scorcher

THE FLICKS: Even though only a handful of people caught Mark Dacascos’ butt-kicking performance in the terrific period action/horror/ flick “Brotherhood of the Wolf,” there’s no doubt it made every one of them a fan. So how does some of the actor’s other work hold up? “Scorcher” casts him as the good guy trapped in a low-budget end of the world adventure. Inspired by other mediocre disaster movies with actors you’ve never heard of (like “The Core”), Dacascos is under-utilized as a Van Damme-type military man who must escort a team into LA to set off a couple of nukes and stop the planet’s plates from shifting. You can almost excuse the lack of special effects and terribly melodramatic dialogue, but to pull the punches on Dacascos’ fight scenes (which are choreographed like a bad 70’s TV series) is almost unforgivable. “Scorcher’s” only accomplishment is to make the apocalypse unbearably boring. “China Strike Force,” despite the Americanized voice-overs and Coolio’s stunt casting, is a traditional Hong Kong action flick that finds Dacascos in much better form as a silky smooth bad guy hoping to introduce the drug trade to China. A couple of supercops set out to stop him as director Stanley Tong (“Rumble in the Bronx”) stages some outlandishly exciting stunts. The hand-to-hand combat jumps from moving vehicles to 30-story skyscrapers, along with a few high speed car chases that prove once again Hong Kong filmmakers have a leg up on the US when it comes to the action genre. Dacascos isn’t the star, but at least he’s surrounded himself with a movie worthy of his talents, and certainly worth a rental. THE FEATURES: Sorry, just a few trailers for other Dimension Home Video releases. But all the movies sport great transfers and digital surround sound. FINAL SCORES: Mark Dacascos has too low a profile to be crowned the next big thing. But if he builds off movies like “China Strike Force” and steers clear of bad blockbuster knock-offs like “Scorcher” at least he’ll keep fans’ hopes alive for a flick worthy of his potential.