Reviewed by: Hyomil Date: 04/07/2011 Reviewer Score: 8

Reviewed by: opifer Date: 04/18/2006 Summary: Synopsis Michelle Yip (Michelle Yeoh) takes tourist photos of rockabillies in Yoyogi Park, Tokyo. Meanwhile, yakuza bust into a noodle shop where a fellow gangster, who wants to give up crime, works as a busboy. They try to murder him with a wakazashi in the alley behind the shop but the cook intercedes and the boy flees into the streets where Michelle is grooving to the sound of garishly painted oil drums beaten with sticks. She breaks out the sort of mad kung fu only a mod woman could possess, revealing that even on vacation a Hong Kong Royal Policewoman is always ready for action. At the airport, a yakuza boss is questioned by reporters about his extradition to Hong Kong where he may face the death penalty for murder. He remains smugly defiant. Michelle coincidentally boards the same flight. A gangster shoots two cops and frees his boss; the pair then attempt to hijack the plane. Michelle and a Japanese undercover cop, Peter Yamamoto, join forces to kill the criminals. Michelle is welcomed as a heroine and courted by a self-assured pretty boy cop, Michael Wong, whom she attempts to brush off with mixed success. At the victory dinner, Peter introduces his wife Yukiko and little daughter who obviously fear for his life. Oblivious, Wong makes an ass of himself by playing up everyone’s violent heroics. Before long, Yukiko and the girl die in a car bomb explosion meant for Peter, who immediately becomes obsessed with revenge. Peter leaves the investigation, double-crosses an arms dealer to get a magnum revolver and uses Michelle as bait to draw out the killer at the California nightclub. Peter blows away the man who murdered his family but remains ignorant of one last criminal. Since innocents died in the crossfire, Michelle is forced into retirement. We learn in a flashback to the Vietnam War that all of the criminals fought together and by saving their commanding officer from a landmine became blood brothers. This ideal of brotherhood compels the surviving ex-officer to kidnap Michael, shoot out his ankles and dangle him from a rooftop to draw out Michelle. Michael commits suicide by untieing himself and falling to his death in order to keep Michelle out of harm’s way. She loses it at the funeral, however, and swears to avenge his death. The villain digs up Michael’s casket and suspends it from a construction crane at an abandoned construction site out of town, taunting Michelle that Michael will forever remain a wandering ghost once he blows up his corpse. He adds that he will do the same to Michelle once he kills her. In the finale, Michelle and Peter take out this last criminal and, exhausted, push the explosion-prone casket to safety. Reviewer Score: 7

Reviewed by: mrblue Date: 09/15/2005 The plot is pretty straightforward here -- after foiling a mid-air hijacking attempt, a trio of cops team up to bring down a gang of killers who are hell-bent on revenge. Royal Warriors falls into many of the traps of the genre, such as weak plot motivators (innocent people getting killed inspires the cops, etc.) and a dull romantic subplot. And Michael Wong stinks up every scene he's in (in fact, he's so bad that he's dubbed in both the English and Chinese versions). But Royal Warriors delivers action, and plenty of it. The first action sequence occurs about five minutes into the movie and it rarely lets up from there. The finale has Michelle driving a Road Warrior-esque armored vehicle and then engaging in a duel with a chainsaw-wielding bad guy definitely ranks among the top of Yeoh's action work. Royal Warrior's script, though pretty weak, does allow Yeoh to be a bit tougher than in many of her other films. Though she is still plenty cute, there's a hard edge to her that makes watching what is really a stock character more enjoyable. [review from www.hkfilm.net]

Reviewed by: ksbutterbox Date: 11/30/2002 Summary: Nice Action from 2 but Michael is horrible.... Really stupid plot but Michelle is great as well as the Japanese actor. Michael Wong is the most annoying actor in the world..He is so bad in just about every movie he's been in except "Beast Cops" and half of "Her Name is Cat". What a bad mistake to have him in this movie..typical dumb "jock"(he should have been killed off alot earlier in this flick)..otherwise it does okay...most of the time...I dunno.. this is so dated when you see it now..it's almost as lame as "the Touch"(it at least pokes fun at itself) in 2002!!! The car chase scenes are really better than some of the fighting! Only if you really like her...otherwise try "Magnificent Warriors" or the original "Yes Madam".

