Tiger Claws

Plot synopsis:
The police investigate a serial killer Bolo Yeung who seems to target only martial arts masters. One after another is killed in the same brutal fashion. This may be a chance for detective Linda Masterson to work on her first murder case. She is assigned the job and to assist her is another martial arts specialist, Sgt. Tarek Richards. Now they need to find a tiger style master, because the killer obviously uses tiger-style kung fu. Not a simple task, since tiger is a very ancient and rare style.
Sgt. Richards decides to renew his training in tiger style in order to better prepare himself for the eventual confrontation with the serial killer. He manages to track down the serial killer and engages him in combat where he ultimately defeats him.

Tags: violence

Review:
Pretty decent.
Rothrock was the best in this with her fights,acting and outfit alongside with Bolo Yeung , but she wasn't the lead, Merhi was.
The problem with that was, Rothrock had all the experience and was better equipped to lead a movie and at the end of the movie it was more than OK if Rothrock had been finished Bolo in a combat fight.If Jean-Claude van Damme or even Richard Norton had been the lead male in this movie then this film had been a classic.Jalal Merhi was very awful in this unfortunately but the movie was enjoyable enough though but would have been a lot better.
So i recommend you this film and if you are a Cynthia Rothrock fan you'll not be disappointed..
Ok action....
This movie, starring Cynthia Rothrock, Jalal Merhi, and especially Bolo Yeung, showcases everything that's wrong with martial arts movies.I still don't know why, but since it's inception, this genre is plagued by production values, acting and direction, which put it only one peg above porn, if that.Jalal Merhi especially talks like Serge the art dealer from Beverly Hills Cop. Cynthia Rothrock's abilities are accomplished, but her acting is limited.
Bolo Yeung still doesn't seem to have mastered English, although I always enjoy his performances..
One of the best Rothrock movie.
Cynthia Rothrock and Jalal Merhi are New York city undercover cops.
There are mysterious killing of martial artist in the city.
Jalal correctly identifies the style as Tiger Claws who only three martial artists in the country are capable of using.
Rothrock, and Jalal gets on the trail of the culprit who turns out to be none other than bad guy played by Bolo Yuen.This is one of the best American made Cynthia Rothrock movie.
It was good move on the producer's part to hire Bolo Yuen as the bad guy.
He brought menacing personality that's usually lacking in movies of this type.Cynthia Rothrock is not known for her range of acting, and it's hard to make an interesting story around her character.
In this movie Jalal and Bolo creates enough contrast to be of passable quality.Out of all the American made Cynthia Rothrock movies, this one is my favorite.
It doesn't have much in the way of contents, but the action is pretty good.
Choice of locations shot were better than usual, but I wished the producers put in more class into the movie as it were in Rothrock's Hong Kong made movies..
Good Classic movie for Martial Art's fans..
Some complain about acting.
They don't know the features of martial art Acting.
It's a different thing.
Not just b-side kung-fu-karate beat em up.
This one is unique for it's sub genre.
What we have here is a thriller.
The main maniac-killer has very big sport ambitions, but he satisfies himself with anonymus fights till death, leaving only his signature scars on the bodies of his opponents..Bolo plays his role very well.
He is a quiet painter in the dojo and he is an ego-maniac killer.
Cynthia is sweet and cute in throwing her mighty kicks as allways:) Jalal is less known action star, but he suits the cast perfectly.
He looks believable in the role of undercover police man.
His pure mean simlycity is the right cure for the twisted Claw-mastermind...
Bolo Yeung Saves It From Obscurity!.
The unstoppable force that is Bolo Yeung continues to run out of control in Tiger Claws.
In this film Bolo goes up against Jalal Merhi, who wrote..
who produced....
who Co-STARRED in this legendary Yeung vehicle.Tagging along with Merhi is the hot Cynthia Rothrock, who's name not only sounds like a porn star, but she also voice acts like one.
