Only the Strong

Only the Strong is a 1993 American action film. It was directed by Sheldon Lettich from a screenplay he wrote with Luis Esteban. It was made by Davis Films, Freestone Pictures and August Entertainment, distributed by 20th Century Fox, and premiered in the USA on 27 August 1993. Louis Stevens, a former Green Beret, returns to his native Miami after service in Brazil and finds that his old high school has been taken over by gangs and drug dealers. When he demonstrates capoeira, a teacher asks him to teach it to at-risk students in an abandoned fire station. He is opposed by local drug boss Silverio Oliveiras, who is also a capoeira master. Capoeira, an Afro-Brazilian martial art, is the central theme of the film: both the hero and the main villain are capoeiristas, and Stevens teaches it to students in the film. English Wikipedia calls the film the only Hollywood film that presents capoeira from beginning to end. Louis Stevens is played by Mark Dacascos, whose martial arts foundation is Wun Hop Kuen Do and who learned capoeira for this role. The chief capoeira adviser was mestre Amen Santo. Joe Brown of The Washington Post described the film as confusingly assembled and edited, with many slow-motion shots. With a budget of 6 million dollars, the film earned roughly 3.3 million dollars in the USA.

Martial arts in this work

Fight choreography

The chief capoeira adviser was mestre Amen Santo, a capoeirista born in 1965 in Bahia who lives and teaches in Los Angeles and founded the Capoeira Batuque group with schools in Japan, Dubai, Germany and Brazil. According to English Wikipedia, he created much of the film's fight choreography and also appeared in it in a small role. We have not been able to establish who prepared the rest of the fights. Mark Dacascos learned capoeira from Amen Santo just before the audition for the role of Louis Stevens. Capoeira was not his original background: according to Wikipedia he holds a 4th dan black belt in Wun Hop Kuen Do, a style founded by his father Al Dacascos, and he also studied muay thai and wushu. We did not find the length of his preparation for the role in the sources.

People and martial arts

• Sheldon LettichDirector
• Amen SantoFight choreographer· Capoeira (real practitioner)
• Mark DacascosActor — as Louis Stevens· Capoeira (portrays the art on screen)
• Paco Christian PrietoActor — as Silverio Oliveiras· Capoeira (portrays the art on screen)
• Amen SantoTechnical advisor· Capoeira (real practitioner)