Tag: 1998

Mehndi

  By

★★½
“This path she has chosen will burn her to ash.”

When judging film for inclusion here, I always want to take into account location and era. The bar is generally lower for older films, those from a time when action was largely male territory. And other cultures also have different opinions on gender norms, so what can seem very mild sauce here, can be pushing the envelope for women’s roles somewhere else. This would be a good example of the latter. In 1998, the year this came out, Hollywood was releasing the likes of Mulan, The X-Files and Wild Things. Bollywood… was not, and it’s important to remember this as we look at a heroine Lifetime might decline as too much of a doormat.

She is Pooja (Mukerji), who has just been married off into the Chaudhary family, and specifically to Niranjan (Khan). The problem is, they are much more interested in her dowry, and when this isn’t as big as they want, the abuse from her in-laws starts. It doesn’t help that her husband is no good, but Pooja remains loyal, even when after he is accused of murder. A mysterious man shows up, promising evidence to free Niranjan… if Pooja will spend one night with him. She does, though nothing sexual happens, and her husband is indeed acquitted. However, the Chaudharys now consider her “soiled”, toss her out and seek a divorce. 

Worse is to follow as, in court, her father pulls a gun and is shot down by another member of the Chaudhary clan [courtroom security in nineties India must have been really slack – later, an attorney stabs a defendant dead!] Finally, even Pooja has had enough, and vows to destroy every one of her in-laws. Though this being Bollywood, that includes a musical number, apparently titled The Evil In-Laws, where she turns the whole village against them with lyrics like, “The evil in-laws! They’ll make your life a living hell. The evil in-laws! They commit great sins.” It’s partly why the whole thing runs 160 minutes, and would be palpably improved at half the length. Bollywood is much better now at integrating the songs, and the occasional attempts at comedy are both utterly misplaced and thoroughly unfunny.

Why Pooja puts up with so much is explained by a line during the marriage ceremony: “My husband is my god.” But it’s a concept which seems utterly alien to a contemporary Western audience – and even to some in India now. The line is revisited later, Pooja now refuting it by saying, “No. My husband is a sinner and a demon.” Pity it took so long for her to realize what’s apparent to the audience almost from the start. There is some power in these later scenes, with Mukerni able to put over the character’s rage, and I liked the way the mysterious man returns to help her. It remains a shame that she appears to be considerably more interested in taking revenge for her father, than on her own account.

Dir: Hamid Ali Khan
Star: Rani Mukerji, Faraaz Khan, Pramod Moutho, Himani Shivpuri

Gangsta Grrlz

  By

★★
“Some things never change…”

Not to be confused with the clearly different Gangster Girls, which isn’t particularly gangster at all, or Gangsta Girls, which is Vietnamese, and especially not to be confused with the execrable Girls vs. Gangsters. Though confusion is understandable, and not helped by Tubi typoing the title to the slightly more correct spelling of Gangsta Girlz, and adding an unrelated poster. So, we all sorted on that? At first, I thought this was a remarkably accurate period piece, starting proceedings off in 1998 Philadelphia, an era of large wigs and even larger mobile phones. I kept expecting it to jump forward to the present day: never happened, and that’s because it turns out, this was actually made in 1998. All the retro trappings were actually of the time.

This does include nineties video quality, and audio that leaves room for improvement in some scenes. However, I’ve endured worse in both departments. It tells the story of Ninea Ranks (Smith), whose boyfriend brought her along on a drug deal that goes wrong, leading to her shooting a man. He takes responsibility, dies in prison, and she decides to embrace a life of crime. This is all explained in voice-over, presumably for budget purposes, and she now has an all-female organization, because she doesn’t trust men. That includes lieutenant T (Gaston), and new recruit Glitter (Jones). There’s a beef with rival leader Dion (King), who would like nothing better than to see Ninea behind bars and unable to compete. However, he faces dissension from within his own ranks, by a disgruntled henchman, Razor.

