The first time Nadia Georges (Kyle Kankonde) meets Juliet Gold (Savoy Bailey), they’re both trying out for a ballet role. Nadia tries to be kind to her but Juliet gets in her face and says, “Break a leg. Literally.” And that’s pretty much what happens when Nadia’s mother Salina (April Hernandez Castillo) distracts her and she slips and breaks a metatarsal bone in her foot.

Their next meeting is a bit friendlier. Nadia is struggling to teach dance and suffering through the pain of a bone that wasn’t set properly. Juliet has left dance behind, tired of having to listen to her mother live through her. She’s forced to live on her own with no monetary help, but she has an idea, thanks to her friend Paris (Raquel Antonia). She still dances. It’s a different kind of dance. But still…it’s dance.

Mickey Valle (Rob Figueroa) is their boss at Pandora’s Palace and at first, they seem to be protected. But then he tells her that Paris has left with a man she met in the champagne room. So what seems like a fun way to keep on dancing while earning enough money to pay to live and keep their families taken care of soon spirals out of control — it’s a Tubi movie about exotic dancing, what did you expect? — and soon they’re set up and dancing in the home of organized crime figure “Handsome” Johnny Palermo (Anthony Robert Grasso) and killing made men when they feel like they’re in danger, which puts them in danger that they may not escape. And now, Mickey wants to kill them too.

Directed by Elaine del Valle and written by Cate Holahan (Deadly Estate), Midnight Hustle remembers to empower its leads without descending into the expected exotic dancing downfall for both. Instead, they both gain from the experience, despite the danger they find themselves in.

You can watch this on Tubi.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Nothing gives me greater joy than when our site gets mentioned on my favorite podcast, The Cannon Canon. There are a few movies they’ve covered that I haven’t, so it’s time to fix that.

I am happy to admit that I rented Action Jackson more than a few times. Carl Weathers deserved to be the star of more movies and, well, Vanity was in it. After watching this movie, I realize that I am only two movies away from seeing every film that she was ever in.

It starts unlike any normal action movie you’d expect, as almost supernatural killers, the Invisible Men, come out of nowhere and kill some auto union guys. That’s how you know we’re in Detroit, you know?

Detroit Police Department Detective Sergeant Jericho “Action” Jackson (Weathers) was a star athlete who went to law school and became a hometown hero, but that was before he arrested the son of important businessman Peter Anthony Dellaplane (Craig T. Nelson). He was quickly demoted, divorced and demoralized. He’s at odds with the public and his boss, Captain Earl Armbruster (Bill Duke, always an angry ranked cop) because he won’t stop chasing down Dellaplane, who really is dirty and is too smart to get caught.

Yet there’s hope. Dellaplace’s wife Patrice (Sharon Stone, fated to be the dead bad girl in every movie at this point) gives him info before she’s killed and Dellaplace’s mistress Sydney Ash (Vanity) is set up. Yes, Craig T. Nelson is at near Michael Douglas level here, sleeping with both Sharon Stone and Vanity. Action Jackson also has help from Kid Sable, a local hotel owner and retired professional boxer — this movie is like James Bond with its strange helper characters — played by Chino ‘Fats’ Williams, hairdresser and connected gossip queen Dee (Armelia McQueen), his old partner Detective Kotterwell (Jack Thibeau), bad kid gone good Albert (Stan Foster) and Sydney’s bodyguard Big Edd (Prince A. Hughes).

This is the kind of movie where the bad guys plan on barbecuing our hero and instead he sets them on fire and shoots them with a grenade launcher. It’s beyond over the top but in a way that completely works within its universe.