Reviewed by: MrBooth Date: 04/25/2002 Summary: One of the best action movies ever made After the success of Yes, Madam!, Royal Warriors was the next movie to feature Michelle Yeoh as a Girl With Gun (TM). When I first saw this movie it really blew me away... I'd seen pretty much all the decent wuxia/wirefu stuff from the 90's, and the best of the heroic bloodshed. Royal Warriors introduced me to the grittier, more brutal action choreography that Hong Kong perfected in the 80's. Watching it again at the 4 Star I was amazed by how well the movie still holds up after I've seen so many more movies in between. Amazingly well crafted action scenes, complex choreography that is a lot more realistic than the more stylised action of the 70's or the 90's. But the movie also features well developed characters, which in turn makes the story gripping and the action scenes that much more powerful. Michelle Yeoh and Henry Sanada both give their all to the action sequences, as do the stuntmen that must have taken quite a pummeling. More often than not there's no question that it's the leads doing the stunts & fighting though. These scenes are brilliantly choreographed and filmed too. I'd say that Royal Warriors is one of the best action movies ever produced, simply. Hell, even Michael Wong is good in it! Reviewer Score: 10

Reviewed by: danton Date: 01/03/2002 I'm working my way through the old ITLOD series right now, and so I finally got to see this Michelle Yeoh classic. RW was filmed on a shoestring budget, but the almost nonstop action in this very tight police thriller is breath-taking. They don't make'em like this in Hollywood, and sad to say, they don't seem to be making them in HK anymore either, now that they're trying to sell their movies to an English-speaking audience. In any case, this one is a must-see (and I'd never thought I'd say this about a movie starring Michael Wong, who is dubbed in this one).

Reviewed by: AgntFenris Date: 05/30/2001 Summary: 1 bad thing Only one complaint was that this movie had to be filmed during the worst decade ever. The clothes! ACK! But this was a great movie with some solid action. Another annoying Michael Wong appearance...but he fits oddly enough. Some great gun and fist battles. Definately a must see.

Reviewed by: nomoretitanic Date: 02/27/2001 Summary: Probably the best representation of HK action flicks Of course this is not the best HK action movie, but I think this one is probably the most "typical" one of them all. It has your out of place English dialogues, your ridiculous undercranks, your crazy stuntworks, your babe with gun, your random mayhem on innocent victims, your speedy recovery from bullet hits, your A-Team hi-tech armour cars, yout villains who swear revenges on their dead brothers and your mama. Okay not your mama. It's very 80's and I don't think it ages as well as classics like Police Story I and II. But it's a solid action flick. I didn't like the ending too much, kinda anti-climatic, the fight sequence in the club was much more spectacular.

Reviewed by: leh Date: 12/09/1999 First in a successful (but very loosely connected) series ofmovies about a policewoman. Some Japanese terrorists seek to avenge the death of one of their own. A very good action movie; recommended.

Reviewed by: hokazak Date: 12/09/1999 Michelle Khan is truly amazing in this classic pull-out-all-the-stops "Girls with Guns" movie, which is still one of the best of the genre. Excellent fight choreography and stunts, and tons of action - including a final scene in which Michelle really "brings down the house"!!! Possibly my favorite Michelle Khan role to date. Hiriyuki Sanada shows off some very impressive moves in his supporting role as Mr. Yamamoto, a Japanese cop who helps Michelle take on the bad guys.

Reviewed by: hkcinema Date: 12/08/1999 This one is full of action, great fighting and as melodramatic as can be. Michelle is a spunky cop, who befriends Michael Wong (a security officer) and Mr. Yamamoto, a Japanese cop on the verge of retiring from the force. In a spectacular scene aboard a plane, they all do away with a hi-jacker, gaining some recognition and fame. But they later find out that the hi-jacker has two loyal but psycho friends who will do anything to gain revenge for their veteran buddy. During the middle of the movie, the sap is poured on thick, as we see Mr. Yamamoto attempt to finally become the infinite family man to his lovely wife and adorable child, only to watch them get killed off. As if we didn't know THAT was going to happen. Though Michael Wong is the annoying puppy dog in this movie, Michelle is high flying and Mr. Yamamoto will amaze. Overall, the fighting choreography is spectacular, which makes Royal Warriors a definitive staple in HK action cinema. [Reviewed by Jennie Tam]