Tag: 2023

Agent of Death

  By

★★½
“Multiple personality new world order”

I quite liked the idea here, but the execution just wasn’t quite good enough to do justice to the concept. It feels like a matter of resources to some degree. But I also feel that a few tweaks to things would have paid significant dividends. The heroine is Tara Croydon (Fox), a CIA agent who experiences a crisis after an operation means she’s not around when her father passes away. In her depression, she signs up for a cutting-edge but rather dubious experimental project under the oversight of Hype (Medina). This involves her being given the ability to transform, physically, into one of fifteen different personas which have been implanted into her.

Once she has come to terms with this, it obviously offers a wealth of possibilities for use on missions. However, this is not entirely without a downside, not least the instability of one of the personas, Maeve (Miller). As a result, Tara is cautioned against using Maeve. She also discovers eventually that the whole operation is not as officially sanctioned as she  believed, and there’s an unexpected connection to her father. The ending doesn’t exactly tie everything up, leaving the film too open-ended for my tastes. Clearly, Marder was angling for this to spawn a franchise, but since work on this apparently started in 2018 (it seems to have begun as a series called Shifter, which premiered in November 2019), I suspect everyone involved has more probably moved on to other things by now.

With regard to the resources, it tries to be considerably more global than it can manage. Tara’s first mission post-implants is to the former Soviet republic of Georgia, and this is followed up by one to central Africa. Except, in both cases, it’s painfully clear that the production likely never got outside the TMZ of Hollywood or wherever. There’s no reason things had to take place overseas: I could easily come up with domestic operations that could have used her talent just as well. The other problem is the 15 personas are only somewhat different versions of Tara. It would have been much more fun to see her occupying a broad range of shapes, skills and personalities.

It doesn’t help that the thunder has been stolen by Netflix series, In From the Cold, also about a spy with the ability to shapeshift. That came out in January 2022, while this was presumably sitting on a shelf somewhere. It leaves Agent of Death looking like a knock-off, even though that isn’t the case. Something of a pity, since this contains a decent amount of hand-to-hand action (and surprisingly little gun-play for an American show involving the CIA!), with Fox and the various actresses representing her personas, doing reasonable work. On the other hand, Fox’s acting tends to come over as wooden: for example, she’s never able to sell the death of her father adequately. While the time passed here, it’s telling that the cliffhanger ending neither excited nor annoyed me very much.

Dir: Matthew Marder
Star: Alanna Fox, Hugo Medina, Samantha Grace Miller, Richard Rivera

The Sayen trilogy

  By

I was rather surprised to see the name of Alexander Witt pop up as the director, at the end of the first movie in this Chilean trilogy. He has been a stalwart second-unit director in Hollywood for decades, going back to Speed in 1994. With regard to the site, he fulfilled the same role on Aeon Flux, but is best-known as the director of the second film in the Resident Evil franchise, Resident Evil: Apocalypse. That was his sole directorial credit prior to Sayen, and I must confess… I was today years old when I discovered he was Chilean. I presumed he was German, based off his name and his work on the Berlin-shot Apocalypse. But, no. Born in Chile, albeit of German descent. He returned there to take the helm, almost 20 years later – again with an action heroine story.

Sayen
★★½

This takes place in the Araucanía region, where Sayen Coñuepan (Montenegro) has just returned to her indigenous homeland. Her grandmother is presented with an offer for her land, but a suspicious Sayen discovers it’s a front for a mining company. Things escalate, with Antonio (Piper), the junkie son of the company’s head, Máximo Torres (Arce), shooting the old woman dead. Sayen vanishes into the jungle, with Antonio and his henchmen in hot pursuit, knowing that if Sayen is allowed to go public with what she knows, it could make things very difficult for the company. However, this is very much her territory, and she has skills to make things potentially very difficult for them. 

