The Queen of Martial Arts, our Lady Dragon! These are the titles available on blu-ray format, so far. Yes, Madam! (1985) Millionaires Express (1986) Magic Crystal (1986) Righting Wrongs (1986) The Inspector Wears Skirts (1988) Prince of the Sun (1990) China O'Brien (1990) China O'Brien 2 (1990) Martial Law (1991) Fast Getaway (1991) Martial Law 2: Undercover (1991) Tiger Claws (1991) Fast Getaway II (1994) Eye for an Eye (1996) Tiger Claws II (1996) Sworn to Justice (1996) Night Vision (1997) Tiger Claws III: The Final Conflict (1999) Mercenaries (2014) The Martial Arts Kid (2015)
Ha, Cheng Pei Pei is the queen and Bruce Lee is the king of martial arts cinema. Anyway, Rothrock’s is an impressive martial artist and her Hong Kong output is impressive. Her kicking Sammo Hung’s stunt double so hard he bled out of his ear is the stuff of legends (Millionaires Express). I don’t know that I totally agree with her career path though. Her direct to video stuff in the 90s got pretty dire and didn’t reach her earlier career highs. Her name became something of a video store joke in the 90s. I wonder if she wasn’t capable of crossing over with better management.
She needed to star on an A-List movie, which didn't happen. That said, her movies were aired on prime time, here in Italy. We still miss a blu-ray edition for: Fight to Win Lady Dragon 1 and 2 No retreat, no surrender 2 Righting Wrongs II: Blonde Fury The Rage and Honor Trilogy
I worked in a video store in the mid 90s and every month or two we would get sent promotional videos to play in store with a bunch of trailers of new releases. Almost every tape seemed to a preview with a "new" Rothrock movie - some were actually new, but others you could tell were before she had some work done - and we regularly got swag for her films. I think I still have a Lady Dragon 2 t shirt somewhere! After I stopped working at the video store, I kind of lost track of her, but I remember her showing up on Xena or Hercules and in some Dukes of Hazzard reunion movie. Years later, I was at the Arnold Classic, an annual sports/fitness expo sponsored by Arnold Schwarzenegger, and she was one of the martial arts celebrities signing autographs and with her dyed black hair, I didn't even realize it was her until I walked by her table.
I admit to seeing some of her movies. She is kinda cute. And I probably would call her the female equivalent to Bruce Lee. Wish her entire output was on Blu-Ray.
Thank you. One movie of hers that I wonder if it will be released uncut on Blu-Ray is Triple Cross. It says on IMDB that it was re-dubbed with new voices in English as Angel of Fury. I have no idea where I can find it with the original voices as Triple Cross.
Yes, man, I would like that too! We still miss some titles. Lady Dragon 1 and 2 are the most popular ones which still need a blu-ray release. LMAO, one crazy person on another forum was claiming that Cynthia used doubles in her early Hong Kong movies. Laughable assumption. Her fight scenes were marvellous and amazing, performed 100% by herself (she accomplished SEVEN black belts in real life). She was 100% astonishing as martialist, and only used doubles for (VERY FEW) dangerous action sequences where fight wasn't involved at all.
She's one of a kind. And she is still a champion. She does a lot of undersea exploring in exotic places, nowadays.
Found Triple Cross. Pretty sure in both versions (Triple Cross and Angel of Fury), that's not her voice.
I never realized we had such remarkable CGI in those days. How they were able to graft Cynthia's face over her doubles' so flawlessly, so seamlessly!
I like her a lot, but it's too bad she was never put in a movie that could have taken her to the next level.
For some years now, I have spent more time than I like to admit trying to piece together the chronological history of her filmography. It's pretty clear that some of her movies were released out of sequence. Her hairstyles (I like all of them, BTW) are inconsistent, if you watch her movies in release order. Both China O'Brien movies were released in 1990, but were filmed back-to-back two years ago in the middle of 1988. Cynthia got a haircut in Fast Getaway in the middle of 1990, and was still sporting it when she made Triple Cross by the end of that year. The filming dates for Lady Dragon are unconfirmed, but all signs seem to point to early 1991. A few Time Magazine issues in some shots are from that period, though I can't seem to find the issue of Newsweek that appeared briefly in one scene. I can't confirm when Prince of the Sun was filmed, but it couldn't have been in 1990. Cynthia's hair didn't look like that at that time. By the time she began filming Lady Dragon 2 in the middle of 1992, she dyed it red. No idea what were the filming dates for Honor and Glory, Rage & Honor 2, and Undefeatable.
One other thing I noticed is her IMDB profile lists a couple of movies that I can't seem to find anywhere: Jungle Heat and No Witnesses. I'm assuming they were movies that were announced, but never got made.
Great post. I think that the most popular Rothrock haircut should be the short hair & blonde one. How many movies did she do with that haircut? If memory serves me well, Lady Dragon for sure?
One thing I noticed with her Hong Kong films (not sure how I should say this) is that they replaced the original foley effects track with a newer one. I wish they wouldn't have done that.
Truly? The blu-ray editions? So weird. I'm sure that they used the original audio track for each movie?