No emotion what so ever is detected in her lines, which is offset by her phenomenal martial arts ability and incredible pectoral superiority.The only thing that manages to bring Tiger Claws down from a perfect 10 would be Jalal Merhi's entire performance as the "hero", and the two cop buddy extras from Beverly Hills Cop.
(hey man, we aren't gonna fall for no banana in a tailpipe!).
I've Seen Better Acting in Porno.
I honestly feel bad for the people who made this movie.
You can tell that they take themselves seriously and are hoping something decent will come of their efforts.Unfortunately for all involved, including the viewer, all we're left with is an embarrassing excuse of a movie.
I won't get into the plot - there's really no sense.
As you can imagine, there's a bad guy, some good guys and a lot of kicking.
The only interesting twist in this one is that the star is a woman, and she actually has some pretty decent moves, I guess.
Her acting, if you can call it that, is beyond horrific, even for martial arts movies, and she doesn't have much of a supporting cast to help her out either.Even if you are a martial arts movie fan, stay away from this mess.
My girlfriend walked in the room when I was watching it and it literally took twenty minutes of viewing to convince her that I wasn't watching a porno.
I'm not sure she's convinced to this day..
keep on kicking....
Tiger Claws is one of the lesser known Rothrock movies and that is no bad thing, it is a pretty decent entry into the old school Martial Arts canon.
Cynthia made a few stronger themed movies around 1991/1992 and this is one of them, the inclusion of Bolo is good, who himself featured in a few films also around that period.
The storyline is good in that it goes some way to explaining Tiger style Kung Fu - instead of just being a cop after a villain style with Martial Arts thrown in, which was an element of her earlier work.
Also some of the fight scenes are pretty decent, with Rothrock herself impressive as always.
Well worth a watch, however as of 2010,this title is not yet available on DVD..
A dangerous death dealer stalks the city of New York killing off Martial Arts Instructors.
Bolo Yeung plays a 'death dealer' - a man who can kill with his bare hands or Tiger Claw Style.
In the film Bolo kills off New York's best martial arts instructors and use their belts, trophies, swords as an offering to the gods to prove to himself he is the best there is.Throughout the film we see hints of Bolo killing off the martial artists, whilst Cynitha Rothrock and Jahal Merhi (both who play New York Cops) try and track him down very, very slowly.
The film, in fact, moves so slowly its hard not to fall asleep.
The plot although a strong one, fails to get off the ground - we never actually see Bolo killing off the martial artists giving the impression that the fighting was going to build up into an all out action-packed ending - but it never did - instead we get a mixed film that couldn't decide whether it was a Martial Arts film or an Action film - in the end it turns out to be a lame cop film with a bit of martial arts - most of which comes from Bolo.Jahal, who is on supension seems to forget that he's wearing tight jeans and seems to be able to high kick on demand whilst Cynitha hardly does anything but sit in a car or fight badly.The fighting sequences themselves are extremely poor - however the training sequences were very good.Jahal, who infiltrates the Tiger Claw training camp trains with other Tiger Claw students, and finally meets Bolo in a strip joint.
There his cover is blown and he, and Cynitha chase Bolo to a conveniently placed Harbour - where they play hide and seek with Bolo.When the final fight sequences appear, Bolo seems to forget he's a psychotic killer and just stands around and waits to be kicked by Jahal - when Bolo does strike he signals to Jahal to get up instead of finishing him.I felt this film with its strong plot could have been and should have been so much better.
The fight chero-gerophy should have complemented Bolo's extenstive martial arts skills and we should have at understood why Jahal (who only trained  for ten minutes) could have defeated a psycho-killer in three.Out of ten, I'd give this three for effort..
The main problem with Tiger Claws - missed opportunities and untapped potential..
A mysterious serial killer known as the Death Dealer is stalking the streets of "New York City" (not Canada.
Not Canada), and the only clue the police have to go on is that the dastardly murderer uses an obscure, underground fighting style known as Tiger.
