Author: Jim McLennan

Relic Hunter: season one

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★★★
“Sydney Fox and the Temple of Tomb.”

relichunterMore or less shamelessly ripping off Indiana Jones and Tomb Raider in equal measures, this Canadian TV series ran for three seasons and 66 episodes between 1999 and 2002. The heroine is Sydney Fox (Carrere), a Professor of history at “Trinity University,” who is renowned for her ability to track down historical artifacts lost for centuries – and, unlike some of her colleagues in the business, return them to their rightful owners. She is assisted on the road by Nigel (Anholt), her British assistant who is smart, but far happier in a library than taking part in the globe-trotting or fist-fighting, in which Sidney revels, and back at base by Claudia (Booth), her bubble-headed secretary who got the job largely because her father is a major donor to the college.

The episodes are almost completely standard, starting with a historical prologue, to show how the relic was lost. Someone goes to Trinity to ask for help finding it. Sydney and Nigel follow a series of clues bringing them closer to the relic. There’ll be another group hunting the same object, for mercenary or other reasons, often with an unexpected agent working for them. Expect secret passages and protective traps, some fisticuffs as Fox takes out the villain’s goons, light romantic tension, a mildly life-threatening situation and a happy ending as the treasure is found and something moral is done with it. The only things that change are the McGuffin and the country involved. The latter is generally as close as the Canadian shooting location can fake it, though the end of the season did appear to fund a trip for actual shooting: five of the last six episodes had a French setting.

It’s hardly challenging stuff, and the action is generally several level sub-Buffy, in part because Carrere lacks much physical presence. The history on view is particularly woeful too, with basic factual errors surrounding just about every “real” character. All told, after the first couple of episodes, which seemed particularly stilted, I contemplated quietly forgetting the entire idea. However, I persevered, and the series did slowly grow on me. Sydney and Nigel develop a nice chemistry, and there are occasional moments which suggest a more tongue-in-cheek approach than you might expect. For instance the line delivered on their entrance into an Amsterdam bar: “Why do I suddenly feel like I’m in a Kubrick film?”. Or, as shown below, there’s the muddy catfight between Sydney and a female adversary, which is almost as self-aware as the one between Denise Richards and Aunjanue Ellis in Undercover Brother.

Make no mistake: even by the low standards of network television, this is hardly great, being incredibly derivative, and unwilling to stray anywhere outside its comfort zone. And yet… Once I came to accept these limitations, I found myself increasingly entertained by the fluffy lack of envelope-pushing. This is the televisual equivalent of putting on a beloved bath-robe: well-worn, comfortable, and you know exactly what you’re going to get. If not something you probably want to wear all the time, there are occasions when it’s just what’s needed.

Star: Tia Carrere, Christian Anholt, Lindy Booth, Tony Rosato

The Devil’s Gravestone

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★★
“Blade-ette, but a good deal more chatty and cheaper.”

devilsgravestoneJaq (LaMont) has devoted her life to hunting and killing the vampires who stalk the night in the metropolis of ‘Roach City’. She became this way after her husband, Cale (Red Star), was turned by one of the most notorious of serial vampires, and the first victim of his blood-lust was their young son. He vanished, and Jaq has spent the years since trying to track him down, taking out any fangster who gets in the way. She is visited by a local detective, Dick (Nemmers), who gives her some surprising news: Cale stabbed himself to death in a local cemetery. However, the body vanishes from the morgue, and it soon becomes clear that that’s not the only strange thing going on, as a woman who was sexually assaulted nearby has gone from zero to heavily pregnant in a few days.

After a brisk and fairly promising start, this becomes increasingly bogged-down in exposition and talk, rather than action. It does have some interesting ideas, putting new twists on old ideas, such as the concept that vampires perpetually need blood, because they “burn” it off constantly, a result of their superhuman strength and speed consuming so much energy. However, there isn’t enough time to do much with these concepts, which are instead espoused – typically by a character I nicknamed Dr. Exposition (James) – then never mentioned or of significance again. If he had been laying the groundwork for a series, it might have made sense, but in a standalone movie like this, it bring things to a grinding halt. It’s the last thing the film needs, because the extremely-low budget approach across the board, from video definition through sound (a lot of the dialogue seems post-synched) to special effects, then becomes all the more obvious.

