We've all seen this story before: A group of cops arrest a drug lord, but the drug lord ends up escaping and takes out a few cops in the process. The cops track down the drug lord and the film ends in a climactic kung fu, endless bullet battle. Add in bad sound f/x that sound like Rocky punching beef, put in a laughable 80's music score, and top it off with a bad Chinese voice dubbing that even goes over the American actors. All in all, a typical Chinese action film we have seen an exhausting amount of times.

Despite the typical story, "China Heat" does have it's eye-rolling guilty pleasure moments that I can see a group of friends having a ball with. My favorite scenes include: a cop's head exploding Scanners style by a gunshot to the head; a bathroom brawl with two men dressed as women; henchmen throwing red buckets that came out of nowhere; a motorcycle jumping onto the top of an airplane; and cars clearly swerving away from a camera planted in the middle of the road.

The DVD

Video:
Summerstorm restored the 15-year-old print in 1.78:1 widescreen to the best of its ability, but a good chunk of scratches, lighting inconsistencies, and picture jumps still remain. However, Many scenes were visually clear and that's really the most you can ask for with a film like this.

Sound: It's hard to critique any audio track with bad Chinese voice dubbing and an overkill of similar sounding goofy sound effects, but the Dolby Digital Mono track sounds the best it can with such a limited variety of sounds.

Extras: Trailer fans take note- this disk contains not 1 or 2 trailers, but 28! First up- 15 Shaw Brothers movie trailers for: "The Magic Blade," "The Super Inframan," "Black Magic," "The Water Margin," "Heaven And Hell," "The Cave Of Silken Web," "Have Sword, Will Travel," "Bells Of Death," "Intimate Confessions Of A Chinese Courtesan," "Shaolin Intruders," "The Shadow Whip," "Vengeance Is A Golden Blade," "The Wandering Swordsman," "The Deadly Breaking Sword," and "The Legendary Weapons Of China. These are the type of fun chop-sockey movies that inspired Quentin Tarantino and would play at Grindhouse festivals.

As if that weren't enough trailers, there is also 13 additional trailers for: "China Heat," "Fearless Fighters," "The Executioner," "Bloody Brothers," "Angel Of Vengeance," "Exorcist Master," "Blood Stained Tradewinds," "Chase From Beyond," "Shaolin Family Soccer," "Lying Hero," "Madam City Hunter," "Retreat Of The Godfather" and "Revenge Of The Scarface." My personal favorite is "Exorcist Master." I had a good laugh seeing vampires with bad makeup flying through the air via wire work while being chased with a bladed umbrella.

Final Thoughts:
If you take the word "China" out of "China Heat," you have a movie worth seeing. Put the two words together, and you wind up with a movie to pass on.

Film and television enthusiast Nick Lyons recently had his first book published titled "Attack of the Sci-Fi Trivia." It is available on Amazon.com.