Because of this, the police chief assigns officer Linda Masterson (Rothrock) the case - he knows she is a practitioner of Martial Arts.
He has another "Kung Fu cop" on the force, a strange foreigner named Tarek Richards (Merhi), so, naturally, he pairs the two up and sends them on their way.
Despite Tarek's lack of enthusiasm, he still is a rogue cop who plays by his own rules.
Usually garbled, presumably.
So Tarek goes undercover at the Tiger training center and meets the mysterious Chong (Bolo).
Will our two heroes get to the bottom of the mystery of the Tiger Claw Killer?
Find out sometime...So if you were going to paint on your hair, what would you do with your life?
Maybe become an insurance salesman?
Carny?
CEO of a company?
Nah, you'd want to be in front of the camera, whether you had any business being there or not.
Hence the rise (?) of Painted On Hair Guy, AKA Jalal Merhi.
Seriously, this guy doesn't use a comb, he uses a paintbrush!
Hey-Oh!
But, in all seriousness, if you could paint on any hair in the world, why would you choose that?
He also has a thick accent AND deadpan delivery.
This "Deadpan Accent" is slowing things down, and he has no screen presence or spark.
On the polar opposite end of the spectrum, we have top fan favorite Cynthia Rothrock as his partner.
Any interest generated by this movie comes from her.
However, the no-energy of Merhi coming up against the genuine energy of Rothrock results in a wash for the viewer and the two forces cancel each other out.
So we're left stranded in a Sargasso Sea of slowness in this amateurish, low-budget-junky-feeling exercise.Much of the movie has almost a childish feel - there are silly shootouts and fights that feel like kids playing in the schoolyard.
Even the laundry list of clichés - it's an election year, the final warehouse fight, the baddie saying to the hero how they're really both the same, the drug deal gone wrong, among many others - here are not FUN clichés, necessarily, like they many times can be.
You get the feeling director Makin was makin' this stuff for the first time ever, not retreading it.
Amazingly, the writer, Maunder, came on board as director for Tiger Claws II.
The dialogue also feels infantile, with a Detective Henderson stating, and we quote, "Serial killers are hard to find." Additionally, if more people die horribly, it "won't look good." But there is a classic "searching for the Martial Arts school montage", so, there's that.For the deadliest Martial Art ever, the extensive training sequences sure are boring, and pounding your fists in woks of sand repeatedly somehow start to lose their flair.
This highlights the main problem with Tiger Claws - missed opportunities and untapped potential.
You'd think with Rothrock and Bolo Yeung, if not Merhi, the movie would have been better.
But Rothrock does pioneer the maritime Martial Art of "Oarfighting", hinting at what the movie could have been if it had a bit more life and pizazz.Many in the cast have funny voices, and perhaps leading the pack is one Bill Pickells, in the acting stretch of a lifetime as Bill Pickells.
Supposedly he's a badass Martial Artist, but the guy looks like Oates and sounds like he's been sucking on a helium balloon for the past several hours.
But his credit at the end is almost up there with gems like "Sgt. Slaughter as Sgt. Slaughter" and Mike "Cobra" Cole as "Cobra" Cole.
But Pickells would still have been a better choice for the male lead than Merhi, who is very stiff, and, if we've said it once, we've said it a thousand times, he was separated at birth with Bronson Pinchot.
We're fairly certain Merhi was actually born on Mypos.Featuring the hair metal song "Break the Walls Down" by Attitude (in the poolhall scene - another sliver of what the movie should have been all along) - Tiger Claws was inexplicably followed by two sequels.
We would say it's for Rothrock and Bolo Yeung fans only..
Worth a look for Rothrock fans.
Cynthia Rothrock is quite hot in this movie, thanks to a combination of her hairstyle, her outfits (if you hadn't noticed before what a busty, curvy figure she has, you'll notice it this time) and her brutal, high-impact fight scenes.
