Latin Dragon (2004)

This martial arts action movie should be titled Latin "dragons," because most every fighter in it is a latino badass. The hero is Fabian Carrillo, a martial arts champion in real life, cast as a former hit-man for the CIA. We see him in his past life, assassinating whomever the government told him to, but leaving him scarred and wanting to do right. His brother is a tough L.A. street cop, played by Luis Ramos. Together they are trying to protect the residents of the barrio from a gang of vatos working for Gary Busey and his main enforcer, Lorenzo Lamas.The movie is non-stop action with shootouts, street fights and assassinations -- with the violence mostly latino on latino. Carillo and Ramos are both well-muscled studs whose brutal skills raise the body count early and often. The vatos are led by Robert LaSardo, whose ripped physique is covered in gang tats, and who kills without remorse. His crew is, likewise, street-muscle bodybuilders. Though impressive, their size doesn't help when Carillo raids the vatos's headquarters and, in a series of awesome fights, slays most of these inked latino musclemen with his bare hands.There are crosses and double crosses, including when Busey coldly discards his henchman LaSardo by ordering Lamas to put a bullet in the vato's head so he can set up Carillo for the murder. Lamas carries out the assignment, leaving the alpha dog's body on display for the cops – including Carillo's brother – to find. His arrest leads to a series of showdowns and more surprise double crosses, with Carillo first taking down a huge anglo biker named "Mad Dog" (pretty much the only non-latino he ices in this flick,) before savagely executing Lamas in a vicious fight. Finally the evil Busey is made to pay the ultimate price at the lethal hands of the Latin Dragon.This movie might be the first martial arts flick to feature a goodlooking latino stud as a kickass hero and Carillo definitely fits the bill. Though a villain, LaSardo's powerful physical presence spotlights him, especially in his fight scenes. In fact, most of the fights feature built young latinos whose martial arts moves and sculpted bodies make for some convincing action. Whether you are latino or not, if you enjoy martial arts, you'll like "Latin Dragon."

The back of the DVD box for "Latin Dragon" declares that star Fabian Carrillo (who's actually third billed in the opening credits!) "...gives us our first mainstream Latino martial arts action hero." Uh, wasn't Lorenzo Lamas - who also appears in this movie - the first person to fit that category? Well, that's a minor concern compared to the badness found in this movie. The plot - about a land-grabber trying to force lower class people off their property - is nothing that you haven't seen before. Somehow it's stretched out to 101 minutes, making seeing the clichés an extra burden than usual. Fabian Carrillo is not exactly a compelling actor, coming across as stony as Chuck Norris but missing Norris' charisma. The movie is also badly shot, with almost all the movie shot to give everything dark and murky colors. Fans of Gary Busey or Lorenzo Lamas will be disappointed, because they obviously knocked off their scenes in just a few days. Haters of Lorenzo Lamas - which are probably more in number than fans - may want to tune into the end to see him beat up and shot.

Man, I sure did love Billy Jack when I was a kid and "Everybody Loves Raymond" is one funny show. So, as I sat watching this movie I kept thinking to myself, "Gosh, this sure seems familiar in a really odd, totally indirect sort of way."And then it hit me.The hero looks like Ray Romano and the avenging retired soldier aspect of his character reminded me of Billy Jack. Then you've got some bad guys making everyone miserable and rich folks with money providing money to the bad guys to make everyone miserable. I mean, it's not EXACTLY like Billy Jack but if Billy Jack ever made it to East L.A. this is exactly how he'd handle things.Of course he wouldn't ride in on a burgundy red Kawasaki (!). No self respecting tough guy would.

This movie has a real story behind all the action with finally, a Latino action hero! The acting is good and the fighting is great and feels real as well as unique, not all the fancy wireworks like most of the martial arts action movies today. It's edgy and depicts the bad guys as what we see in true life today! It's almost scary. Fabian Carrillo did great first time out of the gate as compared to Jean Claude and Steven Segal in their first movie. He has presence on screen and at times has hints of very successful actors. In the cemetery scene he looks like Nick Cage, in the suit he looks like Stallone and at times like John Cusack. He's going to be a big star. This movie kicks ass!