What stands out is probably how little the genre has changed in the 25 years since this came out. This offers much the same mix of unconvincing drama, guns held sideways and relentless hip-hop by the director’s pals, as any of the more recent entries in the modern Blaxploitation field. There’s no surprises at all to be found as things develop, unless you consider the abrupt conclusion, with a caption which succinctly informs the viewer, “Ninea left town to lay low in 1999. But don’t get too comfortable fellas… She’ll be back.” A quarter of a century later, we’re still waiting, and I’m beginning to wonder if we might have been ghosted by her.

The only scene which stands out is Razor chatting to his loyal friend, Curtis, about being fed-up of Dion’s leadership, and deciding to betray their boss. It’s shot and staged simply, and feels all the more authentic for it. Otherwise, what I’ll remember most is likely the spectacular selection of wigs owned by Ninea, whose last name really should have been “Business” [I’ll wait… Forever, if necessary] Characters and plot threads drift in and out without achieving even the caption level of resolution offered to the anti-heroine, such as the police officers who show up for a couple of meaningless scenes. While the performances aren’t bad, they deserve to be in the service of a script which offers the actors considerably more.

Dir: Randy Williams
Star: Keya Smith, Tamura Gaston, Tyrone King, Dawn Jones

The Assault

  By

★★★★
“Assault on Shelter 13”

This was a very pleasant surprise. I wasn’t expecting much from this, especially after seeing Wynorski’s name – let’s be honest, he is best known for bargain basement soft-port. That said, he does occasionally hit one out of the park, such as the sublime Deathstalker II. This is definitely one of his better entries, even if it is, by and large, a low-budget version of Assault on Precinct 13.

Lisa Wilks (Ryan) witnesses the murder of her boyfriend by mob boss Blade, but is too scared to testify. Stacie (Randall), a detective on the force. is told to take care of her, and when Lisa says she’s too scared to go home, takes her to an isolated women’s shelter run by Stacie’s sister, Cindy (Dobro). However, Blade is intent on making sure Lisa doesn’t change her mind and sends his minions to storm the shelter and terminate the threat. However, he reckons without the pluck and resilience of the residents, bolstered by Stacie, as well as ex-army maintenance man, Mike (McCoy).

This has its share of questionable moments. The firing of a good twenty bullets from a hand-gun without reloading would be one, and then’s there’s the supposed two-minute countdown to the climactic explosion, which takes closer to six minutes to happen [I know, because I rewound and timed it]. But there’s a breezy energy which I found highly enjoyable, and the characters, if briefly sketched, are effectively drawn. For example, Toni (co-writer Melissa Brasselle) plays a Latina with a grudge against Stacie, for putting her boyfriend in jail. Or there’s Sandahl Bergman from Conan the Barbarian, as a paranoid schizophrenic, convinced the government is out to get her.

These are simple traits, yet prove entirely usable for plot purposes. We don’t need or want much more than this – it’d only get in the way of the action. There’s certainly no shortage of that, with wave upon wave of faceless minions storming the house, as the inhabitants try to board it up and repel any who make it through their barricades. At points, it feels almost like Night of the Living Debbies, with the thugs playing the role of the zombies. This being a Wynorski movie, there is the contractually obligated strip-club scene. However, showing unexpected restraint to keep its PG-13 certificate, the employees go no further than their undies, and are even strippers necessary to the plot, as that’s where we first meet Stacie, working undercover to expose a protection scam.

You do have to take as read the casual approach for the authorities, the first hour spent dispatching a apparently procession of cop cars into the area, who then either fail to notice anything, or vanish off the grid – because they’ve been mown down. Blade’s tactics, too, seem a bit questionable, especially considering how out-gunned the women are. But as a PG-13 actioner, I found this thoroughly entertaining, moving relentlessly forward, and making the very most of its limited resources.

Dir: Jim Wynorski
Star: Stacie Randall, Matt McCoy, Carrie Dobro, Leslie Ryan

Appleseed (1988)

  By

★★★
“Apples to oranges”

This feels like one of the first anime releases to get an official release in the West, and to be honest, the animation in particular is showing its age. It couldn’t be much more eighties, if the heroine had big hair and wore legwarmers while listening to her Sony Walkman. That said, when you get used to the relatively simple style, it’s decent enough. We are introduced to the post-WW3 world and in particular, the city of Olympus, which was designed to be a utopian environment for survivors. However, like all utopias, it failed to take into account human nature. In particular, some are very concerned by the prevalence of biodroids. These artificial creations were intended to be humanity’s servants, yet for their opponents, feel increasingly more like our masters.