As a jumping-off point, this is… okay, I guess. It begins with a po-faced caption which informs the viewer this is going to be an Important Message Movie. The early going is a bit of a slog, leading to me coming to the conclusion, just because something is “traditional” doesn’t necessarily make it any good. Once granny is gunned down, the film shifts gears and gets more energy. However, I was expecting Sayen to go full Rambo, using the environment to her advantage.  She doesn’t really, short of crafting a bow, which she uses one (1) time, and a bit of impromptu first-aid. Meanwhile, the bad guys could hardly be less subtle about their villainy, if they were given wax mustaches to twirl.

Admittedly, this may be necessary to make things clear for the international audience, who may not be up to speed on the intricacies of indigenous politics at the bottom of South America. We need black hats and white hats: keep things simple. Oh, and Chilean rap. Okay. It is interesting how Sayen doesn’t kill anyone – at least not directly. Oh, people die in her wake. Quite a few of them. However, it’s things like death through careless driving, for example. Or pointing a speedboat at a pier, then leaping off. Given the circumstances, surely no jury in the land would convict. After this lacklustre opening, while I can’t say I was keen to get to the next installment, I’m reluctant to quit any story in the middle.

Sayen: Desert Road
★★★

However, I felt the sequel works a little better. It takes place in an entirely different environment, relocating from the southern forests to the Atacama desert, one of the driest places in the world. The enemy remains Actaeon, the predatory industrial corporation headed by Torres, who have built a lithium extraction facility, after bribing their way to approval. Sayen, now with a businesslike crew-cut, is looking to find evidence of this corruption, and gets help from Qumal (Sánchez), a young woman whose father was among those who accepted the money. A SD card contains the required proof, but Acteon and their minions remain hot on Sayen’s trail, and prepared to stop her, by any means necessary.

This is at least somewhat more nuanced and less simplistic. While Torres remains the personification of evil, things are greyer elsewhere. A good example, is Qumal’s father: turns out he used the money received from Acteon to build a school for the town. There’s also one of the minions, Gasper, whose loyalties seem flexible, and who makes good points about the realities of life in the area. Sayen, though, is largely unbothered by these, though still defiantly proclaims herself not to be a murderer, despite what the authorities and media are saying about her. The desert locations provide some good opportunities for vehicular mayhem. I’d say Actaeon should probably look at revamping their driving courses, because some of their employees literally can’t steer to save themselves.

I’m still not entirely on board with Sayen’s mission: I tend not to feel eco-terrorism is better than any other flavour. However, this benefits from not needing to spend time on set-up, though does mean you really can’t watch it without having seen the first part. I was definitely surprised by a couple of twists at the end, where one character I expected to survive into the next movie, ended up dead, and one I thought was already dead, turned out to be alive. This set things up for the third installment, with Actaeon’s parent company Greencorp proving, in the corporate world, there’s always someone bigger and more morally dubious than you. Will Sayen be able to continue her battle, and also maintain her “clean hands” policy? Guess we’ll find out…

Sayen: The Huntress
★★★

There’s a further shift in setting here, the series moving to an urban location, of the Chilean capital Santiago, where Sayen has joined up with a group of activists. They are seeking evidence that Greencorp, under its CEO Fisk (Aarón Díaz), has bribed senators to vote against a bill protecting the country’s water from exploitation. There’s treachery on both sides, with a mole in Sayen’s group bringing heat on their heels, in the particularly interesting shape of female enforcer Jo (Niav Campbell – not to be confused with Neve Campbell!). On the other hand, they receive help from an unexpected source, because it’s not just eco-terrorists who have had enough of Fisk’s shenanigans…

There are some positives here, with the city landscape providing another fresh set of locations for Witt to work in action sequences, including zip-lines, base jumping and cycling. I particularly enjoyed the multiple battles between Jo and Sayen, although the director is still too inclined to go with the quick cuts, as he did in RE: Apocalypse. There’s a decent balance between the action and drama, with the high-level political intrigue working well. On the other hand, the film suddenly drops in a romantic interest for the heroine, which had me wondering where this came from. I wouldn’t worry about it. He isn’t around for long. It all ends a little too neatly, Sayen apparently able to sustain her position on the moral high ground.

