No Contest

Shannon Tweed as a heroine? Andrew Dice Clay and Roddy Piper as bad guys? All three in a DIE HARD rip-off taking place at a beauty pagent? Hey, this isn't going to be a masterpiece, but it sounds like it would be great fun as a trashy movie!

I said "sounds like". But I was sorely disappointed. Tweed doesn't get naked. The action scenes aren't that great. Clay and Piper aren't that campy, and don't seem to be that enthusiastic.

Not the worst DIE HARD rip-off out there. But _nowhere_ the great movie it could have been. I know the premise sounds great, especially with those actors, but trust me, it's disappointing.

At first I was surprise that I never saw this Shannon Tweed flick during the Skinemax days, than I realized that there's no nudity in it. My lost, as the movie was entertaining to watch.

It's Die Hard at a beauty pageant as Shannon Tweed plays an once popular action star hosting the Ms. Galaxy pageant when a crew of kidnappers take the place hostage.

I've seen Shannon Tweed do a few kicks in her movies before, but she goes all out in this one trying to be Dolph Lundgren only with smaller boobs. She kicks some ass, she fires the gun and she goes after the bad guy. However you feel about female action stars (I'm definitely all for it), I thought the movie did a spectacular job with it and it was nothing but fun to watch.

Another highlight of the flick was Andrew Dice Clay who lead the kidnappers. It's like he took the clichés of all best movie villains and rolled it into one. He was the ultimate bad ass and the ultimate parody all at the same time, and it just put a huge grin on my face watching him.

It's a low budget b-action flick plan and simple, and it works for your amusement. You can catch the film on you tube like I did.

Shannon Tweed's first attempt to change her image and become an action heroine is also one of her best films. To be more accurate, it's the best of the three or four films that I've seen her in so far. It's nothing more than a "Die Hard" clone, and Robert Davi is wasted, but the pacing never lags, the direction has energy and Tweed is fairly convincing as a kick-boxer. (**1/2)

Many would consider this to be a ripoff of Die Hard, but other than locations and antagonist plotting, "No Contest" has a completely different mood. Firstly the primary protagonist is largely unwillingly and frightened, and Shannon Tweed is not terrible in giving a sense of realism to it. Secondly the villains are hilariously captivating, particularly Roddy Piper and Nicholas Campbell as henchmen with over the top cheesy dialogue.

The cinematography is also surprisingly good with competent angling and rendering. Overall it's actually fairly entertaining although it does run out of energy and ideas by the end.

Disclaimer for avid Shannon Tweed fans: there's no nudity whatsoever in this movie. That could be surprising to some, but as I always say: guess there's a first time for everything. This isn't really the kind of sleazy soft-core flick Tweed is usually known for either, it's more of a sleazy dumb action flick. I'll never go as far as calling this screenplay unsubtle, but at one point Tweed's character is described as "Bruce Lee with boobs". Just saying. The whole thing is entertaining enough though, mainly because of the bizarre choice of co-stars. Rowdy Roddy Piper and Andrew Dice Clay, who the hell did the casting on this one? Whoever it was, he or she rules the Earth. The action scenes look pretty good too by the way, Bruce Lee with boobs kicks some serious ass at some point. This movie actually looks like it was meant to be as generic and cheap as possible, but luckily there's too much coolness in it to make that happen.