In that camp is terrorist A.J. Sebastian, who is working with a disgruntled Olympus police officer, Charon Mautholos (Furukawa) to bring about the collapse of Olympus and its all-powerful computer, Gaia. Against them stand the Olympus anti-terrorist forces, in particular Deunan Knute (Katsuki) and Briareos Hecatonchires (Sakaguchi). They are refugees from the blasted hellscape which forms much of the world, who were taken in to Olympus, and became part of its police force. Already bearing a grudge against Sebastian for his killing of a colleague during a hostage situation, they are not unhappy to be tasked with his extra-judicial killing by Olympus’s leader, the bioroid Athena Areios (Sawada). But with the help of Charon, Sebastian is one step ahead of the authorities.

As shown in the video below (you’re welcome!), the original release of the anime did have its fair share of bumpy moments. Several signs clearly refer to the city as “Olumpus”, which doesn’t quite sounds like the home of the gods! Similarly Charon is referred to as “Karen” in the subtitles, which has a rather different set of associations in 2021, never mind the gender confusion it caused. Finally, Briareos is called Buliaros: I guess they were still settling down in terms of his Western name. It’s also surprisingly low-key in terms of action. Once you get past the hostage rescue mentioned above, it’s really Sebastian and Charon that are responsible for much more of the mayhem than Deunan and Briareos.

I did like the characters here though. It’s clear the heroine and hero have an easy-going relationship, trusting each other implicitly. Yet the script still finds the time to give Charon a back-story which makes his action understandable in the circumstances. Sebastian, not so much, however; he’s just a villain. The world-building is generally solid, though I would like to have learned more about life outside Olympus, to provide some contrast. The soundtrack – something I remember as a highlight of many films and series of the time – is utterly forgettable. It’s no Bubblegum Crisis, that’s for sure, and is even further below Ghost in the Shell. Overall though, allowing for its age, it did keep me entertained; truth be told, considerably more  than I feared it might.

Dir: Kazuyoshi Katayama
Star: Masako Katsuki, Yoshisada Sakaguchi, Toshiko Sawada, Toshio Furukawa

Miss Diamond

  By

★★
“More like, Miss Cubic Zirconia”

diamond1There’s an exhibition showcasing the first diamonds ever mined in Germany, dug up by the company belonging to Buhler (Kier). Keeping thing safe is the responsibility of security expert Tim (Kretschmann), who doesn’t realize that renowned jewel thief Lana (Speichert) has her eyes on the jewels. So they’re both in for a nasty surprise, because after Lana is caught by Tim in the process of stealing them, it turns out the diamonds are completely fake. Buhler gives her an ultimatum: Lana must find the real diamonds, or she’ll be handed over to the police, and to ensure she doesn’t just run off, tasks Tim with keeping an eye on her. It soon becomes clear, though, that there is more to the mystery than there appears initially, and someone is very keen to stop them from getting to the truth.

This is flat and uninspired in almost every way, beginning with the complete lack of chemistry between Speichert and Kretschmann, though in their defense, the dubbing isn’t exactly helping them. [Or the beloved Udo Kier, who seems to be sleep-walking through his role] However, that can’t explain away the story, which is about as far from sparkling like diamonds as possible, even if you allow for the ludicrous central concept. Diamonds. In Germany.  It features villains who resolutely refuse to behave with even a modicum of common sense. For example, if ever I become an evil overlord, capture my enemies, and need to dispose of them, I will kill them on the spot, not tie them up underground, with the intention of letting them be run over by a slow-moving tunneling machine.