Once that happens, it becomes a chore to get through. I kept finding my attention drifting elsewhere – checking my email, picking my toenails, the sort of pastimes you do when you’re vaguely bored, yet not disinterested enough to seek out aggressively something more entertaining. More than once, I realized something semi-important had happened while I was distracted, and would have to rewind to the point where I’d lost interest. That’s never a good sign, and the final “apocalyptic” showdown left me thoroughly unimpressed, with all the initial potential having evaporated.

Dir: Jay Mackenzie Roach
Star: Elle LaMont, Joe Nemmers, Grant James, Niko Red Star

Dance of Death

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★★★
“Putting the ‘arts’ in martial arts.”

danceofdeathIn the seventies, Angela Mao was the queen of Hong Kong cinema, occupying much the same position as Pam Grier in the blaxploitation films of the decade. Probably best known in the West for her role as Bruce Lee’s sister in Enter the Dragon (for which she was paid the princely sum of $100!), she had much meatier roles in a slew of films. This is my first exposure to her work, albeit in a print which has seen better… well, never mind days, I’m thinking better decades. It was dubbed and had subtitles, though the English track often matched the English subs more in spirit than anything else. And it wasn’t even ranked in her top 25 by IMDB rating. But, whaddya know, it actually wasn’t too bad.

She plays Fei Fei, a nomadic orphan who comes across two fighting masters, that have been battling for years, without being able to decide who is better. She offers them a solution: they can both train her, and she’ll then go off and fight people – whoever’s training is most useful, is clearly superior. [This kind of thing only makes sense in a kung-fu movie. Fortunately, that’s exactly what this is.] In her first encounter, she sees off members of the Bird Gang, rescuing a member of the Five Styles School, which leads her to join the latter group. However, the rest of the Bird Gang continue their mission to wipe out their rivals, with Fei Fei the sole survivor. She returns to her original teachers to learn more and, after picking up a sixth style from a surprising location, is ready to take on Bird Gang leader, Mu Fa Shan, and his “Upside-down Horse” style.

Early on, I was ready to write this off, because Fei Fei’s fighting skills are second-rate at best. However, as things progressed, I realized that was actually the point: she progresses over the course of the film from being an enthusiastic amateur, through study and training, to someone who can credibly take on a top fighter. Her character may not have much of a story arc: instead, it’s her kung-fu that does. By the time of the final battle – which lasts about 15 minutes – she’s graceful and fluid, filmed by Lu in lengthy shots which do Mao justice. Now, it’s still a style of cinema very different to modern action films; but if you can accept the difference (which I’ll admit, takes getting used too, because it’s relatively slow and far more obviously choreographed), you’ll be fine. I kept being reminded of Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers – and that might give you a clue as to the source of the sixth style… Oh, never mind: the title gives it away. It probably helps that stunt co-ordinator on this was Chen Yuan-lung – whom you might know a bit better as Jackie Chan.

It does suffer too much from the perpetual bane of the genre – too many comedic elements, and a resulting horrid unevenness of tone: the revenge motif which is crucial to the plot never comes over as having any emotional punch, not least because the members of the Five Styles clan bite the bullet before Fei Fei has apparently done more than be introduced to them. But Mao has enough charisma and presence to stop you, just this side of throwing things through your TV. If this is one of her minor works, I’m looking forward to the better ones.

Dir: Chuan Lu
Star: Angela Mao, Shih Tien, Shiao Bou-Lo, Chin Pey

Behind The Women of Armageddon

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manidbannerThe Woman of Armageddon is a sci-fi/action crossbreed, taking elements from both action heroine and post-apocalypse genres. Initially created as the basis for a 2012 calendar, now in its third year, the idea has expanded, under the loving care of its creator, Michael Zinn. Zinn took time off from arranging Doomsday, to speak to GWG.org about the end of the world, as he knows it.

For those who don’t know, high concept Women of Armageddon for us.

Women of Armageddon is a (beautiful) vision of an alternate future. “What if the world ended, and only beautiful women were left?”

What’s your background and artistic influences?

Well, I am a computer geek at heart, but when I was in college, everything was lumped into “computer science ” and there was no such thing as Photoshop. I changed my direction, and ended up at the Hartford Art School as a photography major. By the time I left, computers had started doing graphics and I was able to combine my passions.. As far as influences, well, some artists that definitely inspired me are Boris Valejo – as a matter of fact it was his fantasy artwork calendars that directly inspired the look and colors of 2013. I’m also a big H.R. Giger fan. Another big influence is scifi movie posters as wel as “sexploitation” movie posters like Barbarella; two movies that had a specific influence on this project are Planet of the Apes and Mad Max

Where did the idea come from?

