Blu Ray Review: Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins

Kino Lorber has released, on blu ray, the first of a proposed series that never came to pass. Only this first movie, Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins was released back in the Fall of 1985, and no subsequent sequels happened.

It seemed like quite a good idea at the time. During a decade when aggressive action movies were common and popular, producer Larry Spiegel wanted to make a red-white-and-blue James Bond type movie hero. For the screenplay he hired Christopher Wood, who had penned the Bond classic The Spy Who Loved Me, and his chosen director was Guy Hamilton who had helmed the Bond masterpiece Goldfinger. But the movie flopped and no more Remo movies were made.

There were reasons for this. Fred Ward, a good actor, was miscast in the title role. The budget didn’t allow for a proposed action sequence to conclude the movie. And, the casting of a heavily made up Joel Grey in the role of an old Korean was controversial even in those pre-Woke 1980s. Well, Grey is quite good in the role, and the 4 hours of makeup he endured before each day’s shooting netted an Oscar nomination (losing to Mask).

The narrative has Ward playing a rugged cop/Vietnam veteran who is recruited by a secret underground US organization to hook up with a Korean martial arts master and become an assassin against the enemy forces. The humor is derived from Ward learning martial arts techniques at the hands of the Korean master, without enough time to perfect them. There are several action sequences.

The Kino blu ray offers several special features including an audio Commentary by Producer Larry Spiegel and Co-Producer Judy Goldstein, and the featurettes Created, the Destroyer: Writing Remo Williams, Producing Remo Williams, Secrets of Sinanju: Training Remo Williams, Balance of Power: Designing Remo Williams, and Assassin’s Tune: Composing Remo Williams.

Watching this movie as a stand-alone production, Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins is an amusing trifle that provides a lot of exciting fun. It is briskly paced, nicely shot, and pleasantly entertaining throughout. It might not have effectively resonated at the time of its initial release, but now, decades later, it works well as an amusing throwback that is recommended for libraries as a nice addition to their 80s film catalog.

The blu ray can be purchased here: REMO