|
The most underrated classically masterful actor of the 1980s and 90s, Michael Dudikoff is something of an enigma. An action star like no other, unique in that he has a sort of quirky style, doesn't have a deep voice, but he's got the heart of a dragon. If any actor has the eye of the tiger, it's Michael Dudikoff. Now I enjoy a good B-movie, so you're more likely to appreciate Dudikoff's work if you've enjoyed a movie starring Dolph Lundgren or Van Damme. But I think any film fan could and should recognize and soak in the power of Michael Dudikoff. I'm posting this in a cheeky style, but this isn't some ironic thing, Dudikoff is one of my favorite actors, with a lot of gems. Have you heard of Michael Dudikoff? If you haven't, you're in for a treat. Here's the unofficial guide to the best Michael Dudikoff films. Radioactive Dreams (1985) - A post apocalyptic action comedy adventure, this movie is a gem I think most film fans wouldn't want to miss. Good movie. American Ninja (1985) - His claim to fame, with numerous sequels, this is just a good action movie with ninja. Van Damme fans must see this if they haven't. Avenging Force (1986) - I like this even better than American Ninja, a drat good action thriller. Matt Hunter goes up against an evil group called The Pentangle... classic Cannon, here's a thirty second TV spot to sell you. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9v_9ZNYhSw (Avenging Force) Midnight Ride (1990) - Mark Hamill and Robert Mitchum are in this. "A house wife just left her cop husband, when she picks up Justin Mckay she'll wish she never did as she's plunged into a nightmare and the grip of a psychotic killer." Enjoyable B-movie. Chain of Command (1994) - Your usual solid fun low budget actioner with great one liners, over-the-top villain, R. Lee Ermey, etc. I watched this with somebody who is not a Dudikoff fan, and I think it proves that this is watchable. The whole thing, this isn't one of those bad boring ones, despite a 4.2 from imdb constituents. I stand by this flick, it's better than you'd think. I gave it an 8. Bounty Hunters 2: Hardball (1997) - Jersey Bellini is back! You can skip Bounty Hunters 1, though it's ok, this one is a gem. Really funny, goes to show Dudikoff's range. Check out this minute trailer for a taste. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KnbsBYtfGAU (Hardball) There you go, six Dudikoff classics are your homework, cinema fans. Enjoy it! 
Heavy Metal fucked around with this message at 02:02 on Jun 23, 2016 |
#
?
Jun 23, 2016 01:48
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 24, 2024 02:09 |
|
|
I have seen and enjoyed American Ninja and would definitely be willing to further explore the work of Dudikoff. I've been meaning to watch Avenging Force so maybe i'll check that out soon. Sometimes you just want a good old fashioned 80s action film.
|
|
#
?
Jun 23, 2016 07:56
|
|
|
Wandle Cax posted:I have seen and enjoyed American Ninja and would definitely be willing to further explore the work of Dudikoff. I've been meaning to watch Avenging Force so maybe i'll check that out soon. Sometimes you just want a good old fashioned 80s action film. My friends and I are big American Ninja fans. They're such fun light-hearted cheesefests. We went into Avenging Force kind of expecting another American Ninja, especially since he's alongside Steve James again. But, it's quite a bit darker, so don't go in with those kind of expectations. It's still pretty good though.
|
|
#
?
Jun 23, 2016 19:13
|
|
|
In the Cannon films documentary, they interviewed him. Basically Golan-Globus promised Dudikoff the world. He was going to be the next big action star. Welp.
|
|
#
?
Jun 23, 2016 19:15
|
|
|
I think his speaking accent was just too conventional to compete with the action megastars of the 80s.
|
|
#
?
Jun 24, 2016 01:59
|
|
|
Wandle Cax posted:I think his speaking accent was just too conventional to compete with the action megastars of the 80s. Too true. If he just changed his name to Micheal Van Dudencastle he coulda been huge! Random note, for a while he was listed on the GI Joe: Retaliation imdb page as playing Quick Kick, even for a bit after the movie was out. Would've been great.
|
|
#
?
Jun 24, 2016 02:47
|
|
|
This guy sounds right up my alley. Anyone know if any of these choice films are on Netflix or Amazon Prime?
|
|
#
?