All told, if you said this was a South American take on The Millennium Trilogy, I would not be inclined to disagree. In both cases, you have a young woman with a grudge against the powerful, who has the skills to make them pay for their unpunished crimes. Sayen is more hands-on than Lisbeth Salander, although the latter could take care of herself. I think the heroine here is probably less unstable: without the death of her grandmother to propel her down this path, you could easily see Sayen living a normal life, getting married, having kids and perhaps opening a legal help centre for the local residents. Instead, she ended up hunting the head of a global corporation, seeking justice for relentlessly putting the quest for profits ahead of everything else.

After a bit of a shaky start, putting the message ahead of the medium, the second and third films made for decent entertainment. They were all close to the ninety minute mark, avoiding the cinematic bloat we see too often in movies that do not need to be two-plus hours, and Witt’s experience in well-staged action is apparent. Having a heroine who won’t directly kill, but who is not averse to cracking heads if necessary, is a tricky needle to thread, and I’m not sure this is always successful. On the other hand, Sayen comes from a fresh and interesting background, and the trilogy as a whole does explore new territory. I can’t truly recommend it, but if you are interested in watching these, nor would I argue against it. You do you, gentle reader – you do you.

Dir: Alexander Witt
Star: Rallen Montenegro, Enrique Arce, Arón Piper, Katalina Sánchez

Kitty the Killer

  By

★★★
“Nice Thai, but not quite a cigar.”

The easiest way to describe this is a Thai version of Wanted. You could make a case that the central character is not female. But like Wanted, there’s easily enough going on around him to qualify for this site. The similarities don’t stop there either. In both films, you have an innocent, totally unaware office worker, who is recruited into an ancient order of super assassins, just as they are going to war. Here, the rookie is Charlie (Ngamnet), an insurance salesman – sorry, he’s a sales manager, as he would no doubt correct you – who is caught up in the affairs, and eventually becomes a member, of a lethal organization known only as The Agency.

In something perhaps nicked from Naked Weapon, they recruit by using orphaned young girls, who are trained in the ways of murder for hire. They form cels, each overseen by a manager, in this case codenamed Grey Fox. The last incumbent, Keng (Semglad), drew the wrath of upper management for his unauthorized actions, and designated Charlie as his heir apparent. Which is news to Charlie, who eventually accepts and after an extended training montage, has to deal with the assassins. The most potent of these is Dina (Thangprapaporn). Though there are a number of others, of various experiences and skills, all the way down to Mina, who must be aged about eight [Yes, their names do all end in -ina, thank you for asking].

Fortunately, their enemies appear to sit back while Charlie gets up to speed, with the subplot about a stolen stone with mysterious qualities conveniently back-burnered. Instead, we watch fairly lengthy flashbacks, detailing the past of various characters. This is the movie’s main weakness, with a middle which is close to being free of action, filling in gaps that we never particularly cared about to start with. Given a running-time of almost two hours, this padding feels especially egregious. It also has a somewhat odd mix of tone, things like Charlie’s reactions to events largely being played for comedy. I guess at least it isn’t the toilet-based humour of certain Asian entries I’ve seen, and I will admit to genuine laughter on more than one occasion.

Pleased to report, the film gets back on track with a strong final act. This brings Dina back to the centre, and sees Charlie and her having to team up to take on the Agency’s #1 killer, the masked Nina (Ying Donnaporn Sukprasert). I can only presume the organization is capped at 26 killers, for alphabetical purposes. I pity the poor assassin called Wina. Anyway, the action is fairly solid, albeit somewhat prone to being over-edited. It’s largely hands-on, with swords the preferred weapon of choice, though I suspect the lead performers are actresses first, rather than martial artists. While it’s far from the most original movie I have seen this year, it does some interesting things with those influences. It’d be a better ninety minute film however.

