The past couple of weeks have been either feast or famine. Last week offered up a veritable cornucopia of DVDs to feast your ever-loving movie eyes on. This week is the exact opposite — there is a distinct absence of major releases, and not even all that many lower tier titles that are all that intriguing. It would be a good time to catch up on what you missed last week, or you can start getting ready for the weeks to come. Still, while there are very few titles of interest, do not mistake that for nothing worth watching. There is always going to be something worth watching.

This week's pick is a film from 1986 called Above the Law -- no, not the Steven Seagal flick. This is a movie from Hong Kong starring Yuen Biao and Cynthia Rothrock. It has a very minor story that makes a statement on vigilantisim and police corruption, but more  than that, it strings together a number of first rate fight sequences.

The story is very much just window dressing for the martial arts action flick which is what you watch it for. Intermixed with the tale of corruption are some great fights. The fights include one-on-one battles between Yuen Biao and Cynthia Rothrock, Biao and Peter Cunningham (a world champion kickboxer from Canada), Cynthia and Karen Sheperd, and Biao and Melvin Wong. There are a couple of others, but these are the main fights. Now the fight between Rothrock and Shepard is spectacular; the two knew each other from being in martial arts competitions together and worked together to put on a great fight using acrobatics and weapons, particularly a belt that is actually a chain link weapon with a blade on the end. The fights are incredible and really show what Biao and Rothrock can do.

The DVD looks very good considering how it was likely not handled all that well after its initial release. It has a nice selection of extras, including interviews with Yuen Biao, Cynthia Rothrock, and Peter Cunningham, as well as an excellent commentary track with Bey Logan, a Hong Kong cinema expert.