Jun 24, 2016 15:37
|
|
|
There is an unfortunate lack of Dudikoff on the major streaming services. Prime has one or two but not any of the "good" ones.
|
|
#
?
Jun 24, 2016 15:39
|
|
|
Heavy Metal posted:Avenging Force (1986) - I like this even better than American Ninja, a drat good action thriller. Matt Hunter goes up against an evil group called The Pentangle... classic Cannon, here's a thirty second TV spot to sell you. Thank you, I was trying to remember this movie's name for ages now and just looking at Dudikoff's IMDb page didn't ring any bells. Now I can hunt that movie down and see if it still holds up. I'm not sure whether I can consider myself a true Michael Dudikoff fan. I haven't seen that many Dudikoff movies, but then again his American Ninja movies were as much a staple of my childhood as, say, RoboCop. I do remember thinking "What is this bullshit, where is Michael Dudikoff?!" when I watched American Ninja 3.
|
|
#
?
Jun 24, 2016 17:07
|
|
|
I should watch American Ninja again. I don't remember much other than my childhood best friend showing the VHS tape to me with a shared air of reverence. We repeated it with American Ninja 2. I miss that uncomplicated enjoyment of a rad concept.
|
|
#
?
Jun 24, 2016 17:55
|
|
|
Grendels Dad posted:Thank you, I was trying to remember this movie's name for ages now and just looking at Dudikoff's IMDb page didn't ring any bells. Now I can hunt that movie down and see if it still holds up. Right on, righteous! Rough Lobster posted:This guy sounds right up my alley. Anyone know if any of these choice films are on Netflix or Amazon Prime? Some of his movies are on youtube. At least one of them is official, American Ninja is on a verified Paramount Vault account on there for free. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1B0I8-b_gJg
|
|
#
?
Jun 24, 2016 23:01
|
|
|
I liked him in Bachelor Party. "Nick the WHAT?!"
|
|
#
?
Jun 26, 2016 19:51
|
|
|
I wish Michael Dudikoff was in all five American Ninja flicks and more stuff in general. The guy is awesome. American Ninja II: The Confrontation is the best in the series to me and is one of the most fun movies ever made. Everyone in it is having a blast. Like It's not Flash Gordon next level this is the most easily fun and enjoyable thing in all of cinema tier but it's pretty close to me. I freaking love that movie. It and Atlantis Interceptors are the ones I use whenever people are like "I don't get it why would you watch a movie that's not great?" Another Michael Dudikoff flick that is a must see even though he's not the star is..............McBain*. In 1990 B movie gods Shapiro/Glikenhaus Productions (The Exterminator, TC 2000**) made a film about a low a steelworker named Bobby McBain. In it, McBain watched the man who saved his life in Vietman get executed on live tv during a failed revolution. So after some directionless political meandering he gathers is hold war buddies and, equipped with a cheap prop plane, a large number of rocket launchers, khaki pants and dockers, business casually invade and conquer Colombia for the resistance. Later, the President of the US decides that the bad guy in Colombia "decided to gently caress with the WRONG PRESIDENT." and then declares that from now on all US currency will be printed on red, white, and blue paper. My parents were insane mega-Republican at the time so I got to see this in a theater when I was like ten years old, incredible. Would you like to know who appears in this film at various points? Christopher Walken Maria Conchita Alonso Mickael Dudikoff Michael Ironside Steve James Luiz Guzman So please, I implore you all, watch this movie. *Believe it or not I do not think this influenced the Simpsons, but rather, besides Arnold flicks of course the Simpsons totally was influenced by the Gary Busey movie Bulletproof where he plays someone named "Bulletproof" McBain and it has multiple moments where people notice him and go "[url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9T2S8GHzxqc]McBain![/video]" **TC-2000 is a futuristic sequel to the Billy Blanks movie Talons of the Eagle, which you gotta see because it's literally Streets of Rage: The Movie (as opposed to the also unrelated vigilante flick starring Mimi Lessons actually titled Streets of Rage). Michael Dudikoff is not involved in either film but I think anyone reading this thread would feel great after watching both of these trailers. Bolo Yeung, Billy Blanks, Matthias Hues, and Bobbie Phillips in one movie. Bolo Yeung punches someone so hard the person he punches is totally unaffected but the person behind that person dies. Please watch these trailers. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87oTk73tOmo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LjtvljJQomU Anyways I'm sorry to go off topic from Michael Dudikoff, he's always rad and deserves better stuff now than Navy SEALS vs. Zombies or whatever.
|
|
#
?
