D.O.A.: Dead or Alive (2006)

Girls in bikinis kicking butt – sounds like nothing more than sexist male fantasy fodder, right? No matter the scholarly interpretation and arguments over empowerment, it’s hard to see the feminism in fisticuffs between scantily clad babes…especially when the narrative emphasizes the eroticism, and exploits their camera ready ‘assets’ in a very up close and personal manner. So would it surprise you that D.O.A.: Dead or Alive, based on the lusty adolescent console title of the same name, is readily one of the more estrogen-ccentric films in a long time? It’s a movie geared to make the supposedly weaker sex a smarter, savvier and far more substantive opponent – both in and out of the competitive ring. While its sci-fi subtext may be laughable at best, and its characters cut out of bitmap believability, it remains a gloriously goofy romp as choice chick flick.

Our story begins when Princess Kasumi, leader of her Japanese clan, decides to ignore royal protocol and go after her missing brother. By doing so, she becomes an outcast, leading loyal guard Ayane to automatically switch allegiances and become a court bounty hunter. Her prey? The MIA princess. Meanwhile, professional wrestler Tina Armstrong takes on a boatload of pirates aiming to shanghai her yacht. At the same time, master thief Christie Allen is questioned by the Hong Kong police over some missing bank money. All four eventually find themselves invited to the D.O.A. (Dead or Alive) Competition, hosted by reclusive and eccentric businessman Donovan. The set up is simple – a single elimination tournament where the loser is sent home, and the eventual winner winds up with $10 million. With Helena, the daughter of the invitational’s original founder present, and a collection of competitors from around the globe, everything is in place for another compelling contest – not that this is Donovan’s real intent…not by a long shot.

The first thing you notice about D.O.A. is Yuen’s decision to tweak the color palette. This is a pastel and primary battle royale, an assortment of tints and hues manipulated and manufactured to skirt the boundless border between believability and full fledged fantasy. All the water present is a crystalline blue, matching the azure elegance of the endless sky. Grass is greener than finely polished jade, and sunsets radiant a deep, dynamic orange. Clearly, this director is trying to emulate the millions of possibilities inherent in a complex computer program, but such a strategy also underlies D.O.A. ’s sense of seriousness. Since it is larger than life, the rules of reality really don’t apply, and that goes for every other facet of this film – its set design, its face offs, and its concept of characterization.

The main actresses here are all amazingly capable, with recent Emmy winner Jamie Pressly full of piss and vinegar as a desperate to prove herself grappler, and Sin City’s Devon Aoki as a sword wielding ninja doll. Equally impressive are Prison Break’s Holly Valance as a bodacious burglar and Shark’s Sarah Douglas as the untested Helena. All the gals get a little F/X help to realize their many moves (there is wire fu, real life martial arts, and a smattering of CGI to make it all come to life), but in general, they are very believable as smart, smokin’ hot extreme fighters. Yuen does go a little overboard on the slo-mo shots of torsos and tushies, but this is clearly in connection to the movie’s target audience. Guys like brawling, but they really LOVE a little T&A on the side.

As for the movie’s men, none make much of an impression, although Eric Roberts salt and pepper feathered look gives him a 10 years younger make-over. His performance is pitched somewhere between Christopher Walken and an actual psychotic beach bum. It’s pure Method madness at its most unhinged. As the dorky geek who gives the narrative its nutty professorship, Reba’s Steve Howey is feeb lite. Try as he might, he appears more anxious to pound brewskis than hack code. Other members of the male persuasion are either unimportant, or irritating (especially Brian White as a motor mouthed moron named Zack whose pin head is festooned with a sad spike of green hair). Still, none of these individual failings really matter. Yuen knows that action films rarely rely on compelling, complex personalities to make their point. Instead, it’s all about the fireworks, and D.O.A. delivers a couple dozen Fourth of July’s worth.

Indeed, this is a movie that cuts to the adrenaline pumped production number every couple of minutes, letting dialogue barely sink in before another example of hand to hand Hellsapoppin’ arrives. The choreography and filmmaking during these sequences are just stunning. Yuen obviously knows how to balance the needs of the purist with current pop culture dynamics. He tosses together quick cutting, amazing mise-en-scene, explosion compositions, and just a tinge of movie magic to turn a couple of pretty people beating the snot out of each other into some manner of metaphysical meltdown. It makes one wonder how long he can keep up such a satisfying pace. The answer is 80 plus minutes, apparently. From Princess Kasumi’s escape for the last act face off between good and evil, D.O.A. never settles down. It’s just one amazing stunt statement after another.

There will be complaints that the plot makes no sense – not the contest, but the undercover bio-engineering that’s going on behind the scenes – and some will argue that, no matter their prowess, Yuen and the producers are exploiting attractiveness and sexuality for the sake of some elusive commercial conceit (the film did not do well at the box office, that is, when it could find its way there after its 2006 making). Fans of the games were glad to see the obvious references, as well as the sneaky segment where our heroines forget about fighting and play a friendly game of beach volleyball (wink). The added content on the DVD itself sheds little light on the film’s numerous issues. We get a decent Behind the Scenes featurette, but it mostly focuses on the fighting onscreen, not during post-production. The lack of further context speaks volumes about the studio’s overall faith in this film.

And that’s a shame. If marketed correctly, embracing its genial junk food frenzy instead of trying to overcompensate for it, D.O.A. could have been a sleeper hit. It had the perfect focus group strategizing, and with a little help from the female sect (who would definitely appreciate these gals’ knuckle crunching self determination), this eventual flop could have been viewed as a lot of fun. Instead, it is criticized for everything its not, and castigated for concepts it barely embraces. When it comes right down to it, Corey Yuen has indeed delivered a kind of kung fu interpretation of a Penthouse Forum letter, but there is more than just softcore slumming here. Even if you wouldn’t be caught ‘dead or alive’ watching such a film, you should give D.O.A. a try. It’s nothing more than a big, dopey delight.