At a time when Golden Harvest were trying new things, including a host of international productions, director Robert Clouse seemed to be the go-to-guy after the success of Enter The Dragon. That experience obviously gave him a taste for the Orient, following with films such as Black Belt Jones, Golden Needles, Game Of Death, The Big Brawl, and more...
Shot between Hong Kong, Amsterdam and England, The Amsterdam Kill, while a Golden Harvest production, is definitely one of his weakest - in terms of martial action and excitement. While I'm not a huge fan of his work, Clouse proved to be successful enough even though he was completely deaf, using assistant directors to help him get what he needed. Hal Schaefer joins him once again to complete a score that, honestly, I don't even remember hearing!
Although it features Hong Kong stars such as Yuen Biao, Yuen Wah, Lam Ching Ying and Chen Sing, these are only bit-part, bad guy roles at best. American actor George Cheung wins the role as Mitchum's sidekick. Talking about Robert Mitchum - the guy looks old, bored and totally uninteresting, although he does deliver lines wonderfully. I don't know what the appeal was, but he is the star and does become a bit more watchable as the story moves on. The great Leslie Nielsen co-stars (in a serious role of course), but all in all, this feels like a TV movie marred by the directors usually flat story-telling technique.
When the action comes about, its mainly shoot-outs (and not fun ones), with a car stunt into a canal, and a bizarre ending with Mitchum driving a bulldozer through a host of green-houses after setting free a pack of horses that trample the 2 Yuen's to death!
Overall: Watchable, if only once, The Amsterdam Kill isn't fantastic but it passes the time...
Shot between Hong Kong, Amsterdam and England, The Amsterdam Kill, while a Golden Harvest production, is definitely one of his weakest - in terms of martial action and excitement. While I'm not a huge fan of his work, Clouse proved to be successful enough even though he was completely deaf, using assistant directors to help him get what he needed. Hal Schaefer joins him once again to complete a score that, honestly, I don't even remember hearing!
Although it features Hong Kong stars such as Yuen Biao, Yuen Wah, Lam Ching Ying and Chen Sing, these are only bit-part, bad guy roles at best. American actor George Cheung wins the role as Mitchum's sidekick. Talking about Robert Mitchum - the guy looks old, bored and totally uninteresting, although he does deliver lines wonderfully. I don't know what the appeal was, but he is the star and does become a bit more watchable as the story moves on. The great Leslie Nielsen co-stars (in a serious role of course), but all in all, this feels like a TV movie marred by the directors usually flat story-telling technique.
When the action comes about, its mainly shoot-outs (and not fun ones), with a car stunt into a canal, and a bizarre ending with Mitchum driving a bulldozer through a host of green-houses after setting free a pack of horses that trample the 2 Yuen's to death!
Overall: Watchable, if only once, The Amsterdam Kill isn't fantastic but it passes the time...