I love how matter of fact Weathers was about how this movie got made: “A creation that came about when I was doing Predator and talking to Joel Silver, who loved blaxploitation movies. Joel said, “Well, you know, why don’t you put something together?” So during that time of shooting down in Puerto Vallarta, I created this story and came up with this guy – or at least this title – Action Jackson. And Joel found a writer who wrote the screenplay, and that was it. We got it made.” There’s a TV movie Weathers did after, Dangerous Passion, which was called Action Jackson 2 in Germany, but unfortunately there was no sequel. Weathers said that it was because, “Lorimar sold the lot to Sony and sold the library to Warner Bros., and that was that. It never resurfaced again, unfortunately.”

If you love 80s action, this has so many people you know in it. Dennis Hayden, De’voreaux White, Robert Davi, Mary Ellen Trainor and Al Leong were all in Die Hard together, while Weathers, Duke and Sonny Landham were in Predator. In a better world, we got a whole bunch of these movies.

This was the first movie — after episodes of The A-Team — of former stunt coordinator Craig R. Baxley, a beyond dependable name because he also directed Stone Cold, Storm of the Century, Rose Red and Kingdom Hospital. It was written by Robert Reneau, one of the writers of Demolition Man.

You can listen to The Cannon Canon episode of Action Jackson here.

Tubi is the mom and pop video store of streaming — even if it’s owned by Fox, a fact I don’t like to dwell on all that much — and the movies that it promotes as its originals really prove that. A starring vehicle for former WWE Diva Natalie Eva Marie Nelson — she was already in the movies Inconceivable, Action #1 and Hard Kill, as well as appearing on Celebrity Big Brother — this is the kind of action vehicle that often was created for star athletes in the 80s and 90s like Brian Bosworth (Stone Cold), Howie Long (Firestorm) and, yes, Hulk Hogan (Suburban Commando, No Holds Barred).

Nelson plays Fiona “Phoenix” Grant, an army hand-to-hand combat instructor who leaves the military behind after the death of her mercenary father, Everett (Randy Couture, the former U.S. Army sergeant who became a six-time UFC Champion and the first to hold titles in two different weight divisions). The cops say that he killed himself, but thanks to intel from her former commanding officer General Shackleton (Neal McDonough), she learns that his suicide was set up by a Russian crime family led by Maxim Vasiliiv (Oleg Prudius, who would be better known to WWE fans as Vladimir Kozlov). Maxim and Everett had been battling for years and their final face-off was to be hand-to-hand until a henchman shot the hero in the back of the head.

Now, Phoenix is working her way through the Vasiliiv’s family’s goons, one-by-one. She even goes to lunch with Maxim in a restaurant surrounded by his thugs. There’s also a flashback to when Phoenix lost her mother due to the lifestyle her father lived and a shopping trip with her Aunt Grace (Jessie Camacho, a former police officer and Survivor contestant who played Chupi Chupi on Reno 911!).

Phoenix is packed with tough guys, including Joseph Aviel (who once was Arnold Schwarzenegger’s stunt double), Jonathan Camp, Arnold Chon (a stuntman and MMA fighter), Frank Mir (former two-time UFC Heavyweight Champion, he also has the record for the most finishes and submission victories in UFC Heavyweight history), Rashad Evans (heavyweight winner of The Ultimate Fighter 2, former UFC Light Heavyweight Champion and a 2019 inductee of the UFC Hall of Fame), Phillip Tan (stuntman and trainer for stars like Christopher Lambert) and former Scores bouncer and former New York Hell’s Angels president Chuck Zito, who was also a bodyguard for Lorna Luft, Liza Minelli, Muhammad Ali, Charles Bronson, Michael Jackson, Sean Penn, Chita Rivera, Eric Roberts, Mickey Rourke, Charlie Sheen, Sylvester Stallone and Elizabeth Taylor. He also famously knocked out Jean-Claude Van Damme, standing over him and yelling, “This ain’t the movies! This is the street, and I own the street!” He’s been acting since the 80s, showing up all the way back in 1990: The Bronx Warriors as one of the real bikers that Enzo G. Castellari hired for his post-apocalyptic masterwork.

And hey — Bai Ling is in this as a character named Scavenger, complete with neon makeup that makes her lips look enormous. Man, I love Bai Ling. Keep being in weird parts and showing up unexpectantly!