And even those who complain about her acting (which I have always found OK for this genre) will have to admit that it's a lot better than the acting of her co-star, Jalal Merhi.
Bolo Yeung still has his physical presence, but to be honest, the lethal blows of his Tiger Style - deep nail scratches - don't strike me (no pun intended) as particularly brilliant martial arts moves.
The plot is thin, the motivation of the killer is absent, and I also disagree with the way the ending plays out (spoilers follow): after Cynthia fails to take out Bolo singlehandedly, Merhi should have failed also, and he and Cynthia should have teamed up to turn it into a 2-on-1 handicap match.
But I guess Merhi's ego (he is also the film's producer) got in the way and he had to finish the job alone.
Ummm...
Disappointing.
This movie is sub-par for a B-movie action flick.
I was excited to see Tiger Claws since I love Bolo and Rothrock, but man this movie just flat out sucked my enthusiasm for the genre right out of me.
It was so bad that I may never watch another Jalal Mehri film ever again.
This is the second Mehri movie that I watched and both were pretty sad.
The first was TC 2000 which was saved by Billy Blanks, Bolo and the unbelievably beautiful Bobbie Philips.In Tiger Claws the acting is weak across the board.
When Cynthia Rothrock is the best thespian in the cast you know you are in for a rough ride.
Mehri of course is deadpan with no personality or charisma.
Bolo is great as the villain but really just lurks around until the fight scene finale.As far as the plot goes, it is similar to Blood Moon where some greatly skilled martial artist is killing all the big time celebrity and champion martial artists around town.
Mid-way through the movie you learn that it is Bolo.
Rothrock and Mehri are the detectives who find out that the killer practices Tiger Claw Kung Fu and track down his dojo.All is well and good but you know what blows about the story line?
You never find out why Bolo is killing everyone.
They never give a motive.
Where's the pay-off?
Where's the pay-off?
Even on Scooby Doo you find out the antagonist's motives.
At least with Blood Moon you find out that the killer was DQ'ed from an MMA tournament and wanted to kill all the participants (though you never find out why he has two prosthetic fingers).Finally, the opening scene will throw you.
Rothrock working vice dressed as prostitute with a black wig and sunglasses also sporting huge implants.
During the scene I was wondering who the hot chick was, she looked fine.
Then she walked down an alley where the rapist followed and she opened up her karate on him.
After the fight was over she took off her glasses and wig and what do you know it was Cynthia Rothrock.
I had no idea, this is the first movie that I had seen of hers where she is augmented.
Nice.As far as the overall movie though, it does stink.
I love the No Retreat No Surrenders and the Hong Kong stuff that Rothrock has done but this Jalal Mehri took a decent premise and some good character actors and basically crapped the bed.
Even the fight scenes are weak.
Watch this movie only if you're a die hard Bolo or Rothrock fan.
The middle 30 minutes slow and boring, so much that I found myself checking email and playing Dragon City on my Nexus...
not a good sign..
Bolo's Tiger Claw.
I was searching for this movie for some time now, and i finally got to see it.
Some psychotic martial-artist (Bolo Yeung) kills other martial artists with a rare Tiger Claw fighting style.
Police detectives Linda Masterson(Cynthia Rothrock) and Tarek Richards (Jalal Merhi) who are also martial-artists, try to stop him.
That is pretty much all i can say about the plot.Throughout the movie Rothrock and Merhi are searching for Bolo, and it gets boring.
Actually i wanted to see this only because of Bolo Yeung, and i wasn't disappointed.
Although all the killings occur behind the camera, in the end Bolo really shows why he's considered one of the great martial artist worldwide.
There are couple of good fights, especially the one with Bolo Yeung kicking the hell out of Cynthia Rothrock.
The ending fight between Bolo and Jalal Merhi is somewhat believable, but its not enough to save the movie.
However if u're a fan of Bolo Yeung, i highly recommend this action flick.
PS: Bolo was 54 when this movie came out.
Keep that in mind, and watch his fights.