clare Worley takes his date to the movies to see Sonny Chiba's Streetfighter trilogy. When he is questioned about Chiba's questionable 'heroics', Worley responds that, "he ain't so much a good guy as he is just a bad motherf****r." A long-time fan, Tarantino hits the nail on the head here (he would go on to cast his idol in the Kill Bill films). While Bruce Lee was wowing the world with the speed and agility of the martial arts, Sonny Chiba was demonstrating its brutal, more unforgiving side. In The Streetfighter's Last Revenge, Chiba's anti- hero Takuma Tsurugi is at his most sadistic. He may have punched a guy's eyeballs out of his head in the previous instalment, but here he calmly burns a thug alive in an incinerator.Much of the appeal of Chiba's movies lies with his sneering approach to the ancient arts, where he is far more comfortable sadistically beating a bad guy to a bloody pulp than he is with finding inner peace. This trilogy-closer has upped his mean streak, and made things a hell of a long weirder. The Streetfighter was excellent, Return of the Streetfighter was passable, and The Streetfighter's Last Revenge comes across as a bunch of scenes discarded from the previous movies for being too bonkers. Not only is Tsurugi a near- unstoppable punch, kick and throw machine, but he now dons Mission: Impossible-esque face masks to disguise his identity, and at one point bears vampire fangs for unexplained reasons. There's also a villain even James Bond would chuckle at: A mafia hit-man who dresses like a mariachi with a giant sombrero and shoots invisible laser beams out of his hands.The plot itself is incredibly simple. Tsurugi is hired to rescue Go Owada (Akira Shioji) from a police riot in exchange for a hefty payment. When he goes to collect his loot, he is handed a bag of cut-up newspaper and is attacked by the Owada family's men. Furious, he decides to take revenge on the gangsters. There's also a stolen tape and a master foe in Kunagami (Koji Wada). Noticeably less violent than the previous entries, this third feature shares more in common with a spy film than the martial arts genre. As a result, it's less fun, and only manages to pique the interest when at its most idiosyncratic and just plain daft. It's also nice to see exploitation icon Reiko Ike in a supporting role as Chiba's wannabe sidekick. But ultimately, Last Revenge stutters through a threadbare story, failing to deliver the sort of gory chopsocky that made the original so wonderful. Clearly the weakest of the trilogy.

MartinHafer This review is based on the English language dubbed version entitled "STREET FIGHTER'S LAST REVENGE". The original non-dubbed version is almost certainly better but I have not seen it and don't want anyone to think my review is for the original film. In most cases, the original film is highly re-edited and the plots are often changed so it wouldn't be fair to consider this review to be that for Gyakushû! Satsujin Ken--which was actually released years before the dubbed version.As for the plot, here it is--though most fans really are more concerned with the action and not the adequate plot: Chiba does a job for the mob and they insanely try to cheat them! Don't they KNOW this means they're in for a major butt-kicking!? Well, the rest of the film is pretty much what you'd expect and the only surprise is that in one of his many fights, Chiba is beaten!! Of course, there's a rematch, but still the idea of the Street Fighter losing to anyone is pretty unique! Had I never seen the previous Street Fighter films, I might have enjoyed this film a lot more. The action is pretty good--though unfortunately not nearly as good as it was in the first two Street Fighter films. Some of the original brutality was missing (though the crematorium scene is pretty horrific) and the plot seems pretty poor--especially in regard to the scuzzy lady who seems to again and again hurt people and no one seems to notice that she's BAD!! Even at the end, when the nasty skank is killed, Sonny Chiba's character oddly seems sad to see her die! Frankly, he should have celebrated like the Muchkins did when the Wicked Witch of the East died!!By the way, the evil lady likes to use sex as her main weapon--so don't be surprised when her breasts keep popping across the screen. Parents should consider this before letting kids watch the film. Of course, I think I'd be less worried about my kids seeing this than I would be if they saw all the violence, so it's NOT a kid-friendly film.

HaemovoreRex Well to be fair, matters do at least get off to a cracking start in this, the final chapter in this infamous series of flicks. Sadly however, it has to be said that what follows is tedious at best and moronic at worst.Fans of the violent excesses that these flicks are most notorious for will be in for a major disappointment here as the said scenes have been well nigh omitted entirely with our hero (the incomparable Sonny Chiba) adopting more of a subtle approach to matters. In fact, our protagonist is now shown adopting multiple disguises in order to accomplice his nefarious ends (a far cry from his head on brutality as displayed in the first two films!)Easily the least of the series, there's really very little to recommend here other than the rather cool final fight between Chiba and his nemesis (in other words just fast forward to the end)Overall then, this proves to be a somewhat sad way to end the series. Oh well, one can always re-watch the first two over again I suppose…..

mister_pig Wow, what can I say about SFLR? It is one of the greatest karate-action flicks ever to grace the screen. For my money, you just can't beat Sonny Chiba. He can act, and he can also do some extremely impressive karate!Something I really like about this series of movies, is the fact that Terry (The Street Fighter) isn't really a 'good guy' per se. He is just the main character. He is only out for himself and is extremely ruthless. I just love the way the character is written. You won't find a movie in this genre that is more entertaining.If you've never seen SFLR and you like this genre, do yourself a favor and get it now!10 out of 10