Dir: Lee Thongkham
Star: Ploypailin Thangprapaporn, Denkhun Ngamnet, Somchai Kemglad, Vithaya Pansringarm

Sniper Goddess

  By

★★★★
“Spot on target.”

The Chinese title is 狙击之王：暗杀, which Google Translate informs me translates as “Sniper King: Assassination”. I don’t want to assume anyone’s gender, but I think I’m going to go with the alternate title above, as more appropriate, over the one on the poster. Because there’s no doubt about the amazing talents possessed by Anna (Yang), for whom a shot at three kilometers range is barely an inconvenience. We get right into the action with her being committed as a psychopath after begin captured, following her assassination of a drug lord. Yet another drug lord, actually – she has a deep hatred of them, for reasons we eventually discover, and has been taking them out with regularity.

It’s not long before someone tries to kill her in the psychiatric facility, but she’s able to escape (somewhat), with the help of struck-off former doctor, Nasipan (Tao). However, she is forced, with the aid of a nano-bomb injected into her bloodstream, to take a mission for Artest (Mak). There’s a war of succession going on in the country of “Libiwala”, with the prospect of drug production becoming legal in the country – to the joy of crime boss Roger (Lee). Artest requires Anna to liquidate all those in line for the leadership to prevent this. Or maybe encourage this. It’s all a bit murky, and the plot twists and turns until the very last scene, though never gets incoherent.

This one captivated me inside five minutes, with the hellacious firefight in the asylum, culminating in Anna sniping a sniper right through their scope. The action doesn’t let up for long thereafter, with some excellent set pieces involving both weapons and hand-to-hand combat. For the latter, Artest probably gets the bulk of it. But on the opposing side is a henchwoman who makes Gogo Yubari look like the picture of mental balance (I think she may be played by Guo Muhan, but I don’t recall hearing her name), and cuts a striking figure in her long blond hair and sword. It’s just one of the numerous things this film gets right, including occasional moments of comedy that genuinely made me laugh out loud, the movie winking at its own excesses. 

It’s simply a fun experience, with characters you can get behind, and an impressively strong anti-drug message. All the players are given depth to their roles, and the chance to develop them. Even the little kid, playing the third in line to the Libiwalian throne, is not irritating – and that’s high praise coming from me, as far as child actors go. All told, this is one of the most purely enjoyable ninety minutes I’ve spent of late, easily surpassing bigger budget films like Cleaner or The Gorge, and given my expectations, is likely going to be the most pleasant surprise of the year. The whole movie is embedded below. Take five minutes to check out the opening sequence, and see if it hooks you as well as it hooked me!

Dir: Huo Sui-qiang
Star: Yang Xing, Henry Prince Mak, Tao Tao, Lee Dong Hyuk
a.k.a. Sniper King: Assassination

Surrounded

  By

★★★
“Putting the stage in stagecoach.”

This is certainly a little different from the usual Western. It takes place a few years after the conclusion of the Civil War. Mo Washington (Wright) is on her way to Colorado to take up a piece of land she bought with her hard-earned savings. To avoid trouble on the journey, she is dressed as a man, though being black is problematic enough at that time. The stagecoach in which she’s travelling – or rather, on which, the driver not wanting a Negro inside – is attacked by brigands, led by notorious bank-robber Tommy Walsh (Bell). After a fierce fight, Walsh is captured, but the coach, complete with Mo’s documents, plunges off a cliff. 

The good news? There’s a ten thousand dollar bounty on Walsh’s head, and Washington is left to guard the fugitive while another passenger, Wheeler (Donovan), goes to fetch the authorities. The bad news? That leaves her alone with Walsh overnight, and there are others interested in the fugitive, including those after the reward, and the remaining members of the Walsh gang. Because he’s the only one who knows the whereabouts of the very large pile of loot, resulting from their last robbery. Mo is going to have to figure out who she can trust. For instance, is Walsh’s offer, to split the loot if she frees him, legit? It would certainly more than cover the losses she suffered when her Colorado land went over the edge.

