TNT JACKSON: Topless Blaxploitation Kung-Fu Pandemonium!

A b-movie doesn’t have to be “good” in the con­ven­tional crit­i­cal sense to inspire affec­tion in fans of the form.  TNT Jackson is a notable exam­ple of this prin­ci­ple in action.  This blaxploitation-meets-kung-fu genre-blend was made by pro­filic Filipino direc­tor Cirio Santiago, a film­maker noto­ri­ous for crank­ing out drive-in fare as quickly as pos­si­ble.  His movies were always no-frills, dis­pos­able fare designed purely for profit but when the right con­cept clicked into place, they could be fun cin­e­matic junk food.  TNT Jackson fits this bill: it ain’t “good” but it’s fun in its own loopy way.

At 72 min­utes, TNT Jackson rep­re­sents the b-movie stripped to its barest essen­tials. It opens with a man being killed by a gang of drug deal­ers led by Charlie (Stan Shaw) in Hong Kong. This sets the stage for his sis­ter, Diana “TNT” Jackson (Playboy Playmate Jeanne Bell) to come to Hong Kong look­ing for him.  She’s got kung-fu skills and a bad atti­tude so she fits into this rough-and-tumble ghetto scene just fine.  Charlie imme­di­ately takes notice of TNT and she flirts on and off with him as she tries to get info about the drug ring he works with.

It seems there is trou­ble within Charlie’s group as they’ve started los­ing ship­ments and there might be a rat in the group.  Since this trou­ble began with TNT’s arrival, she comes under the sus­pi­cion of gang leader Sid (Ken Metcalfe) and she is forced to put her fight­ing skills to use.  When she real­izes Charlie was respon­si­ble for her brother’s death, she plots her own iron-fisted revenge that coin­cides with a major drug deal.  However, that revenge is com­pli­cated by Elaine (Pat Anderson), a fed who has secretly infil­trated the drug ring.

If that syn­op­sis sounds some­what sen­si­ble, rest assured that it doesn’t play out that way on-screen.  TNT Jackson is cut so tightly that it fre­quently becomes non-sensical, strip­ping out char­ac­ter­i­za­tion and any sort of plot-clarifying story beats to get to the fight­ing and the nudity.  Santiago directs the film like he’s try­ing to set a land-speed record, result­ing in a lot of awk­ward post-synch dub­bing and peri­odic con­ti­nu­ity gaffes (like the way Bell’s panties change color in one key fight sequence).  He also expects you to believe that the Philippines is actu­ally Hong Kong and that his mostly Filipino sup­port­ing cast is actu­ally Chinese.

It doesn’t help that the fight chore­og­ra­phy is mostly hope­less — Bell looks like she’s doing some sort of weird inter­pre­tive dance when fight­ing and is uncon­vinc­ingly dou­bled by a man for many key action moments.  The same could be said for Anderson, who has a hys­ter­i­cally awful fight scene around a stair­case in which she deliv­ers some of the least con­vinc­ing karate kicks in film his­tory.  As a result, the fight­ing sequences are laden with fast cut­ting and tricks like speed­ing up the footage for cer­tain moves, which gives them an unin­ten­tional Benny Hill vibe.

The per­for­mances aren’t much bet­ter: Bell is bet­ter at being surly than she is at deliv­er­ing lines and Metcalfe, who co-wrote the script with reg­u­lar Corman actor Dick Miller, is mem­o­rably wooden as the leader of the drug ring.  The one really solid per­for­mance comes from Shaw, a gifted per­former who would go on to a long career as a char­ac­ter actor.  His char­ac­ter­i­za­tion is stock “blax­ploita­tion badass” mate­r­ial but he deliv­ers it with inten­sity and a swag­ger that is gen­uinely appeal­ing — and the fact that he actu­ally knew mar­tial arts helps his fight scenes.

That said, don’t let the above cat­a­logue of flaws deter you if you’re into 1970’s drive-in fare.  TNT Jackson’s speed and single-mindedness make it fun in spite of its many flaws.  Those nos­tal­gic for this period will be wowed by the fash­ion, afros and the funky score, which was pur­loined from a past Santiago film, Savage.  Better yet, the film sports a b-movie first in an unfor­get­table scene where Bell fights a gang of thugs while top­less and in panties. That scene alone makes the film worth see­ing, not to men­tion the final 15 min­utes: that last reel is an amphet­a­mine blur of hamhanded plot twists, lousy fight­ing and “shock­ing” death scenes.

In short, TNT Jackson is the kind of film that wears its cheap­jack qual­i­ties as a badge of schlocky pride.  It was a decent hit for New World (in fact, Santiago and Corman remade it twice more as Firecracker and Angel Fist) and has remained a goof­ball favorite with fans over the years.  If you’re in the right mood for no-frills thrills, it will deliver the goods with a daft, dis­tinctly 1970’s b-movie flair.

Lethal Ladies Collection [Triple Feature] Roger Corman’s Cult Classics: Lethal Ladies Collection [Triple Feature]      Female karate cham­pion Susanne Carter (Jillian Kesner) goes to the Philippines to look for her sis­ter who has dis­ap­peared. She stum­bles upon a drug car­tel and a tour­na­ment of no-holds-barred fights to the death in the action-packed Firecracker. Directed by genre spe­cial­ist Cirio H. Santiago (TNT Jackson) and costar­ring Vic Diaz (The Big Bird Cage) and Darby Hilton (Malibu Express).“They call me TNT,” mar­tial arts expert Diana Jackson (Jeanne Bell) announces upon her arrival in Hong Kong to look for her miss­ing brother. From there, she heads smack into what is known as the city’s worst area, a no-man’s-land that is a haven for drug deal­ers, thieves and killers. TNT does not know that her brother has been bru­tally mur­dered by Charlie (Stan Shaw), an American who has set­tled in Hong Kong and is bent on inch­ing his way to the top of the city’s drug-smuggling trade. But he has no idea what he’s up against when he tan­gles with dyna­mite in TNT Jackson!Contract killer Samantha Fox (Cheri Caffaro) accepts a mis­sion to kill a group of gang­sters in the Philippines, but prob­lems arise when she falls for the Manila detec­tive inves­ti­gat­ing the mur­ders. Director Don Schain, who was mar­ried to Caffaro, directed her in sev­eral films prior to Too Hot To Handle, includ­ing Ginger, Girls Are For Loving and The Abductors.