Review of Day of the Panther (1988) by Greg S — 15 Jan 2011

Who knew a tiny action flick from Down Under could compete with the American-made spectaculars of the mid-to-late-'80s? Apparently Aussie director Brian Trenchard-Smith had some notion, and a great deal of confidence (much more than the money he had, no doubt) in his star, Edward John Stazak.

Stazak plays Jason Blade, an occidental ninja recently initiated into the super-secret Panther clan. In the Australian city of Perth (admittedly one that looks pretty docile, no matter how many fights and drug deals Trenchard-Smith sets in various locales), Blade goes undercover to break crime boss Damien Zukor's (Michael Carman, who looks like Nicolas Cage if his skin fell off) stranglehold on the metropolis.

This basic setup leads to some great scenes, including Blade's battle in a parking garage against a half-dozen masked thugs using only a broom handle for protection and a fight to the death against bland (though an effective fighter) lead crony Baxter (Jim Baxter) at movie's end.

Throughout, Trenchard-Smith even offers some improvements on his Northern Hemisphere colleagues' action filmmaking. For starters, love interest Gemma (Paris Jefferson) has a lot more spunk than many action movie heroines. The movie's lean, under an hour and a half running length is also a nice change to traditional American films, which tend to use more exposition than necessary to get "legitimacy." Admittedly, the latter factor might be a result of budget limitations more than anything else, but it is refreshing to have an action movie be more like a hit to the face than a slow, twisting knife wound.