Films from the ’90s were known for two genres: action and comedy. Cops on the beat ready for a drug bust after prolonged detective work only to find out they have the wrong guy. Childhood friends growing up in suburbia trying to make it in the big city, only to cause mayhem in their idiosyncratic and hyperbolic ways. Whether it was meant to make you laugh or fill you with suspense, there was no shortage of films to choose from. Both genres were so inseparable, that they combined the best of both worlds. Instead of procedural crime dramas and feel-good, funny antics, audiences got the buddy cop. Not too serious, not too silly, just seriously funny.
Kindergarten Cop gave us Arnold Schwarzenegger teaching toddlers how to be tough as a Terminator, Ace Ventura: Pet Detective gave us Jim Carrey solving wild capers with serendipitous and auspicious bravado, and Beverly Hills Ninja gave us Chris Farley pursuing his love of martial arts one fumble and tumble at a time. One actor who takes the leap into action comedy and sticks the landing (and a few henchmen!) is Rutger Hauer in Blind Fury. This love letter to the Japanese Zatoichi samurai film series was unsuccessful at the box office, but memorable moments from the sword-swinging romp still hold up to make it an essential ’90s action comedy.
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Silly Sixth Sense
TriStar Pictures
Blinded in the Vietnam War by a mortar blast, Nick Parker goes MIA and is taught to hone his senses as a true Blade Runner by the local village people. Rather than giving in to his handicap as a weakness, the Vietnamese renewed his hope and humanity. The short training montage was endearing and inspiring, one that rids the world of excuses and replaces them with methodical actions. Hauer was well-known for his character roles and embodied a blind man (blind martial artist, Lynn Manning, to be exact) convincingly.
He admitted that Blind Fury was one of his most challenging roles for its use of body language. Redirecting your senses, learning and unlearning them, is no easy task to convey on screen. Reinventing and normalizing an impediment like blindness was a remarkable creative tool for the genre, highlighting the comedic and tragic. The seasoned Dutch actor gives it an optimistic and authentic scope.
Slapstick Samurai
Nick returns to the United States after learning that his friend from the war, Frank Devereaux (Terry O’Quinn) is alive. At the home of Frank’s ex-wife, Lynn (Meg Foster) and their son Billy (Brandon Call), gangsters attack, killing her in a failed attempt to kidnap Billy. Her dying wish is for Nick to take Billy to see his father in Reno, Nevada, where he is being forced to make drugs for the casino crime boss, Claude MacCready (Noble Willingham).
Throughout the film, the “accidental” maneuvers and choreography were precise, but never to the point of feeling robotic. Replacing the white cane with a walking stick that functions doubly as a scabbard for a sword is ingenious. How Nick uses the sword is an extension of himself. He does not want to fight you, as his humble origins remind him of the loyalty and honor he was given. If he must fight you, it is from a place of defense to protect the natural order lost in a corrupted world. His cutting sense of humor never fails to see right through you. Not bad for a blind man.
Strong Men Aren’t Afraid To Cry
Some balk at the sentimental in action flicks. It is understandable, there is no time for blowing noses when the bad guy needs to be blown away. Others see the action as a hurried knee-jerk gyroscope gone out of control. There is plenty to keep our attention, but if there is too much happening, then we get overstimulated and the exciting quickly becomes overbearing or worse, boring. Blind Fury takes its time and wastes no time.
The unsavory henchmen, including the towering Slag (played by heavyweight boxer and martial artist, Randall “Tex” Cobb), are not just mindless puppets. They arrive on-screen complete with their own colorful personalities. Sho Kosugi, the Japanese actor who popularized ninjas in the 1980s, plays the hired assassin, adding another layer of authenticity to the modern martial arts film. The interactions between Nick and Billy are sincere and irreverent; a fun old-versus-young push and pull. Billy sees what he does not know and needs Nick’s guiding wisdom. Nick knows what it is like to see innocence through Billy’s eyes and learns to be young at heart again.
Blind Fury puts us in the footsteps of a blind man, seeing what he sees, knowing what he knows. Best of all, the writing is sharp enough to cut a cantaloupe into four quadrants. Memorable lines top off an action comedy. Simple but salient lines like, “Unreasonable men make life so difficult” and “I also do circumcision.” Blind Fury is action and comedy in equal parts like a strong man who is not afraid to cry.