Director and writer Daniel Zirilli is best known for his action films like Renegades and Invincible, as well as directing videos for Montell Jordan and Scarface, as well as the clip for the song “Short Dick Man” by 20 Fingers featuring Gillette.

Eva Marie has some weird line deliveries in this, but I assume that a lot of the takes were one and done. In truth, this movie isn’t about her talking — or screaming in a shrill blast of a voice as she decimates a room in anger — as it is about her kicking ass. I can report that she does absolutely fine with that.

You can watch this on Tubi.

Directed by Ari Novak (Cowboys vs. Dinosaurs, PawParazzi, Assassin’s Vow), who co-wrote the script with Rib Hillis (Extreme Makeover: Home Edition; he also appears in this movie as Jackson Hardison), Kill Shot starts with a suitcase full of cash being stolen by Dina Diablo (Mara Ohara) and Maximus (Bobby Maximus) before the plane carrying it crashes in the Canadian wilderness. Oh yeah — Novak is also in this movie as Alpha ONE.

Kate (Rachel Cook) is just trying to scatter her dad’s ashes and shoot an elk with her hunting guide Jackson, a former Navy SEAL. They find the briefcase — and the $100 million inside — and become the target of Diablo, Maximus and their henchmen.

This was filmed as Hunted back in 2020. Shot in Montana, it has plenty of great locations. What’s really wild about it is for a movie shot today how much it objectifies its lead actress. Beyond scenes where she appears runway-ready despite being deluged in a river, she starts the credits topless with a gun and later runs through the woods in a torn-up flannel and black panties, which doesn’t really seem like the tactical gear one needs to battle a crew of deadly mercenaries. I was stunned a few times, thinking that this had to be a parody and no, not at all, they really filmed this.

Other than that, Kill Shot offers guns ablaze in Big Sky country. I always worry that the action movie industry has gone away — and by that, I mean the direct-to-video one of my teenage years. As long as movies like Kill Shot keep getting made, I know that the guns and fist stories of my youth live on.

You can get KIll Shot from Well Go USA.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Nothing gives me greater joy than when our site gets mentioned on my favorite podcast, The Cannon Canon. There are a few movies they’ve covered that I haven’t, so it’s time to fix that.

Prince wanted to cast Vanity, leader of the girl group Vanity 6, in Purple Rain, but she left the group before filming began. Instead, she was signed by Barry Gordy to a four-movie contract.

She would be joined by Taimak, a martial artist who had never acted before. He’d studied under “The Black Dragon” Ron Van Clief, who choreographed the scenes where Taimak’s character Larry Green battles Sho’nuff The Shogun of Harlem during a showing of Enter the Dragon. Julius Carry, who had never done martial arts before, learned them as Taimak learned how to be in a movie.

The theater that they fight in was The Victory Theater on 42nd Street, owned by Martin Levine and Richard Brandt. It was the first theater on 42nd Street to show hardcore pornography. It’s a real theater now and lost to the clean-up of Times Square.

Leroy Green becomes Bruce Leeroy and must work on the ability to make his entire body glow with martial arts majesty. If he can find the other master who has the second part of a Bruce Lee medal, maybe he can find that power. He’s challenged by Sho’nuff and his men Crunch, Beast and Cyclone as well as arcade owner Eddie Arkadian (Christopher Murney) and his soldier Rock. They’ve kidnapped Laura Charles (Vanity) and won’t release her until she plays his girlfriend Angela Viracco (Faith Prince) on her video show.

Sho’nuff already has the glow and Leroy has to find his. He also has to learn how to catch bullets, but that seems a little bit easier.

