Plot: Four beautiful rivals at an invitation-only martial-arts tournament join forces against a sinister threat. Princess Kasumi (Devon Aoki) is an aristocratic warrior trained by martial-arts masters. Tina Armstrong (Jaime Pressly) is a wrestling superstar. Helena Douglas (Sarah Carter) is an athlete with a tragic past. Christie Allen (Holly Valance) earns her keep as a thief and an assassin-for-hire.
I have to confess I had never watched this movie until recently; it was discussed on a Livestream with Preston Downey AKA Phat Samurai Guy and after everything heard I expected the worst… and they were mostly right.
This really isn’t a great movie but it does have several plus points, mostly Holly Valance being a Goddess and a great cast that includes Devon Aoki, Eric Roberts, Jaime Pressly, Collin Chou, Kevin Nash, Matthew Marsden, Robin Shou, Silvio Simac and Kane Kosugi.
Directed by Corey Yuen (R.I.P.) DOA: Dead or Alive is never less than entertaining perhaps for all the wrong reasons, but it’s still a fun ride, never taking itself too seriously.
The female cast spend most of the runtime in bikinis and fighting which is nothing to complain about even if the fights are regularly let down by noticeable wirework and rotten effects.
It’s well paced and Eric Roberts is at his sleazy villain best here; his final showdown with practically everyone is hilarious. He wears special glasses that predict his opponents moves so he is unstoppable… until he loses the glasses.
I was reading a few behind the scenes tales on this film apparently there were a lot of language barriers between the cast and crew and Jaime Pressly stated “A lot of bad stuff came up and happened, [and] it just didn’t turn out the way that it should have.”
Overall, DOA: Dead or Alive is hardly a great movie but it’s certainly easy to look at, well paced and has enough action to keep things moving. It’s a guilty pleasure more than anything except I never feel guilt watching anything.