When I first saw this movie in 1989, I was 15 years old and not very savvy about the movies. I remember this film having great fight scenes and a compelling, better than average story and solid acting. The passage of time has conspired to prove me wrong.
Best of the Best is not a bad movie by any means, just not as good as I remember it to be. Phillip Rhee is the only actor on the American team who can fight without the benefit of editing and stunt doubles. The rest of the cast just throw some sloppy looking basic punches and kicks, when combined with quick cuts and sound effects, gives the appearance of them actually fighting. I'm growing tired of other user comments disparaging Hong Kong martial arts films. The best action scenes in the best HK films make the fighters in this movie (with the exception of Rhee and the "Korean" fighters) look like geriatrics fighting underwater.
This movie's plot device of competitors dying in a Tae Kwon Do match is also ludicrous. In international competition, TKD fighters wear heavy chest padding as well as headgear. They have about as much chance of dying as getting hit by lightning during the match. I could see the possibility of someone dying from a professional boxing match (which has happened hundreds of times, unfortunately) or an MMA (mixed martial arts) event, but not a TKD tournament.
Basically, this movie seems to have been conceived as a love letter from Phillip Rhee to Tae Kwon Do out of a sense of ethnic pride in which he trumps up the effectiveness of TKD. Ask any serious MMA fighter, and you'll learn the TKD is of dubious value in a real fight.
Best of the Best is not a bad movie by any means, just not as good as I remember it to be. Phillip Rhee is the only actor on the American team who can fight without the benefit of editing and stunt doubles. The rest of the cast just throw some sloppy looking basic punches and kicks, when combined with quick cuts and sound effects, gives the appearance of them actually fighting. I'm growing tired of other user comments disparaging Hong Kong martial arts films. The best action scenes in the best HK films make the fighters in this movie (with the exception of Rhee and the "Korean" fighters) look like geriatrics fighting underwater.
This movie's plot device of competitors dying in a Tae Kwon Do match is also ludicrous. In international competition, TKD fighters wear heavy chest padding as well as headgear. They have about as much chance of dying as getting hit by lightning during the match. I could see the possibility of someone dying from a professional boxing match (which has happened hundreds of times, unfortunately) or an MMA (mixed martial arts) event, but not a TKD tournament.
Basically, this movie seems to have been conceived as a love letter from Phillip Rhee to Tae Kwon Do out of a sense of ethnic pride in which he trumps up the effectiveness of TKD. Ask any serious MMA fighter, and you'll learn the TKD is of dubious value in a real fight.