Jun 26, 2016 21:16
|
|
|
Someone needs to do a Cyntia Rothrock effort post. I saw a bunch of movies she starred in back in the 90s, but the only one I can think of off the top of my head is Blown Away with Corey Haim.
|
|
#
?
Jun 26, 2016 21:46
|
|
|
Neo Rasa posted:American Ninja II: The Confrontation is the best in the series to me and is one of the most fun movies ever made. Everyone in it is having a blast. Like It's not Flash Gordon next level this is the most easily fun and enjoyable thing in all of cinema tier but it's pretty close to me. I freaking love that movie. It and Atlantis Interceptors are the ones I use whenever people are like "I don't get it why would you watch a movie that's not great?" I saw American Ninja II a dozen times before I ever saw American Ninja I, which made finally seeing American Ninja I very interesting. I advise anyone new to the franchise to do the same, American Ninja I will seem positively subdued and downright plausible after American Ninja II. American Ninja II was still more fun.
|
|
#
?
Jun 30, 2016 22:36
|
|
|
I must've seen American Ninja and the sequel over a hundred times as a kid, my brother and I would start acting out the fights when we were bored. Did anyone see Cobra, the TV series he played in? I swear I saw the whole season, but almost everything I remember about it turns out to be from a very similar series called Viper.
|
|
#
?
Jul 1, 2016 14:09
|
|
|
From now on, if a Dudikoff movie pops up on a streaming service, somebody let the rest of us know. I'm kind of in the mood for Dudikoff but not enough to actually, you know, pay any money to see him. I will do my part and try to stay vigilant for any Dudikoff that may become available.
|
|
#
?
Jul 1, 2016 14:13
|
|
|
BioTech posted:I must've seen American Ninja and the sequel over a hundred times as a kid, my brother and I would start acting out the fights when we were bored. I remember Cobra. Typical 80s fair, despite being in the early 90s, but at least Dudikoff was to show he had a humorous side to himself. The show was one of those things where the hero had plastic surgery and given a new identity, but unlike some shows, where they cast a different actor as the "before" version, Dudikoff was just given a mullet and Hulk Hogan style mustache. Knight Rider was actually the best for this. They actually got an actor who had the same hair style as Hasselhoff, and they had Hasselhoff dub his dialogue.
|
|
#
?
Jul 3, 2016 21:21
|
|
|
|
| # ? Apr 24, 2024 02:09 |
|
|
I'm a huge fan of Radioactive Dreams. If you ever wanted to see the closest thing to a Fallout movie, it's that. When Lisa Blount comes on, she's wearing what looks to be a Pip-Boy and is in tight blue shirt and a bunch of the factions of Edge City are cancer-riddled greasers, cannibal hippies, atomic biker chicks, disco midgets, and video commandos straight from Electric Avenue surrounded by post-nuclear wildlife like radioactive ghouls and rodents of unusual size. Anyway, Dudikoff is in it as the brother of John Stockwell, who both are the loosely-adopted sons of two gangsters who holed up in a bomb shelter to wait out the heat, but ended up being in a prime position to survive World War 3. There's various cuts of the movie, the Japanese cut, I believe, has an intro where the boys' real father is shot in a carjacking by the two gangsters, who take his sweet ride with them in the back seat. Dudikoff's character, Marlowe Hammer (who, like his brother Phillip Chandler, were named after pulp noir icons by the mobsters), is a bit slow in the head, having fallen out of a tree by the distant shockwave of nuclear explosion. It's very much the most unDudikoff performance of his career, because he's never the cool dude, but he's mostly bumbling and naive and out-of-sorts in this post-nuclear society, especially when women are around. Even when he's supposed to be cool, it's like it's an act, like he's going through the motions of what he thinks is cool: there's a point where they've decide to turn things around and go on the attack and he's threatening a woman and it's like this pastiche of film noir tropes that come running out of his mouth. Stockwell is the more levelheaded brother, especially since he's the narrator, but Dudikoff's great in it because it's very much that humorous side that most of his films don't show.
|
|
#
?
Jul 4, 2016 00:39
|
|