Thanks to the DeBarge video for “Rhythm of the Night” that movie had a lot of people talking about it back in 1985. Gordy used all of his Motown artists to get people talking about it. The Last Dragon was directed by Michael Schultz, who also was behind Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Heart’s Club Band, Car Wash, Scavenger Hunt, Krush Groove and the Fat Boys video for “All You Can Eat.” Oh man! Also the TV movies Timestalkers, The Spirit comic book adaption and Disorderlies. It was written by Louis Venostra, who also wrote Bird On a Wire.

It’s also an early Ernie Reyes Jr. movie.

You can listen to The Cannon Canon episode of The Last Dragon here.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Nothing gives me greater joy than when our site gets mentioned on my favorite podcast, The Cannon Canon. There are a few movies they’ve covered that I haven’t, so it’s time to fix that.

Enemy Territory isn’t available on DVD even and to find it, you have to look on YouTube. And you know, I think it’s worth tracking down. It’s such a strange film, directed by Peter Manoogian. He also made parts of The Dungeonmaster, Demonic Toys, The Eliminators and Arena, which I would say is a pretty great run of films. It was written by Stuart Kaminsky and Bobby Lindell, who don’t have all that many credits.

It’s the kind of movie that John Carpenter really likes to make, you know, a siege of a building or a film about escaping one of those places whole being surrounded by superior forces. Or even Roberta Findlay, who made Tenement or Maura O’Connell and Paul Donovan’s Canadian urban invasion movie Siege. Or Walter Hill’s Trespass or the Stephen Hopkins movie Judgement Night.

Barry Rapchick (Gary Frank, who mainly has worked in TV) was once a successful insurance execution, but now he’s more interested in drinking. To save what’s left of his career, he has to go to Lincoln Towers, perhaps the most frightening place in New York City, to complete the life insurance policy of Elva (Frances Foster). At the same time, Will Jackson (Ray Parker Jr.) comes to repair the phone lines and see his girlfriend.

Barry doesn’t understand the many rules that comes with living in Lincoln Towers, like how the Vampires see it as their castle. They’re a cult, more than a gang, led by the Count (an absolutely deranged Tony Todd who as always is the best thing in this movie), who mark Barry for death just for touching one of their young members, Decon (Theo Caesar).

As they try and stop him from leaving, the building’s security guard and Decon are both killed. He’s soon trapped in Elva’s apartment along with Will as his reluctant partner, as he wants to get out just as bad. Elva sends them to find her granddaughter Toni (Stacey Dash) and they all go to find Mr. Parker (Jan-Michael Vincent), who is pretty much the only person the Vampires fear. He’s a disabled Vietnam vet who hates just about every race and who has armed himself with an arsenal including a weapon-launching wheelchair.

The Vampires have taken Elva and Toni and want to exchange them for Barry, but Mr. Parker goes wild, shooting everyone he can before taking one to the chest and dying himself. The trio of Barry, Will and Toni learn that a young kid named Chet Cole (Deon Richmond) knows of a way out that no one else does. The little guy sneaks out of bed and takes them there. You may wonder if a kid being in danger is too much. Well, that kid has a baseball bat that he uses to knock one of the Vampires, Psycho (Robert Lee Rush), down an elevator shaft.

Can they make it the rest of the way out? Is the Count unkillable? Will the cops come even after refusing to get near a place where so many of their number have been killed?

Enemy Territory has the budget of a TV movie, but has a great idea that getting rid of the money that is weighing you down is the only thing that can save your life. Ernest Dickerson replaced the other DP when he was let go and as always he knows how to get so much out of so little. He shot this the same year he did Eddie Murphy Raw and would go on to direct some great movies of his own like Juice, Surviving the Game (another movie I need to see), Tales from the Crypt: Demon Knight and Bones.

It also has Ray Parker Jr. not singing the theme but in the movie. He’s also in Disorderlies and seeing as how I’ve written about that movie twice today, I should probably get to that soon.

Tony Todd is the heart of this movie. I could say that for nearly everything he’s done, but he takes this from a simple trapped in a building movie to outright audacity. He deserves all the credit he gets.

You can listen to The Cannon Canon episode of Enemy Territory here.