Imagine Mad Max meets the Sports Illustrated Swimwear Calendar. The idea originated in 2011, with the prophecies of impending doom in 2012 and the hype of the world ending… possibly on Dec 21, 2012. It was a spoof in my head. A mash up of the Mad Max costumes and women who had the time apparently, to do their makeup and retain their femininity… But it soon evolved to represent women more as a symbol of strength and survival.

_MG_3852Was there a particular type of Armageddon in mind?

Actually, yes and no… The original calendar had a few concepts tossed around. One was that each month would represent a different Armageddon: zombies, aliens, biochemical warfare, natural disaster, nuclear war, etcetera. Another concept was going to be Armageddon around the world, using Landmarks like the Eiffel Tower, Empire State building, Wall of China, Golden Gate Bridge. So there’s the “no”. The “yes”, is that in the photographic novel I am developing, there is a specific Armageddon – but that’s not to be disclosed at this time!

How did you go about putting the first calendar together in 2012, getting the models and the weapons?

It was Thanksgiving 2011, and I was visiting family in AZ. The idea had been in my head all year and I finally shared it with my girlfriend at the time, Janine Maloney, who is a fabulously talented makeup artist. She was very encouraging and brainstormed the idea with me, and involved the first models , whom she had worked with on makeup at the local Haunted Houses that usually crop up during Halloween season. They were all very inspired by the concept and eager to get involved, which really helped bring the calendar to life.

In addition to Janine’s “theater” friends, I come from the local music scene, and was able to involve some of my local female musician friends, which helped add some audience to the calendar. We were very fortunate that they were all available and in about three weekends we scrambled to costume and shoot 12 girls! As a matter of fact, a few of the models had boyfriends who built props and sets, and they showed up with some awesome weaponry that appears in the first calendar. It went amazingly smooth for the first time around. I did all the graphic design and layout over a week, and we were able to have the calendar available to order right around Christmas-time!

How was the reaction?

People seemed to really get it for the most part. It also seemed to be inspiring to women. I think people like the fact that these are regular girls and they look great, tough yet battered, Hard, yet soft. Our own reaction – which was interesting – was that this concept needed to expand. We originally were thinking about making a comic book, and in looking for an illustrator, we realized that we had already created a style we could use to express this as a “photo-graphic novel”, a twist on the popular adult version of comic books called “Graphic Novels”

Where did things go from there?

While we were writing the story, the opportunity to appear at ComicCon in NY came up. We didn’t have time to produce the PhotoGraphic Novel we wanted, so we decided to do another Calendar )2013. 2013 was even better than 2012 and we also did a deck of playing cards. The second calendar was amazing! We were definitely better prepared and even more energized – it was also more photography based than post-processed.

What have been the biggest lessons you’ve learned, and the most rewarding moments?

Each project presents its own set of challenge and learning experiences. I learned that a Calendar has a limited window of opportunity for selling!  But I also learned that the concept was huge and there was a world to create.  The biggest challenge was definitely losing my partner in the project. Janine Maloney is an amazingly creative and talented Makeup Artist who happened to be my girlfriend. When we split up, she moved to New Mexico. The 2014 Calender was emotionally challenging as well as logistically.

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Fortunately, a few of the girls i worked with were also talented Makeup Artists and helped me through the challenge, Ally Antun, he only girl that has actually been in all three calendars, is extremely talented and motivated. She has created some great horror characters for “Slim’s Chamber of Horrors” a local haunted house experience that made the news this past season.

The most rewarding moment was holding the first calender in my hands. It was the most tangible proof i had ever seen that “You can do whatever you set your mind to.” The second most rewarding was having a booth at Comicon 2012 in NY with the girls in costume. The response was amazing.

Looks like this is just one of several similar projects – tell us about the others.

Well, This project has definitely connected me to my own style, which I don’t think I had established before, as far as shooting with women goes. While I do enjoy just shooting portraits, The ideas that excite me are more storytelling oriented, a moment in time that speaks to the viewer…

I have a project called DrrtyGrrls which is an homage to old school pinup photography and style, with a little twist – each girl has gotten herself “dirty” in her respective scenario. For example “Arc-Angel” os a girl in a motorcycle shop with a welding flame, working on a motorcycle, or “Flour Girl”- a waitress in a kitchen who has made a bit of a mess with the mixing machine.

