Plot Details: This opinion reveals major details about the movie's plot.

Amongst the sea of straight to video martial arts nonsense that you can find on budget DVD, G2:Mortal Conquest always stood out to me. Possibly because its star, Daniel Bernhardt, had been a star player in the TV series Mortal Kombat Conquest, and partially because the story looked familiar. The reason for this was that I actually caught a good part of the movie very late on TV one night under the title 'G2'. I was very tired, and no matter how hard I tried I couldn't work out what the title meant, so I turned it off.
I finally got round to buying Mortal Conquest (as the UK DVD calls it), and realised that I was watching the same movie the other day.

The main character here is Steven Conlin (Daniel Berhardt - Bloodsport 2: The Next Kumite), an antique dealer who dreams of a mysterious sword, and a historical setting where he single handedly battles a group of mongol warriors with the sword.
We also meet cop Cory Harris (Meeka Schiro - The Protector) who has been investigating 'The Swordplay', an illegal underground fighting circuit where the combatants fight to the death. Recently arrived in the US from Hong Kong is the evil Parmenion (James Hong - Big Trouble in Little China) with his entourage which consists of deadly twins Ying (James Kim - Exit Wounds) and Yang (Simon Kim - Universal Soldier: The Return), hulking brute Cam Natale (Nick Milano - in his only role) and the sexy Boi (Bing Shen - In her only role).
He has with him the sword Steven craves, and constantly forces him to participate in the Swordplay if he wants it. Conlin meets Cory when she comes to ask for advice on an artifact that is used as the calling card of the swordplay, the two immediately hit it off, and she seems very familiar to Conlin.
After much dreaming fighting and going to and fro, it turns out that Conlin is a reincarnation of a soldier of Alexander the Great, who was sent to retreive his sword. After being helped by Parmenion's daughter Isis (Cory), he has to fight the troupe of mongols single handedly. In his dreams, he always seems to lose the battle, but can he win in real life and complete his mission to regain the sword and send the seemingly immortal Parmenion back to where he came from?

If that summing up of the story seems confusing and disjointed, well thats because that sums up the story of this Highlander wannabe in a nutshell. There were times when I really didn't have much of a clue what was supposed to be happening, and was only still watching due to the quality of the combat scenes.

The acting in this movie is acceptable, if nothing more. Bernhardt is pretty decent in his role, and is at least a likeable hero. Reunited with his Bloodsport 2 + 3 co-star James Hong, who puts in possibly the worst performance of his I have ever seen, the movie does at least boast two semi-talented actors. Like I say, this definitely isn't Hong's best performance, although the fact his character sucks can't have helped him. The majority of his dialogue is either doing a really campy laugh or shouting "avenge me!". The rest of the cast is pretty decent, if not ever rising above that. The exception being Bing Shen who I actually though was sexy as hell, despite not having a gorgeous face or voluptrous body, she had the right body language though, and was pretty enough to pull off her role quite well, and Im slightly disapointed that this is her only movie.

The music in the movie is actually pretty cool. Not cool as in I want the soundtrack, but cool in that it fits in with the movie very well. It is all very Oriental-esque and reminded me a lot of the music in the Mortal Kombat videogames. Which is really the mood of the movie seeing as the main focus is really the martial arts battles.

The special effects in the movie consist of the strange blue light that engulfs the immortal warriors when they die. This is a pretty hokey effect, but this is a straight to video martial arts feature so it has to be expected. The other effects include several decapitations, all of which were surprisingly well done, even if the blood is a bit too dark.

Now, lets get one thing out of the way right off the bat. Director/Writer Nick Rotundo has some sort of obsession with reincarnation,Alexander the Great and his sword. 4 years before this movie was made, he made Gladiator Cop, the sequel to 'The Swordsman', with Lorenzo Lamas, which had near enough the exact same plot, except Lamas played the reincarnation of Alexander himself, hell James Hong is even in it, as a character called Parmenion who seems exactly the same to the man he plays here. While this is possibly an attempt at some sort of sequel, no one seems to reference this, so I have to assume he is just someone with a degree in history who is obsessed with Highlander and can only make B-Movies. And why the hell is this Macedonian soldier of Alexander the great so good at martial arts?

The plot of the film is, as I said, incredibly confusing and at times really stupid. While the basic plot is clear, the film feels the need to explain it the most inane possible way, and there are several questions left unanswered. Such as, why does Parmenion keep offering Steve the sword, why doesn't he just kill him before he knows what is going on?. Why are Cory and Steve not in the same knowledge as Parmenion and his cronies? and most importantly, how did Parmenion and co actually get a chance to come back?
One of the most amusing and horrible things about the film is its choice of intro and outro. They both feature the sword floating amongst stars while a narrator mumbles a load of garbage about power and such. The only line that really caught my ears was one about "only one can truly wield it, and with it he is invincible" or something along those lines. But the Parmenion goon did a good enough job of wielding it, and surely that would have meant that Alexander was invincible then, seeing as he once used it?. Now granted my views on invincible all come from movies and videogames, but invincible sure sounds to me like unkillable in meaning. Unless of course they mean that he was invincible in the way you are when you play Super Mario Bros. and get a star, allowing you to run through enemies killing them, but if you fall down a hole you still die. In which case you have to wonder which hole Alexander fell down.

While I could pick holes in the plot and moan at it all day, I won't, mainly because it is just really an excuse for Bernhardt to fight some people and show off his great martial arts skills. And there are a good enough number of fights, and they are well enough executed to keep people looking for a cheap and cheery martial arts fix satisfied. Bernhardt pulls off his trademark moves from the Bloodsport sequels along with a host of other nice moves both unarmed and with a sword. Everyone here can fight, and the numerous fighting tournament-esque battles are definitely the highlight of this movie.

And to be honest, that is all I expected of the film, a ridiculous story, some pretty ladies and good fights. And that is exactly what I got. Both the villainess and the heroine are both pretty, as I explained the story is ridiculous and the fighting is pretty top. And to be honest, fans of this type of movie are who I would recommend this to. If you aren't put off by the dumb front cover, one look at the back cover, where the UK DVD has pictures from Bloodsport 3. Yes, this is the type of film that gets that type of attention paid to its DVD sleeve.

If a dumb story doesn't put you off, and all you want is a silly movie with good martial arts fights, then G2 is a decent bet if it is inexpensive or on TV. While it isn't any sort of quality viewing, it is harmless rubbish cinema at its most silly. I have to say that I think Bernhardt deserves better movie roles, but at least this entry into his CV can at least claim to be entertaining, unlike his other movie released in 1998, Bloodsport 4: The Final Chapter.

Recommended: Yes

Viewing Format: DVD
Video Occasion: Good for a Rainy Day