{"id":1421,"date":"2024-07-29T22:39:53","date_gmt":"2024-07-29T22:39:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=1421"},"modified":"2024-10-14T11:37:09","modified_gmt":"2024-10-14T15:37:09","slug":"gymkata","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/07\/29\/gymkata\/","title":{"rendered":"Gymkata"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Gymkata <\/strong>(1985)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 MGM\/Action-Adventure\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 90 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (language, strong martial arts violence, bloody images, brief nudity)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Robert Clouse\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Charles Robert Carner\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Alfi Kabiljo\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Godfrey A. Godar\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date:\u00a0 May 3, 1985 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Kurt Thomas, Tetchie Agbayani, Richard Norton, Edward Bell, John Barrett, Conan Lee, Bob Schott, Buck Kartalian, Eric Lawson, Sonny Barnes, Tadashi Yamashita, Sharan Lea.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: $5.7M (US)<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: ***<\/p>\n

\u00a0How can anybody pass up a movie like Gymkata<\/strong>? You\u2019ve got to love an action flick whose tagline promises a new style of fighting that combines \u201cthe skill of gymnastics\u201d with \u201cthe kill of karate\u201d. To date, it\u2019s the only movie that I know of in which the hero employs these rather unique martial arts techniques.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Gymkata<\/strong> is the very definition of guilty pleasure. It\u2019s so bad, it\u2019s great. It shamelessly borders on parody. I found myself laughing a lot for all the wrong reasons. It\u2019s not supposed to be a comedy. It shouldn\u2019t be this enjoyable. Damned if I didn\u2019t find myself liking this dopey action flick and believe me, they don\u2019t come much dopier than this.<\/p>\n

\u00a0As a straightforward action flick, Gymkata <\/strong>isn\u2019t too bad if you can get around the ridiculous premise. It attempts to do for Olympic gymnast Kurt Thomas what Bloodsport would do for martial artist Jean-Claude Van Damme. On that level, it doesn\u2019t succeed at all. Thomas has zero screen presence and no acting talent whatsoever. I can\u2019t imagine what the producers thought as they watched the dailies. However, he\u2019s NOT the first professional athlete to fall into this category. At the time, NOBODY thought bodybuilding champ Arnold Schwarzenegger could act. NOBODY thought he had much of a future in film. He\u2019s probably still laughing all the way to the bank. In short, the producers gambled on Thomas and lost. In my opinion, his terrible performance is part of the fun. I will say this in the late gymnast\u2019s favor.\u00a0 He\u2019s better at the acting thing than Mitch Gaylord. Remember American Anthem? Then you know exactly what I\u2019m talking about.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The Special Intelligence Agency (SIA) approaches gymnast Jonathan Cabot (Thomas) after a match and asks him for a huge favor. They want him to enter the fictional country of Parmistan and compete in something called \u201cThe Game\u201d. It\u2019s basically an endurance\/obstacle race in which the players are pursued by Parmistan warriors. All foreigners who enter Parmistan MUST play the Game. The winner of the Game is granted their life and one request. No foreigner has won the race in 900 years. Cabot\u2019s SIA agent father (Lawson) took part in the Game and (supposedly) got killed by the pursuing warriors. The odds are definitely not in Jonathan\u2019s favor.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The US government wants to place a Star Wars satellite station in Parmistan to monitor all the satellites around the world. It would serve as an early warning system in case of a nuclear attack. Guess what the SIA wants Jonathan to request if\/when he wins the Game? As if this isn\u2019t already enough to take in, there\u2019s also some business about an attempted coup against the country\u2019s leader, the Khan (Kartalian). The man behind the coup is none other than the Khan\u2019s trusted right hand man Zamir (Norton, The Octagon). If no foreigner has survived the Game in 900 years, how does the SIA know all this? Simple, Princess Rubali (Agbayani) told them. She\u2019s the Khan\u2019s daughter and is trying to help her father keep his title and his life. Here\u2019s another question. If Parmistan is so isolated and insular, how did she manage to get out and deliver all this valuable intel? The plot of Gymkata <\/strong>has more holes than a loaf of Swiss cheese.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Rubali and a few others help Jonathan train for the Game over the next two months. It\u2019s the oddest training I\u2019ve ever seen, it consists of Cabot listening to the sound of an axe whooshing through the air and learning to walk up a set of stairs on his hands. Whatever happened to \u201cWax on, wax off.\u201d?<\/p>\n

