Product Details

• Actors: Tim Bruner, Harold Connor, Brandon De-Wilde, Drake Diamond, Gary Green
• Directors: Brandon De-Wilde, Lou Kennedy
• Format: Color, Dolby, DVD, NTSC
• Language: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: R (Restricted)
• Studio: Echo Bridge Home Entertainment
• DVD Release Date: January 1, 2001
• Run Time: 86 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B00005JA8G
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #220,556 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
• For more information about "Breathing Fire" visit the Internet Movie Database (IMDb)

Editorial Reviews

BREATHING FIRE - DVD Movie

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Not Bad, August 20, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Breathing Fire (DVD)

BREATHING FIRE tells the story of two young martial arts masters, Vietnamese Charlie (Johnathan Ke Quan) and Tony (Eddie Saavedra) who live together as brothers, but actually are not. In truth, Tony's father, Michael Moore (Jerry Trimble) killed Charlie's mother back in 'Nam, and his brother David (Ed Neil) gave Michael a nice guilt trip and forced him to to raise Charlie, then an infant, as his own son. That has been kept from Charlie long into his teen years.

In fact, Michael hides alot of things from his family. He and his chopsocky gang have robbed a bank of several million dollars. It was successful in part because the bank executive Peter Stern (Drake Diamond) is on their side. After locking up their stolen haul, the bad guys destroy the keys to their vault, but not before making impressions of them in a plastic pizza and dividing it equally to keep the honor amongst themselves.

After Stern decides to turn himself and the gang into the cops, the gang shows up and kills him and his wife, but thier daughter Annie (Laura Hamilton) escapes with her father's slice of the pizza and heads to David, Charlie, and Tony, who agree to protect her.

BREATHING FIRE, like so many other "kickboxing" martial arts movies, has a cast that is composed mostly of real-life martial arts champions. That's a wise choice to satisfy martial arts fans. Those in search of riveting, oscar-worthy performances, however, I would advise to steer clear. PKC Kickboxing Champ Jerry Trimble may have a well-molded physique and that overall look of pure evil, (He was also the bad guy in the kick-{ing}Jet Li 1989 Hong Kong movie, THE MASTER, which is now finally seeing a stateside release) but it doesn't much help him. Trimble is so lacking in any acting ability, his performance in BREATHING FIRE achieves somekind of benchmark : it may not be possible for another martial arts champion to give a worse performance.

However, who does watch these movies for their crummy dialouge and tacky acting? Not me, but we do watch for the martial arts action, which BREATHING FIRE has plenty of. It's so loaded with hyperactive karate mayhem, it more than makes up for the lousy acting. BREATHING FIRE certainly lives up to it's title.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars at least it has bolo, July 14, 2007

By 

dominion_ruler "Bryan" (Carolina, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Breathing Fire (DVD)

Breathing Fire is a super cheesy martial arts films, set in the tradition of the "No Retreat No Surrender" movies. There is the similar poor acting, cheesy characters, cheap music, cheesy sound effects, and actually lots of cool looking cheesy fights. Breathing Fire though still doesn't feel as enjoyable as No Retreat No Surrender, and ends up just being rather cheesy in a bad way. The fights are not as fun and the charcaters are not as enjoyable. The only two standouts that are memorable, are of course Bolo Yeung and Jonathan Ke Quan - simply for his famous role as Short Round in Temple of Doom and his role in The Goonies.

This movie is basically inconsistent. It has an original story that actually has a bit of a complex plot for these types of movies. It is about 2 brothers - Charlie and Tony - who live together with their father (Jerry Trimble) who is secretly in the business of robbing and stealing. We know this in the beginning of the film, but they do not learn about it till much later. In the meantime, one of the men that worked for their father, decides he wants out, and in return the rest of the gang kill him and his wife, leaving an orphaned daughter. She seeks out help from a man who is actually the father's brother, and he takes her to live with the 2 brothers and their father. While the story is a bit interesting, it is filled with goofy moments throughout, as well as horrible acting that is some of the worst I ever seen. Fights are good, but in the cheesy manner, as most look very fake, but still manage to entertain.

