‘American Samurai’ (1992) Review

Reading Time: 5 minutes

Over on Kung Pew Video, I’ve been revisiting the direct-to-video relics that raised us. This week: American Samurai.

---

American Samurai should have one of the greatest final fights in martial arts movie history. You’ve got David Bradley and Mark Dacascos as rival brothers in a duel to the death with swords. And somehow…the movie totally botches it.

Bloodsport Meets The Octagon

If you grew up on VHS martial arts movies in the 90s, you might remember American Samurai. It had everything going for it. An underground fight ring plot…but with swords. Fighters from around the world. And two of the best B-action martial artists of the era—David Bradley and Mark Dacascos.

It’s basically Bloodsport mashed up with The Octagon… but with samurai instead of ninjas.

And for a while? It actually delivers on that promise.

What’s Good?

But before we get into where American Samurai fails, let’s talk about where it succeeds. First off, you’ve got Mark Dacascos in one of his earliest roles, and even here you can see the talent.The guy is just on a whole other level of amazing when it comes to martial arts actors. I don’t think he passes well as Japanese, but when he starts swinging that katana, it doesn’t matter. He’s totally convincing.

Then you’ve got David Bradley, who by this point is basically carrying the torch from the American Ninja era. He’s not flashy, but he’s physical, believable, and he looks like a guy who can actually mess you up. And there’s just a fluidity to the way he moves–almost panther-like. 

And the tournament setup works surprisingly well. It’s simple, effective, and it gives you a steady stream of fights, exotic opponents, and that classic video game “fight your way to the top” structure. Which is exactly what I want from a movie like this.

Building Up to the Final Fight

And the whole movie is building toward one thing. Collins versus Kenjiro.

Two brothers, different paths.
One follows his father’s code.
The other chooses a life of crime.

The whole movie is about getting to that final duel and finding out which of them is the better swordsman, which has chosen the correct path. 

And then–we get there. And it’s just a total nothing burger.

The Frankensteined Scene

The final fight between Dacascos and Bradley doesn’t even feel like a real fight. It feels…assembled. From parts and pieces that seem like they don’t even go together. You start noticing weird things.

Bradley’s costume changes between shots.The camera stays tight, like it’s hiding something.You barely see the two men actually engage one another.

And for a movie that spent its entire runtime building toward this one fight, it’s over almost as soon as it starts. It doesn’t feel like a climax so much as it feels like a huge letdown.

Producer Interference

For years I wondered what happened to this fight. I even had myself convinced I’d seen a version of this on Showtime that wasn’t Frankensteined together. But apparently that version doesn’t exist. At least not in the way I remember it. 

Director Sam Firstenberg has said in interviews that the version of American Samurai that was released by Cannon isn’t the movie he made. Producers stepped in during post-production, re-edited scenes, moved things around, and scraped together scenes from other fights in the film to assemble the final duel. That’s why some of the shots are so tight. And it’s why Bradley’s costume changes from shot to shot. It’s why you can spot fighters in the background who died earlier in the film.

But here’s the silver lining: In the last few years, fans worked with Firstenberg to piece together a Director’s cut of the film using the existing footage.You can find this version on YouTube. 

The big upgrade with this cut in my opinion is the picture quality. It’s vastly improved from the old VHS copy I have. And it’s better than my DVD copy. But there’s been some other tinkering–some modern B-roll that has been added and some cheesy camera effects–that are anachronistic and honestly make this feel kinda cobbled together like the official version. Just in a different way. 

The ending is improved, and it’s more faithful to what Firstenberg wanted, but I think it ends up feeling kind of anticlimactic, and I kinda see why the Cannon execs wanted to stretch it out. 

That final fight needed to breathe. It needed to be a showcase of these two incredible martial artists’ skills. And it needed to bleed off some of the tension it’d built up between these two characters. 

Despite that, it flows better than the official release and it looks much better and fixes the inconsistencies created by the tight shots and Bradley’s shifting kimono. 

If I was gonna create my own cut of the film, I would keep the cleaned up picture quality and the director’s recut ending, but I’d lose all of the other unnecessary, quirky stuff and modern b-roll shots that were added to the movie. 

My criticisms aside, though, I want to commend the fans who made this happen and thank them and Firstenberg for their efforts. It’s pretty cool that people cared enough about this obscure 90s karate movie to take it upon themselves to put in all of the effort it must have taken to clean up and recut it. 

So if you’re listening to this, I salute you.

Fun Movie, Lackluster Ending

But for me, watching American Samurai is still an exercise in frustration. Because all the ingredients for another great B karate movie in the vein of American Ninja are right there. The premise. The fighters. The setting. The buildup.

It shoulda been a no-brainer. Put these two amazing martial artists into the arena and let them go at it with katanas. Instead the film trips over its sword and totally lets the audience down. And as much as I want to side with the director on this–I’m with Cannon on this thing. This movie and these two actors deserved a real final fight. Something the audience could sink its teeth into. And that’s something we’ll never get.

Should You Watch It?

So is it still worth watching? Yeah. I think it is. Hell, I own it. And I still watch it every couple of years. The fights leading up to the crappy finale are worth it alone if you’re a fan of this genre. It’s campy and unintentionally funny in places, but that’s all a part of the charm of movies like this. This is a 2 star movie for most people, but it gets 3 from me for the fun fights and colorful characters. If you can sit back and enjoy the ride knowing it’s gonna come to a crashing halt at the end, you’ll probably enjoy American Samurai. 

Either way, if you watch it, come back and let me know what you think. 

Be kind. Subscribe. 

And I’ll see ya in the video wasteland.

---

Kung Pew Video is where I dig into the neon-drenched, straight-to-VHS corner of film history. New episodes weekly. Be kind. Subscribe. See ya in the VHS wasteland.