High Kicks

The movie does start off okay, cheesy acting and atrocious haircut by the male lead side.

Some thugs try to rob an aerobic studio and, when that fails, decide on a whim to just rape the owner instead.

Credit where it's due: there is no unnecessary nudeness in this movie, and the actual raping isn't shown. Instead we spent a very long time with the victim and how she tries to comprehend what has happened to her. Roth does indeed an acceptable job acting out the victim here. I guess she is the only one on set to actually have seen an acting school from the inside.

But sadly this is where everything goes downhill. We get treated to endless barrage of absolute boring scenes with Mr. Haircut and Ms. Aerobics Teacher on a boat, on a bike, in a café, on a boat (again) running around, doing aerobics... the actual plot is sidelined for most of the movie. Unbelievable.

No one would ever mistake a cheap shot on video experience like 'High Kicks' for a good movie. This is bad cheese of the highest order. How much you're willing to laugh at a story unable to pass an IQ test in addition to the poorly done fights is the name of the game here.

Sandy (Tara Lee-Anne Roth) owner and aerobic instructor of a newly opened gym sees a robbery turn rape via a gang of thugs lead by TC (Louis Lombardi). Trying to get past the horrible event she grows closer to new hire Sam (Dennis Swarthout) who teaches her the value of martial arts for self defense. As a potential romance heats up between the two so does a measure of justice taking out members of the gang one by one with Sam and his karate pals by her side.

Bathe in numerous musical montages to kill time and the most ethnically diverse street gang you've ever seen. Though my fav part is an attractive gym patron (Anastasia Alexander) who puts the moves on Sam and is none too subtle about it. The way he handles the situation is a hoot. The gym actually called "High Kicks!" and inside for the first time is to gawk at ladies working out in closeup. Camera work has a slightly perv feel, but the director follows through minus some minor hesitation (lol). No nudity whatsoever though.

Just oozing 90's vibes and able to melt a bunch of b-movie genres together (gym workout flick, karate of the lowest order, lite romance) 'High Kicks' surprised my dismal expectations. Those experienced in bad might warrant giving it a look on the lookout for laughs. Spotty audio capture of dialog leaves no ambiguity of its quality.

After being attacked and raped by a gang of hoodlums, an aerobics instructor named Sandy turns to her new friend Sam, a karate expert, for help. After some martial arts training, she and her newfound karate cohorts decide to bring their own brand of justice to these hoodlums since the police won't do anything about them. It should also be noted with regards to the plot that never ever, not even for one single moment, does it become convincing in its portrayal of events.

I swear I could feel my brain cells literally melting away as I watched this cheese fest that is when it wasn't being utterly overwhelmed by the almost vomiting inducing level of political correctness constantly a presence in this film. Indeed, the gang is made up of members from nearly every different race (must not discriminate after all when it comes to male sleaze balls) and all the guys in the film who seem to be actually able to fight seem to also be totally ineffectual as males for the most part, wearing pink t-shirts or sweatshirts, doing aerobics and basically anything our leading lady Sandy asks them to do. It's interesting that only the effeminate men seemed to be portrayed in a positive light. Possibly as a means to appease all those male sleazes watching at home, the camera does seem to continuously leer at women as they work out to the point you honestly expect this to turn into a full blown porno film at any moment (the music even lends itself to this suggestion). However it never does. In fact, it doesn't even have any nudity.

I watched "High Kicks" as part of the 10-movie DVD set called "Women Who Kick Butt". No doubt if that's the first film of the set you watch you'll be disappointed, but if you watch it (like me) after such atrocities as "Death Run To Istanbul" or "Flight To Danger" it seems comparatively better. The female lead takes her role very seriously and gives a convincing emotional and physical performance (she was stunt-doubled in some scenes by Michelle "Mouse" Krasnoo). The acting of the men sucks, but at least they seem to know what they're doing when it comes to martial arts. And although the film was cheaply shot on video, the camera-work is decent. Of course there are a lot of things that could be improved. The script is short on logic (how do they always manage to find the villains so easily?), the fight choreography is sometimes clumsy, and there should have been more action - the climactic fight, for example, should have been longer than 1 minute! (*1/2)

Like most of the other comments, I came into this movie totally unprepared for what I was about to see. This movie was so bad that I was cringing with every scene, but at the same time I was compelled to see what happened next. I just can't even believe that a movie this bad actually exists. When the movie ended, everyone in the room agreed that it was hands down the worst movie any of us had ever seen. And the fact that it was produced in 1993, but set in 1983 is beyond me. But then again, nothing else in this movie makes sense either, so who knows. This movie should be shown to prison inmates in solitary confinement. They'll never do a