Some newer work I’ve been doing is inspired by groups on Facebook like Girls with Guns and Badass Babes, so I have been focusing on the gun culture as well as the biker and tattoo cultures, which are very visual to begin with, providing me with tons of inspiration and material. I have also recently begun working for United Ink, a tattoo based company that runs Tattoo Expos and sponsors their own United Ink Angels – a group of up and coming tattoo models.

What are your favorite action heroine movies?

Hmm. That’s a tough one. I love the Rssident Evil Series. Of course, I have to mention Tarantino’s Kill Bill, and Planet Terror. Can I sneak in Tomb Raider as well?

How would you survive a zombie apocalypse?

Unfortunately, I don’t think I would last too long! But if I had any chance to just escape to the wilderness beforehand, that’s what I’d do. Avoid areas that were once populated.

What next for the Women of Armageddon?

Well, the story is pretty much developed and the script is being put together, so we can begin production on the photo-graphic Novel. But I have also been doing a bit of video production the last few years and it’s a very good possibility that we can bring the Women of Armageddon into some sort of live action series or feature. That would be phenomenal!

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RIN ~Daughters of Mnemosyne~

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★★★
“Harry Potter, with more lesbians.”

mnemosyne2There’s something to be said for not laying everything out on the line for your audience from the get-go, and only gradually revealing pertinent information. But do it too often, or for too long, and you run a significant risk of driving them away in bafflement. Such is probably the case here: for rather too long, it’s clear that the characters know a great deal more about what’s going on than the audience. The central character is Rin (Noto), a private investigator who, we soon discover, is immortal. We find this out because she keeps coming back after getting killed by Laura (Ohara), an assassin employed by the mysterious “Apos,” who thinks he/she is a god, and is intent on proving it. Turns out, this immortality is the result of Rin ingesting a spore from a tree known as Yggdrasil – yep, that’s ancient Norse. In Japan – which normal people can’t see. If a woman is infected, she becomes immortal. If a man does, he turns into an “angel”, a monster that hunts and eats the immortals, who have an irresistible urge to have sex with the angels.

There’s more. A lot more, spanning a century or so. Probably too much more than should be crammed in to six 45-minute episodes, but as I noted with AHS: Coven, that’s not necessarily a bad thing. It’s fairly clear where it’s all going to end: a battle between Rin and He-who-must-not-be-named, Apos. Before we get there, however, there’s a lot of sex, much of it of the girl on girl variety, though with a significant quantity of BDSM as well, befitting is apparent origins on a Japanese version of Skinemax. That certainly makes this unsuitable for minors: some is necessary to the plot, but a lot of it feels more like fan service – a bit of a shame, because it needlessly devalues what’s a fairly intriguing concept, containing a good deal of imagination. Rin’s daily business, such as finding lost cats, always seems to end up dragging her into much more complex affairs, linked either to Apos or some big corporation.

Some of these are well done and are capable of standing alone, such as the third episode, which covers biological weapons and human testing, still something of a taboo subject in Japan (Don’t mention Unit 731. I mentioned it once, but I think I got away with it).  However, the closer we get to the big bad, the more confusing and less interesting things become. One review put it beautifully: “It feels like you’re just watching the characters explain what the hell is going on, while raping and eating each other.” I think the creators are trying to up the ante, but there’s little or no emotional wallop to the sexual sadism, with the result that it becomes kinda dull. However, it does also play to anime’s strengths, in that whatever the mind conceive, can be depicted. If you don’t get a frisson when the angel wings start sprouting, you’re a more phlegmatic individual than I. Overall, it’s worth a look, though you may want to track down the episode synopses first, and use them as a cheat-sheet.

Dir: Shigeru Ueda
Star (voice): Mamiko Noto, Rie Kugimiya, Nobuyuki Hiyama, Sayaka Ohara

[Random amusement: while looking for pics, I did a Google Search for images with “mnemosyne anime”. One of these things is not like the other. #AmyPondWTF?]

Black Widow to get her own film

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blackwidowVariety reported recently that Marvel Studios “is developing a film that would revolve around Black Widow,” as previously played by Scarlet Johansson in the Iron Man and Avengers entries of the Marvel Universe. She is also a significant part of their upcoming release, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, and will be part of the next Avengers film, subtitled Age of Ultron, which is slated for release in 2015. Marvel Studios president Kevin Feige said, “Widow’s part in that is very big. We learn more about her past and learn more about where she came from and how she became in that film. The notion of exploring that even further in her own film would be great, and we have some development work with that.”