Which brings me to the topic of the action showcased here, and unfortunately, most of it ranges from the physically impossible to the cringe-inducing. The former is showcased during that escape from the tunneling machine, where Lana somehow dangles from a chain with one foot, while simultaneously pulling the 180-lb plus Tim up off the ground. The latter sees Lana doing front flips as she is simply trotting across a roof. Who does she think she is, Catwoman? This soundtrack also appears to be composed by somebody who has listened to too many James Bond films, which simply reminds the viewer of the gulf between this and any 007 movie of the same era.

A couple of marginal saving graces do exist, just not in the central performances, main story-line or cinematic direction. I was kinda amused – perhaps unintentionally – by how crap Tim is. He’s the one that’s always getting knocked out, captured, falling out out boats and generally put in peril, from which Lana has to save him. Some of the vehicle stunt-work is not too bad either. But overall, what you appear to have here is little more than a underwhelming TV pilot, certainly bad enough not to make it to series.

Dir: Michael Karen
Star: Sandra Speichert, Thomas Kretschmann, Udo Kier, Michael Mendl
a.k.a. Die Diebin

Amazon Warrior

  By

★★★
“Where’s Lana Clarkson when you need her? Er… Never mind…”

amazon warriorI’ve seen some painfully cheap, poorly made excuses for movies in the post-apocalypse genre in my time, and I was actively braced for another one here. To my pleasant surprise, this didn’t suck. While it certainly delivered on the first half, apparently being made on a budget of spare change off the producer’s bedside table, the film possesses a script into which some work has gone, and decent leading performances, neither being expected. Indeed, this is likely some production values away from being genuinely good, at least in a nostalgic way, harking back to the Argentinian sword ‘n’ sorcery flicks that were churned out for the video market in the mid-eighties.

After the world has gone to hell in a hand-basket [and a bad digital effect], it returns to a tribal state. One of these are the gynocentric Amazons, but their territory is invaded by the marauders, an alliance of tribes under General Steiner (Storti), who perpetually needs to find and takes over new territory, to stop his alliance from splintering. You could read a political subtext into this, although that would likely be giving the script too much credit, I suspect. The only survivor of the slaughter that follows is Tara (Rodgers), who grows up, vowing revenge on Steiner and his crew. We join the vengeance in progress, with Tara now a mercenary who notches her belt for each marauder killed, but has taken time out from her busy revenging to escort two young women from one spot to another, at the request of their father (Sherer). On the way, she meets Clint (Jerman), a like-minded individual, who also had his family killed by Steiner, and so who is on his own personal mission. Or, is he?

It’s this angle which is one of the facets that keeps things interesting, with the storyline taking some unexpected twists and turns, right up to the final scene. Rogers is also effective in a role that could easily have become a collection of cliches, and the supporting performances are appropriate to their tasks. The fight sequences just about pass muster – it helps if you squint at them sideways, rather than giving them your direct attention – and it appears that after civilization has collapsed into anarchy and chaos, what remains will resemble an SCA get-together, albeit with rather more fur bikinis. The audio could also have done with some significant clean-up, not that hearing every word of dialogue is exactly crucial. Still, this comfortably exceeded all expectations, even if those were basically flat-lined going in; it retained my attention and was entertaining throughout. If you can manage your hopes realistically, not anticipating something on a par with the upcoming Mad Max remake, this should do the same for you.

Dir: Dennis Devine
Star: J.J. Rodgers, Jimmy Jerman, Raymond Storti, Bob Sherer

Zero Woman: Dangerous Game

  By

★★
“Game for just about anything, but mostly moping.”

zero woman dangerous gameThe main mission given to Rie (Shiratori this time) is a little bit different, from her usual, straight-forward assassinations. Instead, she’s given the job of protecting a witness. Nana (Matsuda), the disgruntled mistress of an organ-trafficking ring, who has had enough and agreed to co-operate with the police. Rie is part of the protection detail, but soon finds out that the gangsters, under ever-so strange boss Kaneda (Nogami) with his transvestite tendencies, are not going to sit back and wait for Nana to take the witness stand. Oddly, the cops let Nana stay in her own apartment, perhaps figuring that’s the last place her former lover would look. but when that is unsurprisingly stormed, Rie takes the target back to the operative’s flat, where they hang out, exchanging small talk – that’s mostly Nana, of course, since Rie is about as talkative as the enormous pet fish she has in a tank, and to which she feeds goldfish.

