Bullet Points: Rage and Honor II

Sometimes movies wait too long to put out a sequel… a prime example of this would be Gremlins, which was a huge blockbuster hit in 1984… but by the time the 1989 sequel came out there was no momentum.

Nobody can accuse Rage and Honor of making that mistake as just one year later, Rage and Honor II was in video stores…

• Bank Job: Kris Fairchild (Cynthia Rothrock, Sworn to Justice), who was a teacher/martial arts instructor in Rage and Honor, has made the natural career transition to government operative and we see Kris in a hostage rescue mission as the movie begins and SHE GETS SHOT IN THE NECK! No worries, what we were actually watching was a training exercise, one that Kris obviously failed… but that doesn’t discourage her boss to send her on her first assignment. Kris will be going undercover at a bank in Jakarta believed to be laundering money. Kris’ contact when she arrives will be Agent Stevens…

• Parking Garage Blues: When we first see Agent Stevens he’s on a pay phone calling into Edwards, fearing his cover may have been blown. This is also where we are introduced to Thor, a poor man’s Matthias Hues played by Ron Vreeken (American Samurai) who is following Stevens. When Kris lands in Jakarta, Stevens is not their to meet her at the airport, that’s because he was too busy getting run over in a parking garage. Kris ends up taking a cab to Stevens’ place, where she finds it ransacked and deals with some of the ransackers who were still on site. In fact she treats one of the guys like they were Jazz and she was Uncle Phil… this is also where Kris and Thor lock eyes for the first time.
• Willy’s Bar: Agent Stevens helped prove that parking garages are some of the most dangerous places in all of action movies, but Preston Michaels (Richard Norton, Rage) is about to prove the bar fight rule when he shows up for his shift as the bartender at Willy’s Bar and finds his co-worker Charlie getting hassled by some goons looking for protection money. Preston takes care of them with ease despite being outnumbered, this impresses the hell out of Tommy Andrews (Patrick Muldoon, Black Cat Run) who becomes something of a Preston Michaels fan boy until Preston finally agrees to train Tommy how to fight.

• Reunited: One day after a training session Tommy goes out to his car and is greeted by Thor and his goon friends, they’ve disabled Tommy’s car and are looking to kidnap him… fortunately Preston hears the commotion and comes to Tommy’s aid. Preston then takes Tommy home and Tommy invites Preston to come in and join the party that his bank president father is throwing, he sweetens the deal by mentioning his hot new co-worker that will be at the party… that hot co-worker is Kris Fairchild and the man she is in Jakarta to investigate is Tommy’s father! Kris pretends not to know Preston at the party so she doesn’t blow her cover… but later that night the two meet up and she fills Preston in on what she is doing in Jakarta. And Preston admits he moved to Jakarta since things weren’t looking to good for him in Los Angeles after the events of the first movie.
• Dirty Laundry: Tommy’s dad, Gerald Andrews is in fact laundering money for Indonesia’s most powerful crime boss, Buntao (Frans Tumbuan, Blood Warriors), and Gerald is starting to get greedy and is using the fact that he has records of all of Buntao’s dirty dealings to gain an advantage. This explains why Tommy has become a target and things are about to get worse the day after the party… Tommy invites Kris out for lunch, but when they get down to the lobby of the bank, they encounter Buntao’s goons. This leads to a car chase that ends up with Kris and Tommy’s car flipping and soon after exploding (SPOILER ALERT: Kris and Tommy got out in time). Preston gets involved at this point and he and Kris have to break the news to Tommy that his dad is a money launderer… Tommy doesn’t believe it at first, but when they find Tommy’s dad dead, it all makes sense. Now it is time to take Buntao down… but another underworld player named Dazzo enters the picture and the movie gets a twist that only Johnny Rico or Zack Morris probably saw coming.

If you loved the first Rage and Honor, you’ll love Rage and Honor II… both have great fight scenes, the winning combination of Rothrock and Norton and a surprising plot twist. The supporting cast was stronger in the original, but the car chase gave the sequel a boost in the action department so things even out.

And in the interest of keeping things even, my review of Rage and Honor had four Bonus Bullet Points, so my review of Rage and Honor II will also have four Bonus Bullet Points…

• If You Ever: …wanted to see Richard Norton use a fish as a weapon, then Rage and Honor II is the movie for you.
• Subtitled: Rage and Honor II was released as Rage and Honor II: Hostile Takeover for the DVD release in the United States.
• If You Ever: …wanted to hear the boss of a major crime syndicate sing his own version of Don Ho’s “Tiny Bubbles”, then Rage and Honor II is the movie for you.
• Travel Tip: When in Indonesia be sure to visit their hottest discotheque, aptly named Fire.