Obviously, we’re looking at this being some time off – probably 2016 at the earliest, beyond even Ant-man [says something about the studio that such a trivial character gets his own movie before any female!]. Presumably, that’ll all help keep Ms. Johansson fully-employed for the foreseeable future. However, the track record of movies based on comic-book heroines is not a great one: it’s littered with the corpses of more or less dismal failures. Elektra was likely about the last effort, close to a decade ago. Before her? Catwoman. Barb Wire. Tank Girl. All the way back to 1984’s Supergirl, the sad fact is, there has never been a broadly successful film based on an American comic-book with a female lead. You could probably also add to that depressing list, the stillborn efforts to get Wonder Woman made into a TV series or movie, and she’s certainly a better-known character than Black Widow.

Not that there haven’t been flops on the other side of the gender coin e.g. Jonah Hex or R.I.P.D. But these have been counterbalanced by smash hits: three of the all-time, worldwide box-office top ten are based on comics. That’s enough of an incentive to make studios forget the failures; the struggle of Wonder Woman show they otherwise appear to have quite a long memory for such things. However, two words have perhaps changed the landscape: Catching Fire. The biggest movie at the North American box-office released last year, it demonstrated that a young woman can carry an action franchise, appealing across the traditional divide between men and women at the cinema. While its predecessor skewed heavily female (71% over the opening weekend), Fire saw a much more even split, at 59%-41%. That’s still about the reverse of The Avengers (40%-60%), and it will likely be a tough kinda sell to pitch Black Widow’s costume as any kind of post-feminist statement.

Still, there will be a lot riding on this. If it succeeds, it could open the doors for other (arguably, more deserving) comic-book heroines to follow onto the silver screen. But if it were to tank, I may well be collecting a pension before anyone dares give another entry a large-budget treatment. But if we get more stuff like the below, I’ll take that risk.

Killer Women

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★★
“Here lies Molly Parker, dead by a thousand clichés.”

And it didn’t take long for the fatal blow. The series was an American version of the popular Argentine crime drama Mujeres Asesinas, which had already been successfully transplanted to other Latin American countries. This edition was originally only given a trial run of sorts, with eight episodes bought, and scheduled after New Year as a mid-season replacement for another deceased ABC series. However, after miserable ratings for the first two episodes, the network cut the order to six shows, a mere ten days after the series premiere. Unaware of this, it caused us some confusion when we turned on #6, which was suddenly now #8, with the sixth and seventh having been reduced in their entirety, to “Previously, on Killer Women…”

The problem was clear: scripts unable to escape the tired and banal, going down well-worn paths over familiar from a thousand other shows, right from the opening shot of the Alamo, unimaginative director shorthand for “We’re in Texas.” As if the stetsons and cattle weren’t a giveaway there – WE’RE IN TEXAS. [The show doth protest too much: it was largely filmed one state over, in New Mexico] Another example: literally seconds into the establishing scene of one episode, Chris predicted the victim would be a star athlete, from the NFL, bludgeoned to death with one of his own trophies. Turned out he was from the NBA; otherwise, she was spot-on. This kind of painfully obvious was par for the course. Oh, look: the heroine is having a sexy relationship with hunky DEA agent Dan Winston (Blucas). Now she’s trying to get out of an abusive relationship with her politician ex-husband (Nordling). This apparently gives her an empathic relationship with other woman in similar situations. Kill me now.

It’s a shame, because the best thing about the show is Helfer, who plays lead Molly Parker with a winning charm that deserves much better material. There’s something of Geena Davis about her, both women being tall (Helfer is 5’11”, an inch less than Davis) and lanky, with smiles that can light up a room. Truth be told. the former model is probably a little too polished to be the Texas Ranger she plays here, but she does convey the multiple facets of her personality well, rather than being a one-dimensional crime-solving machine. Indeed, most of the performances are perfectly adequate. Blucas has previous experience playing the eye-candy boyfriend to an action-heroine, having been Riley Finn in season four of Buffy, and Nordling is suitably slimy as the husband who just won’t accept that it’s over.

