No one would confuse "The Octagon" with say, "The Godfather." It is what it is. A "B-movie" from the 80's starring a martial-artist turned actor. It features decent action, some decent themes and a horrible voice over that supposedly conveys the main character's internal thoughts.
It's too easy to dismiss these films as being just expired, stinky cheese - relics of a film milieu that we have hopefully left behind us as we move into the brave new worlds of Uncanny Valley CGI and 3D over-the-top actioneers that look like giant, gorgeously executed video games.
Of course, there are those die-hard fans who see no disconnect in these films and rabidly declare them as revolutionary - which to some extent they were. At the time, there wasn't anything like "The Octagon" gracing American movie screens and big action was nascent at best in any form let alone martial arts.
I try not to go to either end of the spectrum. I do laugh inadvertently at the bad dialog, plot devices or action but I also realize that it was 30+ years ago and these movies are going to look creaky no matter what, even as they were also creating legends like Chuck Norris. I mean, put any 1980 Buick on the screen and you're suddenly wondering how anything that big ever functioned (the term 'bulgemobile' comes to mind.) Nevermind that the fashion, haircuts, and insanely tight pants they all wore including our hero, Mr. Chuck Norris, looks like something from a bad porn film. As expressed, it is what it is.
Norris' movie career took off with his villainous appearance in Bruce Lee's "Way Of The Dragon." Lee liked to pit two different styles against each other and in Way it's basically Korean/American-style karate vs Chinese Kung Fu. The opponents couldn't have looked any different with the slight (but ripped) Lee rocking his black Chinese button-up outfit and the burly, red-haired (and hairy!) Norris in a traditional white gi. After the epic nine minute battle, Norris is defeated and Lee heads away, dusting his black jacket off as if it was another day at the office and not this incredible fight to the death. The scene furthered Lee's legend and created a new one in Norris.
Norris was (is) the real deal. A student of Korean martial arts called Tang Soo Do, which become Tae Kwon Do in a Korean martial arts unification attempt, he was a champion of several real-world tournaments. He got involved in martial arts when he served in the Air Force as an Air Policeman in Korea. A lot of military people and cops seem to come to martial arts as a way to supplement their on-the-street skills. Since they are likely to face some form of violence every day, it just makes a lot of sense. Norris became a star pupil, a sensei who started his own style (Chun Kuk Do - "The Universal Way")and eventually his skills brought him to the attention of Hollywood via the Hong Kong film world.
Norris did two movies as the lead after Way started his fame, but "The Octagon" was unique in that it featured mostly martial arts underpinnings. Norris' character's half-brother is Japanese (and a bad guy) (Tadashi Yamashita) and Norris has to face him in the Octagon in the final battle. Even though the bad guys are mercenaries, they are being trained by ninjas which includes Yamashita as a co-founder of the school for terrorists. Yes, terrorists who were on the minds of our culture even back then. Ninjas (a fairly unknown concept at the time) run through the entire film and there's a masked, mystery ninja in red (played by legendary Australian stunt man/martial artist Richard Norton) who constantly shows up to inflict ninja-type punishment on people who cross his evil bosses. There were many legit martial artists in the film including the legendary Gerald Okamura who played the brutal trainer and who is a fifth degree black belt in Kung Fu San Soo. His IMDB page features over 55 feature films that he has either starred in or worked in as an actor and/or a martial arts coordinator as recently as this year.
Norris' character has grown up with the same ninja training (shown in flashback) but has rejected using it unless absolutely necessary. He's forced into a confrontation only at the end of the film because there is no other way to stay alive.
The fight sequences are just fine and stand the test of time. Some of the ninja stuff like them climbing a building with nothing but their hands or the hiding they do in plain sight is still really cool. And they did it for reals, yo, since there was no CGI (computer generated imagery.)
The rest of the film is varying degrees of so-so, sad, or just plain laughable like when hottie Karen Carlsen, dripping sexuality, openly invites Norris to come and see her and he says "Fair Enough."
Uh? Huh?
A serviceable plot, characters and theme are really only redeemed by Norris' exquisite kicking and fast hands. Here is a man in his prime with skills that make you wish you had spent more time at whatever you were trying to accomplish because you knew he did. It was overly obvious that Norris had mad skilz at the time and knew how to both throw and take a punch.
This also made Octagon unique because unlike "Billy Jack" which featured an actor with some Hapkido training (but was stunt-doubled by his sensei for most of the kicking scenes,) or "Kung Fu" which featured an actor with dance training, "The Octagon" starred a real martial artist who was already legendary in martial arts before he became an actor. Norris was first and foremost a black belt - acting, as was proven to the dismay of film critics many times in many films, was a distant second in importance in his film career.
As an aside, since Norris kicked butt and took names in so many films and for so many years, he was transformed into a meme similar to the Jack Bauer character in the TV series "24." I think some of them are truly funny but they also tell a tale of an actor whose films never let him be less than the hero who struggles mightily, but always comes out on top.
Some funny ones are:
- When the Boogeyman goes to sleep every night, he checks his closet for Chuck Norris.
- Chuck Norris is so bad he can light a fire by rubbing two ice-cubes together.
- Fear of spiders is arachnophobia, fear of tight spaces is claustrophobia, fear of Chuck Norris is called Logical.
- Chuck Norris has a grizzly bear carpet in his room. The bear isn't dead it is just afraid to move.
- When Chuck Norris does a pushup, he isn't lifting himself up, he's pushing the Earth down.
- There used to be a street named after Chuck Norris, but it was changed because nobody crosses Chuck Norris and lives.
- Chuck Norris doesn't call the wrong number. You answer the wrong phone.