\u00a0He completes his training and heads off to Parmistan with the princess. The only way to get into Parmistan is through the town of Karabal. While there, he gets attacked by anti-American terrorists who kidnap the princess. It\u2019s a perfect opportunity for him to put his newly acquired fighting skills to use. In one of those coincidences that only happen in B-movies, the terrorists chase him into an alley where there just happens to be a bar (as in a parallel bar) between the two buildings. How convenient! Nimble Jonathan swings around this bar and kicks the crap out of the bad guys. He manages to rescue the princess and they proceed on their journey.<\/p>\n

\u00a0What does this have to do with the plot? Absolutely nothing! It\u2019s an excuse for the filmmakers to throw in an action scene. It also shows what an adept action hero Jonathan has become over the past two months. By the way, have I mentioned that Cabot and the princess fell in love during that time? Yep, I\u2019m afraid so. How predictable! Naturally, he learns she\u2019s been promised to Zamir shortly after arriving in Parmistan.<\/p>\n

\u00a0By the time the Game begins, he has every reason to try and win. Zamir has every reason to make sure he loses. He also has his own reason for plotting an overthrow. It involves selling the satellite rights to the enemy (whoever the hell that is!). It\u2019s a pretty brutal competition that involves the usual crap, climbing up steep cliffs and crossing a rope bridge while ninjas (I think) shoot arrows at the players. There\u2019s one original obstacle though. The players have to make it across a village populated entirely by the criminally insane. I never would have thought that there would be so many insane people in such a small country. It\u2019s a B-movie, so what the hell!<\/p>\n

\u00a0Now that you\u2019ve read this synopsis, I\u2019m sure you will agree Gymkata<\/strong> sounds perfectly ludicrous. It most certainly plays that way. I know I shouldn\u2019t like this movie. It\u2019s junk, pure junk. Everything about it has \u201cBAD MOVIE\u201d written all over it. Sorry not sorry, I just can\u2019t help myself.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Gymkata <\/strong>is directed by Robert Clouse, the guy who first introduced Bruce Lee to American audiences with Enter the Dragon. There\u2019s no denying the 1973 kung-fu actioner is a kick-ass classic. Clouse\u2019s list of credits also includes Black Belt Jones (starring Jim Kelly), Game of Death (Bruce Lee in his final role), The Big Brawl (Jackie Chan) and China O\u2019Brien (Cynthia Rothrock). He\u2019s a pretty good director as far as action flicks go. In my opinion, he\u2019s made a reasonably entertaining movie here. In fact, I would even say it\u2019s a little more than reasonably entertaining. It\u2019s downright fun!<\/p>\n

\u00a0I get a real kick out of the sloppy editing and stupid dialogue. My favorite line comes when a character says \u201cDon\u2019t worry, her mother is Indonesian\u201d when assuring Jonathan that the princess can be trusted. Okay, I\u2019m convinced. Most of all, I love how NOBODY in Parmistan (except the princess) looks even remotely Asian. The Khan looks like Albert Einstein, for Pete\u2019s sake! Nobody in Gymkata<\/strong> can act, especially Tetchie Agbayani. She\u2019s definitely attractive, but she has absolutely no talent. She reads her lines so flatly, I kept wondering if her character was supposed to be under a trance of some kind.<\/p>\n

\u00a0I didn\u2019t get to see Gymkata<\/strong> at the movies. It didn\u2019t open in any theaters that teenage Movie Guy 24\/7 could get to easily. I often wonder how audiences reacted to this movie. It would have been interesting to watch this with an audience full of action fans. I rented it when it came out on video (around Thanksgiving weekend) and ended up watching it twice in the same day. I thought it was great. I still do. There\u2019s something about cheesy action flicks from Cannon that makes me feel good. They\u2019re like cinematic comfort food. They\u2019re not good for your brain, but they\u2019re so satisfying.\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Gymkata (1985)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 MGM\/Action-Adventure\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 90 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (language, strong martial arts violence, bloody images, brief nudity)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Robert Clouse\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Charles Robert Carner\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Alfi Kabiljo\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Godfrey A. Godar\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date:\u00a0 May 3, 1985 (US)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Kurt Thomas, Tetchie Agbayani, Richard Norton, Edward Bell, John Barrett, Conan Lee, Bob Schott, Buck Kartalian, Eric […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1627,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[27,9,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1421","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-b-movies","category-guilty-pleasures","category-kick-ass-actioners"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/Gymkata-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1421","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1421"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1421\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2943,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1421\/revisions\/2943"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1627"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1421"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1421"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1421"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}