As for Bolo Yeung's performance, his first appearance in this film is classic - dressed like an old lady while he and the rest of the gang are ready to rob a bank. He has a few fights in this movie, but most are dissapointing and weaker than in most of his films. He doesn't really get enough chances to make his presence known, but he is still fun to watch when it is his turn.

Basically and over-all supercheese-fest that is not the classic fun-filled cheese like No Retreat No Surrender. Its still fun at times, and it does have Bolo Yeung and everyone's favorite boy from the Temple of Doom who is now an older teenager. Expect a movie with no realism whatsoever.

3.0 out of 5 stars "The reason it won't break is because you fear it", May 13, 2010

By 

Mike Sehorn "Rezo the Dezo" (APO, AE United States) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Breathing Fire (DVD)

"Breathing Fire" bears striking similarities to Ng See-Yuen's No Retreat, No Surrender trilogy and its additional installments (e.g. The King of the Kickboxers) - indeed, so many that if you're curious enough, you'll check to see if anybody who worked on the former was involved in this one. No Ng See-Yuen or Corey Yuen to be found in the cast list, but producer Brandon Pender worked on the action content of the original "No Retreat, No Surrender", so one can assume that he's responsible for the resemblance in style, production, acting content, and martial arts action. I can't imagine that you haven't seen any of the aforementioned movies if you've managed to locate this one, so chances are that you'll know what to expect.

The story: socialite Michael Moore (Jerry Trimble, The Master) is a respectable father in the public eye, but unbeknownst to his kickboxing sons Charlie (Jonathan Ke Quan, Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom) and Tony (Eddie Saavedra), his wealth is the product of many bank robberies. When he murders a partner following a major heist, the man's daughter (Laura Hamilton) finds shelter among Moore's sons, who must learn a powerful style of kung fu from their uncle David (Ed Neil) if they are to protect the girl and themselves from their father's henchmen.

Having Bolo Yeung (Bloodsport) on the cover of the DVD is extremely misleading: while he's arguably the biggest star of the ensemble and does get a respectable number of fight scenes, he's nevertheless just a thug in Jerry Trimble's gang. Heck, the first time you see him he's actually dressed in drag, shortly after which he stuffs a bank manager's head down a toilet. This buffoonish tone remains consistent throughout the film: Charlie and Tony somehow manage to turn a wall-painting chore into a dance contest a'la Tom Sawyer, their friend Mickey (T.J. Storm, Conan: The Adventurer) channels R.J. Madison via a dead-on Michael Jackson imitation in a club, the brothers train by punching phonebooks and attacking watermelons, later getting attacked in a bar by a trio of little people... Oh, and then there's aftermath of the bank heist, wherein the robbers make an impression of a vault key in pizza dough for security purposes, inevitably leading to a climatic fight over a piece of it. No, don't bother scratching your head - I don't get it either, but rest assured, you'd better be up for a laugh if you commit yourself to this movie.

The martial arts content isn't quite as off-the-wall as the See-Yuen movies but are still well-shot and creative, with plenty of opportunity for Jonathan Short Round to show off his hitherto-unshowcased tae kwon do abilities. Bolo and Jerry also are more than serviceable, but the surprise physical performances come from no-name stars like Eddie Saavera, henchman Allen Tackett, and Ed Neil (who was in the Lord Zedd costume throughout Mighty Morphin Power Rangers) as the screwup kung fu master. There's no wirework but plenty of jumping kicks, flipping and spinning, and people getting thrown through windows and tables - all finely choreographed and with minimal doubling. The only falling point here is that most of the fights are quite short or feature frequent intercutting to another scene. Luckily, the best fight of the bunch - the end battle - features none of these hiccups and sends you home with a newfound respect for the performers.

I didn't necessarily like the film's climax, which involves a backstory regarding Charlie's parentage and Michael turning a complete 180 to make sure you don't feel sorry about his fate. Also, the Echo Bridge DVD release of this film is in no state to impress: it's clearly been transferred directly from a VHS copy, leaving the picture looking muddy and the frame rate noticeably flawed during the action scenes (get the Westlake Entertainment version if you can). Nevertheless, it's a fun enough karate flick if you're into this kind of stuff, so if you've watched all of the "NRNS" sequels and are still hungry for more, this is about as close as you'll get to the real thing.