Only the Strong (1993) on Netflix
Louis Stevens comes home to Miami from Brazil and finds gangs and drug dealers running his old high school. A teacher asks him to teach capoeira to the school's worst students.
- Netflix3.7/5
- IMDb6.6/107,640 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes13%
Trailer
Plot summary
By the time Louis Stevens comes home from military service in Brazil, gangs and drug dealers have taken over his old Miami high school. Stevens is a master of capoeira, the Afro-Brazilian martial art, and he uses it to drive dealers off school grounds. His former teacher Kerrigan sees the effect he has on the students and asks him to teach capoeira to a handful of the school's most troubled ones, who practice in an abandoned fire station. Among the students is Orlando, the younger cousin of Silverio, who runs the local drug trade and is himself a capoeira master. Teaching the class brings Stevens the anger of Silverio.
Cast
- John Fionteas Hector Cervantes
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Only the Strong (1993)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Only the Strong, starring Mark Dacascos, is considered to be the only Hollywood film that showcases capoeira, an Afro-Brazilian martial art, from beginning to end.
- Though Mark Dacascos is a talented martial artist, his background is not initially in capoeira: just before his audition he was trained by famed capoeirista Amen Santo, who was responsible for much of the fight choreography and has a small role in the film.
- The two most prominent songs in the film are by Serapis Bey, the second of them, Zoom-Zoom-Zoom, far better known outside the film as the theme song for Mazda's television commercials.
