Best of the Best 4: Without Warning

Phillip Rhee stars as Tommy Lee, the same martial artist who must rescue his daughter from Russian (?) spies who want him to give them back the disc that he's gotten a hold of in exchange for his daughter safe and sound, much kung fu ensues. I actually enjoyed this the best, to be fair I sort of liked the first one, but this one had all the silliness and action that I've come to expect from the typical kung fu/actioner. This loses the racist elements of the abominable third entry and gives us more martial arts, stupid plot threads and a hot love interest for our hero. Phillip Rhee, while no gifted thespian, is surprisingly likable and seems far more exciting in the fight sequences than he was in parts 1-3. Indeed, his fight sequences are intensely choreographed and Rhee proves to be an excellent director as martial arts sequences go. Also the cast includes Ernie Hudson, Tobin Bell (Jigsaw from Saw) and Art La Fleur. Also there is torture that involves a pitching machine, bad guys who screw up a traffic light, to cause an accident and tons of kickboxing. Indeed the film is an excuse to give us Phillip Rhee at his ass-kicking best and frankly, who on earth can hate such a flick?

* *1/2 Out Of 4-(Pretty Good)

BEST OF THE BEST 4: WITHOUT WARNING is the fourth and final of this martial arts-based series. Now that I've seen all of them, I can report that the second one is by far the best; the first one was weak and unfocused and the third too derivative a thriller. The fourth is much like the third was: it has some good action scenes but the plot is entirely derivative and it's not as good as the second in the series.

Phillip Rhee once again returns to write, direct, and star in the whole thing. Oddly, he's now a widower with a six-year-old daughter, which is bizarre given he was single in the last movie which only seemed to take place a couple of years previously. Rhee falls foul of the Russian mob, who are searching for a plot MacGuffin in the form of a computer disc that just so happens to fall into Rhee's possession. Action ensues.

BEST OF THE BEST 4 is a film with cheesy stunts and cheesier action, including an explosive encounter with a tanker and plenty of motorbike action. The action is pretty cool, especially the early encounter in a corner street store between Rhee and a couple of goons, even though the story and characters are sub-standard. Still, there are a few familiar faces in this one, not least Ernie Hudson (GHOSTBUSTERS) as a tough-talking cop, SAW's Tobin Bell as the villain of the piece, Schwarzenegger double Sven-Ole Thorsen as a henchman (what else?), Paul Gleason (DIE HARD) as a priest, and Art La Fleur (THE BLOB) as an ally.

I thought this was the worst of the four Best of the Best Movies. Although Phillip Rhee in my opinion does a good job in all, I thought the acting was for the most part subpar in this film and didn't think the plot was all that great. Some decent fight scenes.

The first two best of the best films, I feel, were the most entertaining but this fourth addition with Ernie Hudson was watchable and contained 2 really good fight scenes and one amazing shootouts! In general with it's low budget the film made due very well and I was glad I had watched it. If you liked the first two or three you will certainly enjoy the fourth.

Is there a Best of the Best 3.5? I'm just asking because in this film Tommy is a widower with a six year old kid and last time we saw Tommy he was young free and single. He's also got his Tae Kwon Do school back after telling folk in the last film he gave it up. Hey-ho. Let's not over think things.

Who's gonna mess with Tommy's family this time and then act all surprised when his cheesy feet start zooming towards their faces, knocking their teeth out and stuff? This time you've got the bad guy from Saw, some other guy, and Killian's henchman from The Running Man out to get a disc from Tommy that he didn't even know he had, as some girl slipped it into his pocket shortly before being machine gunned to death by a bad guy from some counterfeiting gang.

This gang steal and entire truck at the start of the film and waste loads of cops so we know they mean business. They also prove to be the biggest bunch of morons Tommy's had to face, as they do the one thing that Tommy hates the most – That's right, they target his family.

Blah blah fight scenes, blah blah threats. Tommy kicks his way through a lot of bad guys in this one, but I reckon we spend a bit too much time with the bad guys in-fighting rather that Tommy jumping all over their heads. He's also managed to go up against bad guys that take themselves out! Not only are they all threatening and shooting each other, one of them manages to kill more bad guys than Tommy.

Seriously, there's loads of bad guys chasing Tommy at one end of a tunnel on motorbikes, and this one guy at the other end of the tunnel grabs a truck and speeds towards them, then misses Tommy, then hits the rest of the bad guys causing a huge explosion that takes out a helicopter too. All Tommy had to do was get out of the way.

Phillip Rhee also directs this one too, and it'll do for a quick action fix. The second film's the best one in the series by my reckoning. I think there was plans for a fifth one where Tommy didn't even bother getting out of bed while the bad guys just took care of themselves.