Miami Connection (1987) – Review

According to 80s movies, everyone knew martial arts – where a big kung fu brawl could break at a moment’s notice – but sadly not everyone could be Chuck Norris, so for every badass martial arts flick made there are a dozen duds to be found. Which brings us to Miami Connection, a film so terrible it is actually awe-inspiring to behold. From the poor camerawork to the stilted acting, to some of the most unconvincing fight scenes ever put to film, and that writer/producer/star Y.K. Kim was an actual black belt in Tae Kwon is just added sadness as he did not have the ability to translate that to the screen in any way shape or form.

The movie takes place in Orlando, Florida, which is certainly a strange location for a movie called Miami Connection as at no point does anyone go to Miami – or make references to any kind of connection – at least none that I could tell. The story deals with an evil group of motorcycle riding ninjas that are moving in on the local drug trade, and how they are thwarted by the “rock” band Dragon Sound, and yes, I will admit that not one part of that sentence isn’t awesome, unfortunately, what follows is not.

Dragon Sound, the fusion of music and tae kwon do.

The films key villains are Jeff (William Ergle) and Yashito (Si Y Jo), and it is Jeff who runs the local gang element, while Yashito operates the ninja training camp that supplies Jeff with his ninjas. Their operation is shown to have some bugs in it when a group of their ninjas takes out a rival drug gang, but then forget to steal the money. Adding to those problems is the band Dragon Sound as John (Vincent Hirsch), one of the band’s supposed singers, is dating Jeff’s sister Jane (Kathy Collier), and Jeff is not cool with that.

It’s West Side Story meets Scarface.

But that’s not all the drama this film provides as there is also a rival band that got replaced by Dragon Sound at the local hot spot – we’re assuming also the only club in Miami – and they want their gig back. At first, they try to force the club owner to fire Dragon Sound and hire them back, but it turns out the owner also knows martial arts, and he beats the crap out of them. So their next option is to go and take out Dragon Sound in a street brawl, but that they had just gotten their collective asses handed to them by 40 something-year-old club owner, this does not bode well for that plan of action.

I do like to think that all contract disputes are handled like this.

They are of course trounced by Dragon Sound, and so their only recourse is to go to Jeff and his gang for help. Jeff certainly is all up for taking out these punks, who would dare date his sister and put her in their band, so they challenge Dragon Sound to a fight at a nearby train yard, that ends in a draw when the cops arrive.  One can clearly tell that most of the cast members are all friends of writer/producer Y.K. Kim (who also plays band member Mark and tae kwon do mentor to the group), and this movie comes across more like a martial arts version of a Judy Garland/Mickey Rooney movie where a bunch of local kids decides, “Let’s put on a show!” That these people actually have training in tae kwon do is apparent – they do have some skills – but that director Richard Park and Y.K. Kim have no clue as to how to film or choreograph fight scenes is also very apparent.

The film does include the required ninja training camp scene.

For some reason Y.K. Kim thought this movie needed even more story elements, so he tossed in a plot thread about how Dragon Sound members are all orphans and that Jim (Maurice Smith), the one black member, has been trying to locate his dad for quite some time. The Oscar-worthy clip of Jim breaking down and crying in front of his bandmates is truly something special.

“My mother was Korean, and my father was Black American. She gave me this picture when she was real sick. I was only nine years old.” *sniff*

The movie all comes to a head when Jim gets a letter informing him that his father has been located, and so the band rushes out to get him a new suit because I guess meeting your long lost dad in your karate Gi or band T-shirt isn’t cool. While on route to the airport to meet Jim’s dad they are set upon by the Miami ninja clan.

I’m not really sure how stealthy this is.

This film is terrible, it is so bad that its made me re-think how I feel about Tommy Wiseau’s masterpiece The Room, and making one think of The Room – while watching your movie – is not a good thing. It’s clear that this film was a passion project of Y.K. Kim’s, and that he really wanted to promote the awesomeness that is tae kwon do. Throughout the film members of Dragon Sound spout out platitudes about the peace-loving aspects of tae kwon do, and how their band should go on a world tour and spread the message. We even get a tag line at the end of the movie, “Only through the elimination of violence can we achieve world peace.” That’s a strange message to end a film that contains ninjas carving up people in gouts of fake blood.

Creating world peace one bloody corpse at a time.

This is a hard film to recommend to even lovers of bad martial arts movies, as not only is the acting atrocious and the fight sequences rather lame – even by standards of the day – but there is also the songs, the godawful songs that go on FOREVER. So I will end off this review with a clip of Dragon Sound and their chart-topping hit “Against the Ninja” If you can handle this song you may be able to survive the Miami Connection.