The Best Martial Arts Musical Love Story . . . EVER?
Okay, okay The Last Dragon may be the ONLY martial arts musical love story, but that still doesn't detract from its AWESOMENESS!
Produced in 1985 by Motown (HELLO), The Last Dragon starred Taimak as Leroy Green and Vanity as Laura Charles. Leroy is trying to achieve the last level of his martial arts training, known as "The Glow" and along the way he fights villains and finds love.
But with all the VERY cool martial arts scenes and love, comes two of the BEST parts of the movie! Sho' Nuff the Shogun of Harlem AND DeBarge!!
Sho' Nuff is THE VILLAIN and could possibly be the best dressed villain of all time. The fact that his entire name is, and he is always introduced as Sho' Nuff the Shogun of Harlem puts him in the #1 spot, alone. But the Samuri outfit and the hair takes him to the next level. And let's not forget classic quotes like, "Kiss my Converse." We can all take some tips from Sho' Nuff on building self-esteem, because as he says he is, " . . . baddest mofo low down around this town."
The Last Dragon also introduces us to the music of DeBarge. The Grand Rapids based group had its share of hits with "I Like It" and "All This Love", but The Last Dragon introduced us to one of the party starting anthems of all time, "Rhythm of the Night" and a very suave El DeBarge out front!
With all that this movie has to offer, it is definitely in a category all it's own. Even if there's not another movie like it!
Check out the trailer below!