A Force of One feels like a bit of a transitional movie, seen today. It has the look of a Seventies film but of course was the movie responsible for unleashing that most 1980s of action movie stars, Chuck Norris onto the wider world after his supporting role in Way of the Dragon and minor success of Good Guys Wear Black. At the time it came out, I loved this movie – possibly because it was the only martial arts film that I was old enough to get into – and at the time, Norris was an unknown quantity. It was only in the middle of the decade that he began making ghastly right-wing fantasies that reflected his own political worldview.

A Force of One avoids the politics in favour of a story of drug dealers, hired killers and police corruption, told with all the nuanced subtlety of a sledgehammer to the testicles. Norris is Matt Logan, kick boxing champion and karate teacher, who is reluctantly drafted in by the police (most notably the coolly sexy Jennifer O’Neill) to teach them self defence and help capture the mysterious karate killer who has been offing narcotics cops. Who could it be? Well, as we only meet one other karate fighter outside Norris’ crew, and as he’s clearly an unsavoury type, the answer might not come as a shock. Equally, the revelation of the identity of the dirty cop comes as less than a surprise when we see Ron ‘Superfly’ O’Neal amongst the police crew…

Although written by Ernest Tidyman, who wrote both Shaft and The French Connection, A Force of One has surprisingly clunky dialogue and the subtle moralising of a Quincy episode – something we can attribute to Tidyman dying and the screenplay being subsequently worked over. In a way, this black-and-white crassness actually works for the film – Norris was no actor at this stage of his career, and his wooden delivery is actually helped by the hokey situations and clichéd dialogue.

None of the crudeness and tackiness of the film means that it isn’t fun. Quite the opposite in fact. Much like an extended episode of some Seventies cop show, the movie revels in its own basic style and is hugely entertaining because of it. The kickboxing scenes are handled well, the villains are slimy, the junkies suitably pathetic and Norris is as square-jawed and stoic as you want a cartoon hero to be. And unlike his later work, this doesn’t leave a nasty aftertaste. This is also the film that, seven years after Bruce Lee’s death, finally saw martial arts becoming a regular part of mainstream US action cinema (with imitators like Jaguar Lives and Force: Five following hot on its tail) – for that innovation alone, it deserves to be seen as a minor classic.

Anchor Bay’s new Blu-ray includes a couple of entertaining but crude featurettes (one a new ‘making of’ and the other on producers American Cinema) and a disappointingly stilted commentary that was in dire need of a moderator to remind director Paul Aaron that the basic requirement of a commentary rack is someone talking.

DAVID FLINT

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