The Challenge
Director: John Frankenheimer
Year: 1982
Rating: 7.0
I saw this decades ago and really liked it as one
of the better West meets East action films in which West often gets its ass
kicked at first but eventually comes out on top. Some of the Asian exoticism
feels rather out of fashion and uncomfortable now but it sat fine with me
35 years ago. Times change. But fortunately the coolness of Scott Glenn and
Toshiro Mifune never gets old. Having them both in this film at times in
conflict, at times in alliance is a pleasure. Mifune was past his glorious
films with Kurosawa and doing a lot of Japanese TV and western films, but
he is still a powerful presence on the screen. Glenn was still at the beginning
of his career and though he has been in loads of films, he never reached
the fame I expected. Maybe it was the awful haircut that he had in many of
his early films.
This feels a bit B'ish for director John Frankenheimer who helmed such great
films as The Manchurian Candidate, Ronin, 52 Pick-up, Grand Prix, Black Sunday,
French Connection II, Seven Days in May, The Train and Seconds - but he had
his share of so-so films as well. This falls into the middle for me.
Glenn is a washed up boxer who gets hired by a Japanese family to smuggle
an ancient sword into Japan - but another Japanese group is trying to steal
it by any means possible. The two competing groups are headed by brothers
- one a traditional family that trains in martial arts; the other brother
is a wealthy businessman who uses guns and deceit - guess which one Toshiro
Mifune is? Glenn begins as an oafish foreigner who slowly converts to a warrior.
The scene of him buried to his head for five days and having to eat bugs
to survive is great as is the last 30 minutes of the film that is a terrific
action segment. That 30 minutes takes the film from average to good.
