Opening with quite a dark introduction, we see the great Eddy Ko hit rock bottom, prepared to kill his disabled son (played by a real child with Cerebral Palsy) to ease stress and financial difficulties. His wife begins prostitution in a bid to bring more money in with Eddy turning to crime to help free them from their situation.
Director Li Chao, who also brought us the fun Angel Force (aka Mission Kill) with Moon Lee and Simon Yam, as well as The Kung Fu Kid (aka Shaolin Avengers) with Chin Kar Lok and Lam Ching Ying, delivers a heavy dramatic-thriller, with hard martial arts action and gritty violence. Our heroes come in the form of the handsome Ben Lam and amazing Yukari Oshima, both at the height of their careers around this time!
The Osh plays a social worker, signed to the home of Ko, seeing what kind of family they are first hand. As Eddy gets more involved with a gang of thieves from the Mainland (one being his cousin), things quickly go from bad to worse pulling Yukari and cop friend, Lam, into the mess which only leads to more martial arts action.
As well as playing a bad-guy bit-part, the fantastic Ridley Tsui, who had only been in the game as a fight choreographer for a few years at this point, provides the choreography for the action, with Bruce Law looking after the vehicle stunts - also still quite fresh to the industry. The action sticks to the dark nature of the film, providing some hard martial arts fighting as well as some painful looking stunt work. One fight in particular that stood out was the car-park fight with Yukari in the early half of the film that reminded me of Jackie's two-car battle in Police Story, although not as extensive. Of course, there are many more fighting highlights throughout from both stars, and of course, the powerful finale which is just fantastic!
Having starred in many kung fu classics of the seventies, including a collection of Shaw Brothers productions, and directed some of his own such as the Leung Kar Yan and Philip Ko classic, Two On The Road, Li Chao directs A Punch To Revenge in a classic style which isn't a bad thing at all - only in that it makes the film seem a little more dated than the likes of Police Story 1 & 2 which came out earlier.
Overall: Lost among the many hits of its era, A Punch To Revenge offers some dark drama as well as some fantastic martial arts action and stunt work!
