This week on Impact-Online we take a look back at the third and final part of Impact's interview with Cynthia Rothrock from twenty years ago in 1994…
In this final segment of an epic update, the fearless Bey Logan feels the wrath of Rothrock, as Cyndy lambasts vicious critics, defends her career choices and talks Stallone and t.v…
Bey Logan: Do you read reviews of your films? Apart from mine, that is…
Cynthia Rothrock: I don't go looking for them. If I happen to come across one, of course I'll read it, if I see my name somewhere. I was happy to get some good reviews in entertainment weekly, which is a big magazine over here. I just read a review the other day that someone had sent to my mom, of China O'Brien 2, and it was really good. I got a good review in Variety for Fast Getaway, for my acting in that, so that made me very happy. Of course when critics write nasty things about me, I just block that from my mind. I have a theory that what goes around comes around. If you're going to be vindictive to someone for purely stupid, selfish reasons, then you're going to get what comes to you in the end. It's not worth worrying about or thinking about that kind of review.
Bey Logan: You're really a very calm person, and one of the few times I've seen something really get your back up was when I.K.F seemed to be a running campaign against you in 'Video Kicks' column, and you responded to it in print.
Cynthia Rothrock: Enough's enough. I think I am one of the calmest persons to work with, and I'll put up with a lot, as you know only too well, Mr Logan! However, there comes a time when you reach a certain point an then that's it!
Bey Logan: I just got back from Mifed, and I noticed that, whereas last year there were posters of this film Dark Red all over the place, this year it had vanished, and it wasn't made despite the publicity…
Cynthia Rothrock: I never had a contract on that, and you never believe a film will go until then. The same thing happened with another film I was going to do called Head Hunters. It was a good script. I liked it, and I still get distributors coming to me and asking when it will be available! With the Stallone movie (The Executioner), I had a pay or play contract, so that, even though they never made it, they still paid me.
Bey Logan: It was a shame about that. However it turned out, it would have HAD to have been better than Oscar and Stop! Or My Mom Will Shoot.
Cynthia Rothrock: There were a lot of reasons for that film not happening. For one thing, it was with Stallone's own company, and he had so many commitments. He had ten films to do. Then he got this idea that he didn't want to do action pictures. He wanted to do comedies. If he had done that, it certainly would have been a big boost for my career. I would certainly be doing big-budget films. You know, a lot of people say: 'Oh, you're doing these films in Hong Kong and Indonesia…' Granted, the production qualities may not be as good as in America, but some of these movies have made me so popular elsewhere. I try to the best I can with every performance, but what's most important to me is that I have fun, that I love the people I'm working with and have a great time. When I did Rage and Honour 2 in Indonesia I had such a wonderful time. I'll never forget the experience of being on that set, on those locations, with those people. To me, whether the film was good or not, I'd never say that I shouldn't have done it, because I wouldn't have wanted to miss that.
Bey Logan: You've had a life, which is more than most people can say.
Cynthia Rothrock: Yeah. I don't really regret any of the films I've done, except maybe the Sunny Lim ones! As you know, I shot a pilot in Australia for CBS/Fox, which was great. I had a development deal with them, and the first script was very mature. I don't watch a lot of t.v., and I was surprised. I was going: "Do they allow this sort of thing on t.v. these days?"
Bey Logan: But now with Chuck doing Walker, Michael Dudikoff doing Cobra and so on, action t.v. seems to be back in a big way.
Cynthia Rothrock: Right. T.V. is so powerful, and the audience is massive. As soon as you do something like that, you get such a following.
Bey Logan: Of all the films you've made to date, which is the one you're happiest with?
Cynthia Rothrock: Angel of Fury. It was a little different from the things I normally get to do. It was more of a thriller, so I got the experience of filming a horror type film. That was very exciting.
Bey Logan: And, of we could destroy any of your films for all time, which they be?
Cynthia Rothrock: Fight to Win, Twenty-Four Hours to Midnight, Triple Cross and another one I did a while ago which is going to pop up soon.
Bey Logan: Not Prince of the Sun?
Cynthia Rothrock: No! I like that film, because I got to play a Tibetan monk in it…
Bey Logan: A monkette, anyway.
Cynthia Rothrock: Right. The costumes were different, and the fights were good. I like to do off-the-wall things. I'd like to do something futuristic, or else a comic book character.
Bey Logan: Producers take note! Cyndy, thank you. A pleasure as always.
Cynthia Rothrock: Bey, thank you!
Profit Without Honour
B Flick Fu Fest for Cyndy
Honour and Glory is the latest production from Hong Kong schlockmeister Godfrey Hall, a veteran of that territory's IFD company. He moves upmarket a little here, in that he's assembled an impressive cast including Cynthia Rothrock, Chuck Hawkeye Jeffreys, Robin Death Cage Shou and newcomer John Ritz Miller. However, this muddled picture has all the trappings of the dreaded American martial artist vanity film, despite the fact that its producer, Tai Yim, doesn't get to show off his own superb kung fu in the flick.
Instead, it's his students who are to the fore, with Miller impressing with his muscles, martial arts and weapons play, and supposed 'star' Donna Jason depressing with her limitations as an actress and a screen fighter. The acting is often as embarrassing as Herb Borkland's sad dialogue. Only Rothrock and Jeffreys perform with honour, and that's probably because they are given relatively little to say. Cyndy has clearly only been hired for her pulling power, and only gets to cut loose in the final reel. The Chinese version of the flick features cult fave babe Yukari Oshima, but she isn't viable here. Chuck Jeffreys proves once again that he is an absolute dead ringer for Eddie Murphy, and that he has the best moves this side of a Hong Kong stuntman. Chop socky fans will enjoy the kung-fu style action of Honour and Glory, Cyndy fans will be delighted to learn that she's moved upstream to appear in slicker flicks like this.