However, there are complications, because it turns out that a senior politician has an ill daughter, who is relying on the organ trafficking ring for a black-market transplant. The word comes down to Rie’s boss, Mutoh (Ryu) that the investigation has been squashed, and Nana is to be dumped out of witness protection, as no longer of interest. That would almost certainly be a death sentence, because her betrayal of the gang isn’t limited to her knowledge of their actions, she also swiped a large suitcase of their cash before turning police informant. But has she done enough to endear herself to Rie, that her bodyguard might be prepared to go off-book and continue with the original mission on her own initiative? Or, better yet, entirely take out Kaneda – whose weirdness has now graduated from transvestitism to cannibalism.

This is too chatty to succeed, especially when the conversation is so one-sided, as are the ones between Nana and Rie. They do form a somewhat interesting contrast in characters, and Shiratori certainly has the physical presence to carry off the part of a cold-blooded assassin, to a much greater degree than some of the previous actresses in the series. But to reach the bloody finale, you have to sit through a solid 70 minutes of her moping around her apartment, with our without Nana, and that’s more than an entire month’s quota of mope for me. The L they’re missing from the sleeve probably is “lugubrious”. Kids, look it up…

Dir: Hidekazu Takahara
Star: Chieko Shiratori, Ichiho Matsuda, Masayoshi Nogami, Daisuke Ryu

Raging Angels

  By

★★
“Because “Peeved CFOs” wouldn’t be as catchy a title.”

Despite the name, there isn’t much raging, especially in the first half, which is more about the struggle for ownership of a company. It starts with an attack on the current chairman and his wife Bin (Ng) while on a trip to the Phillippines, after which she takes over the company. That doesn’t last long, as Tammy (Cheung) has designs on its finances, aiming to asset-strip it for his own purposes and divest Bin of her shareholding. To this end, he frames her and Chin (Leung), her best friend who is the wife of the company’s accountant, for drug smuggling: Chin takes the rap and is sent to 10 years jail. It takes all Bin’s resources to get her out, and when he does, Tammy sends his henchmen to kill their mother [ok, its not clear whose mother]. Bin and Chin arrive just too late, but find the minions’ vehicle, full of weapons… Yep, finally, it’s raging time!

When it finally kicks in, it’s certainly good stuff, to the extent that you wonder why they basically didn’t bother for the first 75 minutes: the only notable action heroine sequence to that point sees Ng take on a predatory lesbian and her gang in prison. However, it loses half a star due to the action, for no apparent reason, being shot in a crappy strobey fashion, dropping frames here and there: I wondered whether it was just my dubious copy (which also had audio in two different languages simultaneously), but I’ve seen a couple of other reviews that mention it, so I’m thinking it was a deliberate stylistic choice, albeit one we could have well done without. Ng and Leung both still have the moves, though they are unable to dispatch Tammy by themselves and have to rely on male help; further debit there.

Not to be confused with the Sean Patrick Flannery pick – unlike Amazon did! – the film’s main mistake is taking a good cast, and failing to play to their strengths. Which would be kicking ass, in case you were wondering. The final reel shows the makers are aware of this, which simply begs the question, why wait so long? The performances aren’t bad, with both Leung and Ng are decent in their roles. However, it feels like having to eat an entire loaf of bread before getting a couple of slices of ham at the end. While you’re glad for the break, it doesn’t repay the effort.

Dir: Rickie Lau
Star: Carrie Ng, Jade Leung, Roy Cheung, Eddie Ko Hung

The Avengers (film)

  By

★★½
“An object lesson on all the things which can go very, very wrong on the journey from script to screen.”

Film-makers really need to let the sixties go, especially when it comes to mining TV schedules and turning them into movies. The Mod Squad, Thunderbirds, Wild Wild West: the remainder bins in Walmart are littered with the DVD corpses of failed attempts. While it’d be a massive stretch to call this incoherent mess anything like a success, it does have some merits, not least in the casting of Fiennes and Thurman as John Steed and Emma Peel. If undeniably different to Patrick McNee and , it still works, despite the unfortunate efforts to shoehorn in a romantic relationship between the pair; one of the things that made the original series work was the lack of this, with Steed and Peel being strictly business. Thurman, in particular, appears to be working her way towards The Bride territory, with a similarly wide range of funky costumes. In that light, much of her performance makes a great deal more sense.

