My review was written in February 1986 after a screening at Harris theater on Manhattan's 42nd St.
"Knights of the City" is a silly mishmash filmed in South Florida two years ago under the title "Cry of the City" (retained as a theme song). Filmmaker-star Leon Isaac Kennedy attempts to mix elements from the youth gang pics of the late 1970s with the recently demised ("Beat Street", "Flash Forward") genre of dance/rap music contests. Hokey result, picked up by New World, is yet another dud ready to line the shelves of home video stores.
Pic gained some notoriety when its production company, Miami Gold (not credited on screen in release print) left Florida after much local ballyhoo and exec producer Michael Franzese was later charged by the feds with racketeering and allegedly using his film companies to launder funds.
With new producers, music and post-production changes, pic emerges as a diffuse tale of three urban gang members (setting is indeterminate despite Florida lensing) played by Kennedy, John Mengati and Nicholas Campbell, at war with a rival gang, The Mechanix, led by Jeff Moldovan, that is invading their turf. Kennedy and Mengati also head up a musical group, which looks like their ticket out of the ghetto when they are briefly befriended in jail by drunk record company owner Michael Ansara.
Kennedy crosses both the color line and social classes by romancing Ansara's daughter, statuesque Janine Turner (named Brooke here and styled after Brooke Shields), who, a la "Flash Forward", organizes a street talent contest. After being coached in the latest dance steps by (fellow ex-Clevelander) Jeff Kutash, Kennedy & crew win the $10,000 prize and a recording contract, even though their much-applauded performance is pretty bad.
Campbell is a hardliner who wants to keep the gang together, and there is some chummy solidarity in the final reel when the good guys unite to wipe the floor with The Mechanix.
Filmed by director Dominic Orlando with too much back lighting and smoke machine effects, pic is padded with quickie turns by numerous guest stars from the music world, including Smokey Robinson as the contest emcee. Sammy Davis Jr.'s stint ended up on the cutting room floor, however.
Kutash's choreography is unimpressive and pic's musical sequences never generate the excitement of such models as "Breakin'" or even New World's own "Body Rock". The hope to modernize a "West Side Story" format is stillborn because this is not a musical but rather an action pic, with interpolated musical performances.
Campbell wins the overacting honors with a strident, screaming act, while his future teammate on tv's "The Insiders" series, Stoney Jackson, has little to do as the group/gang's drummer. Kennedy's script is extremely self-serving, unbelievably adding to his screen persona as "a lover and a fighter" the status of rap singer.
