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No Retreat No Surrender

Play trailer 1:36 Poster for No Retreat No Surrender PG Released May 2, 1986 1h 23m Action Crime Drama Play Trailer Watchlist
Watchlist Tomatometer Popcornmeter
80% Tomatometer 5 Reviews 53% Popcornmeter 5,000+ Ratings
Picked on by Seattle bullies, a karate student (Kurt McKinney) learns enough to face a Soviet (Jean-Claude Van Damme) twice his size.

Critics Reviews

View All (5) Critics Reviews
Walter Goodman New York Times The advice from this corner: Retreat. May 21, 2003 Full Review Craig Schroeder Battleship Pretension No Retreat, No Surrender is an argument for JCVD as a hard-to-define, compelling action commodity. Jan 7, 2021 Full Review Ed Travis Cinapse An objectively bad Karate Kid rip-off, No Retreat, No Surrender manages to never the less entertain and delight with a combination of pure earnestness and legitimately cool fight work. Nov 13, 2018 Full Review Austin Trunick Under the Radar Come to No Retreat, No Surrender for the Van Damme-age, but stick around for the wall-to-wall WTFness. Feb 28, 2017 Full Review Emanuel Levy EmanuelLevy.Com Rated: 2/5 Aug 17, 2005 Full Review Read all reviews

Audience Reviews

View All (354) audience reviews
Patrick R A classic for me I was hanging Sandbags from trees as a kid 😂😂🤷🏻 Rated 5 out of 5 stars 08/07/24 Full Review Audience Member A absolute classic 👌 Rated 5 out of 5 stars 08/03/24 Full Review Diana H My favorite classic of those films Rated 5 out of 5 stars 06/26/24 Full Review Michał K What a massive garbage, JCVD in it only for a second, what a cash grab. The people in this movie looks like they never act, and the story is beyond ridiculous Rated 0.5 out of 5 stars 02/10/24 Full Review DanTheMan 2 I'd forgotten that Van Damme is barely in this movie despite it proudly and very prominently boasting his name on the front cover, he appears for a brief moment during the opening before disappearing from the film entirely only to crop up during the final tournament at the end. Regardless of this, No Retreat, No Surrender borrows heavily from The Karate Kid in another of the decade's derivatives that can also be applied to films like Sidekicks, but this time mixed with elements of Rocky IV. The movie certainly isn't good, often horrifically cheesy, but it makes up for its shortcomings as it entertains and delights with a combination of pure earnestness and legitimately cool fight choreography courtesy of Hong Kong director Corey Yuen. Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars 09/08/23 Full Review Alan S I literally grew up with no retreat, no surrender! I love this movie. The acting may not be great but it definitely marked a big memory in my head when I was a child watching this karate show, now 28 years later and still looking for the DVD to play this movie again lol Rated 5 out of 5 stars 09/04/23 Full Review Read all reviews
No Retreat No Surrender

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Cast & Crew

Lone Wolf McQuade 57% 67% Lone Wolf McQuade Watchlist Dick Tracy 63% 53% Dick Tracy Watchlist Gator 25% 43% Gator Watchlist Charley Varrick 82% 83% Charley Varrick Watchlist White Lightning 67% 62% White Lightning Watchlist Discover more movies and TV shows. View More

Movie Info

Synopsis Picked on by Seattle bullies, a karate student (Kurt McKinney) learns enough to face a Soviet (Jean-Claude Van Damme) twice his size.
Director
Corey Yuen
Producer
See-Yuen Ng
Screenwriter
Keith W. Strandberg
Distributor
New World Pictures
Production Co
Seasonal Film Corporation, New World Pictures
Rating
PG
Genre
Action, Crime, Drama
Original Language
English
Release Date (Theaters)
May 2, 1986, Original
Release Date (Streaming)
Apr 21, 2017
Box Office (Gross USA)
$1.5M
Runtime
1h 23m