No, it’s the storylines that aren’t up to scratch here, starting with the central conceit, which sees Parker every week confronted by a murderous woman or women. Given that FBI stats have male murderers outnumbering their female counterparts by better than nine to one, this was stretching credibility a bit, and is a limitation which further hampers writers who have already demonstrated a lack of ability. The debut episode starts off promisingly enough, with a woman in a blood-red dress stalking down the aisle of a church and gunning down the groom. But what first seems like a straightforward crime of passion, turns out to be the result of blackmail by a Mexican drug cartel, and somehow ends with Parker and Winston carrying out a solo raid across the border to rescue the victims. I think I heard a snort of derision from my wife as this all unfolded, and sadly, she was largely justified.

There were a couple of stories which were potentially interesting: I liked the second episode more, but even that spiralled its way down into eventual implausibility, with the killer deciding Molly’s unwanted ex-husband is a suitable target for her next victim. The back story was little better, with her brother (Trucco) apparently cheating on his wife, but actually taking on “extra work” to help out his ranch financially. It doesn’t take a weatherman to figure out that this will end up blowing him into conflict with Winston. It probably says something that skipping episodes as the network did, had little or no effect on coherence. All told, this was on thin ice from the get-go, and its termination came as no surprise, sad though we always are to see any action heroine show bite the dust. Helfer will hopefully recover, and go on to better things. This will otherwise be quietly forgotten by all involved.

Creator: Hannah Shakespeare
Star: Tricia Helfer, Marc Blucas, Michael Trucco, Jeffrey Nordling

"The best thing about the show is Helfer, who plays lead Molly Parker with a winning charm that deserves much better material."

Wing Chun

  By

★★★½
“Half kick-ass fights, half zany bedroom farce”

wingchunWing Chun is the name both of the school of martial arts, and the woman whom legend has it was responsible for its creation – which, in itself, is pretty cool. Tradition says Yim Wing Chun was an 18th-century figure, to whom a warlord proposed (rather forcefully, one imagines) marriage: she developed the style and used it to beat him, thereby escaping wedlock. This movie is a very loose depiction of her life: Yim and her wily but unloved sister, Abacus Fong (Yuen) run a tofu shop in a town plagued by raids from local bandits. Yim rescues a beautiful woman, Charmy (Catherine Hung) from them, and Charmy’s allure brings crowds of customers – well, at least male ones – to the store. Yim’s former sweetheart, Leung Pok To (Yen) shows up, determined to woo her again, but mistakes Charmy for Yim. Meanwhile, bandit leader Flying Chimpanzee (Chu) has had enough of Yim humiliating his men, and kidnaps Charmy to lure the martial arts mistress into their fortress.

You’ve got Yeoh, the greatest kung-fu actress of all time, in my opinion. You’ve got Yen, who’s the greatest kung-fu actor of the modern era, in my opinion (Bruce Lee, and Jackie Chan in his prime, might be slightly better). You’ve got veteran Cheng Pei Pei, who’d find fame five years later in Crouching Tiger, as Yim’s teacher. And you’ve got Yuen, the greatest kung-fu director – I’m not even going with “in my opinion” on that one. So, why isn’t this a solid gold, five-star classic? Simply because, while the fights are awesome, the stuff between the fights is nearer to awful, focusing far too heavily on slapstick of the British, “Whoops! Where are my trousers?” comedy school. Not, I should stress that I’m averse to that per se: it just isn’t what I want in my action movies. Here, people leap in and out of bedroom windows, fall over themselves at Fong’s “stinky tofu” breath, and repeatedly, somehow manage to mistake Yeoh for a man. None of this is the slightest bit interesting, and it’s even less amusing.

Indeed, it’s a tribute to how good the battles are, that I was prepared to endure comedic stylings apparently crafted by an unsophisticated eight-year-old, to get to the next confrontation. Take your pick of which is best. The one on the docks? The battle over a tray of tofu? The encounter in an inferno? We haven’t even mentioned Yim vs. Flying Chimpanzee, which is the duel so good, they had to do it twice [and I was impressed Yeoh retained her position at the heart of the movie, not stepping aside to make way for Yen]. Without exception, these are all imaginative, inventive, varied, fluidly shot and edited: practically a master-class on how fight sequences should be filmed. The trailer below – which wisely removes just about everything else apart from the martial arts – will give you some idea. It’s just a shame their grace and beauty isn’t in the service of anything more memorable than dumb humour.

Dir: Yuen Wo Ping
Star: Michelle Yeoh, Donnie Yen, Kingdom Yuen, Norman Chu