Sadly, very little else of the movie does, though one wonders how familiar those whose reviews ripped into it were, with the original series – things like henchmen in teddy-bear costumes would fit in there, yet seem idiotic in isolation. The version as released was hacked down from 150 minutes to 89, and I suspect much of the excised footage is in the middle, since that’s where what remains falls apart completely. Sir August de Wynter (Connery) has taken control of the weather, and is using this to blackmail the world’s governments. It’s up to our suave, sophisticated duo to stop him: Peel goes up top to defuse the controlling device, while Steed stays down low, to face de Wynter in hand-to-hand combat. This might have worked better, if I didn’t keep thinking, “Sean Connery is five years older than my Dad.” While there is more to the plot than this, it’s an aspect of the film where more cutting would likely have been welcome.

The style is nicely captured, and Peel stands as the equal of Steed, in no way secondary or subservient to him, as is shown in a marvellous sword-fight between the two. Thurman has no problem at all handling the action side of things, and we even get two Umas for the price of one, thanks to a cloning subplot which is never fully developed or explained [part of the hour left on the cutting-room floor, I suspect]. It seems that the individual pieces were all in place: however, the disaster movie which resulted [budget, $60m; US box-office, $23m] shows that the road to cinematic hell is paved with good intentions.

Dir: Jeremiah Chechik
Star: Ralph Fiennes, Uma Thurman, Sean Connery, Jim Broadbent

Kite

  By

★★★½
“Leon, if Matilda had been adopted by Stansfield, instead of Leon.”

Concerns about some content here means Kite has had a tortuous release in the West. First time out, in 1998, it was shorn basically of all explicit sexual content: given the potentially underage nature of the animated heroine, Media Blasters didn’t want to be hit with a kiddie porn charge – laughable though that may seem for a “cartoon”! – and played it very safe. Subsequent releases over the next six years restored first much, in the “Director’s Cut”, then all (“Special Edition”) the footage, but the OAV* might just work better without the sex. It’s hardly as if I finished it and thought, “Y’know, what this really needs is some sequences of the heroine getting molested.”

Because the story is interesting enough on its own. Sawa is a teenage assassin, basically mind-controlled by her foster father, Akai: he’s a cop who uses her to mete out vigilante justice to paedophiles, etc. [This is ironic given their relationship, the nature of which even the edited version makes fairly clear.] She meets a young man, Oburi, in much the same situation, and their growing relationship threatens to disrupt the status quo of everyday slaughter. And, “slaughter” is the word, since Sawa’s weapon of choice is bullets that first penetrate the victim, then explode. Cue more irony: in America, even animated teenage sexuality is entirely verboten, but teenage, paint-the-walls-blood-red carnage? Bring it on.

The action is certainly intense, well-animated and directed, though perhaps excessive. Even after falling from a building, through the road, down to the subway – then being blown up, flying back into the air and blasted through an apartment window, some BandAids are apparently all the medical attention Sawa requires. This conflicted badly with the gritty realism of the story, and I also hated the doodling sax soundtrack, which sounded like something rejected by Abel Ferrara for Driller Killer. Otherwise, though, it’s generally impressive and stylish, with a downbeat approach that is refreshing, as well as some spectacularly messy violence.

* = Original Animation Video, a common “straight to video” anime format. It’s only 50 minutes, about standard length for such things. A live-action version, directed by Jorge + Javier Aguilera, produced by Rob Cohen & Anant Singh, was announced earlier this year, but no release date has been scheduled. And No Doubt’s video for Ex-Girlfriend borrowed heavily from Kite – the bathroom assassination is re-staged, almost shot-for-shot, as this video shows.

Dir: Yasoumi Umetsu
Star (voice): Kotomi Naruse, Shingo Oyamada, Goro Shibusawa, Tatsuo Matoba