As with the Hong Kong movies which use the gender disguise thing, it does require a large suspension of disbelief. As soon as Wright opens her mouth, any illusion of her being able to pass for male goes out the window of the stagecoach. On the other hand, gender is almost irrelevant as things unfold. I suspect eliminating the need for concealment would not have helped the intended moral here. The racial element however, is much more pertinent, with Mo having literally walked off her owner’s plantation. Yet there’s more in common with Walsh then it initially appears. Well, providing you accept at face value and trust his story, about being orphaned at age eight by robber land barons. Which might or might not be wise.

It’s in their scenes together where the film is at its strongest, even if they’re just sitting by the campfire, talking. If it feels almost like a play, this is still engrossing, two actors in prime form. Less successful is the arrival of a third party, not least because this leads to a poorly-staged fight, unfolding in near total darkness, where it was impossible to see what was happening. Maybe it worked better in the cinema? At home, it severely took me out of the experience, staring at a blank screen. Fortunately, this recovers to a decent finale, with Mo deciding she is the only person she can truly trust. In the end though, her character seems less fully-rounded than Walsh, despite, or perhaps because of, all the talk. As a result, this only intermittently fulfills its undeniable potential. 

Dir: Anthony Mandler
Star: Letitia Wright, Jamie Bell, Jeffrey Donovan, Michael Kenneth Williams

The Girl of Destiny

  By

★★★
“Lost in translation.”

I’m very cautiously giving this one our middest of mid-tier ratings, which I reserve the right to change in future. Because this one showed up on one of the… “less official”, let’s say Chinese movie channels on YouTube. While the likes of Youku and iQiyi make the effort to deliver subtitles which are typically at least intelligible, I’d say the subs here reached such a level, only about one line in five. Then I still had to figure out cultural context for this period piece, which also seemed to reference local folklore. I guess I should be grateful the soundtrack here was intact. The previous night, I’d watched another film on the same channel which, I kid you not, had random bursts of musak injected, presumably to avoid YouTube’s automated copyright system.

I have to discuss all this, because consequently, I really can’t describe the plot in more than the vague terms. It takes place in Shang Dynasty China, the earliest period for which there’s evidence, when the country was under threat from invasion by the Luo people. A heroine arose to stand against them, Fu Hao (You), who was destined by fate to be the country’s saviour. [There’s something here about her being descended from a heavenly bird, but I am absolutely vague on the details there!] She teams up with the Emperor’s heir, Wu Ding (Ma), despite the objections of his father. For the emperor wants him to marry a noble-born, yet less heroic woman (Li), rather than a peasant girl like Fu Hao.

It reminds me of the various versions of the Mulan legend, with a plucky heroine coming out of nowhere, when the country needs her most. There doesn’t appear to be quite the same element of needing to hide her identity; though for reasons discussed above, it’s hard to tell. I will say, it looks better than I anticipated, with some impressively large-scale battles. I was a bit concerned they were going to make her fly, in line with her avian lineage. Fortunately, Fu Hao’s talents appear to lie particularly in things like mountain climbing; there’s a nice moment where she and Wu Ding jump out a high window to escape, landing on a kite being flown by an ally.

If the broad strokes here are all decent, there’s a severe lack of detailed depth – again, that may be me more than the film. It does also feel rather comfortable and safe. It ended up exactly where I expected – she basically sends the Luo leader home, after giving him a good telling-off – and I don’t think any significant plot development (of the ones I understood!) came as the slightest surprise. I get the sense it may have been quite jingoistic, pitting the heroic Chinese against evil foreign invaders. Hardly the first there, and it wasn’t especially egregious. If this ever appears in a more intelligible version, I’ll probably give it a re-review. I feel it deserves that.

Dir: Dong Wei
Star: You Jingru, Ma Xueyang, Ma Shuliang, Li Linfei

Baltimore

  By

★★★
“The art of terrorism.”

Going off the Wikipedia article about Rose Dugdale, I can’t help feeling this could have been more epic than it was. I mean, a former debutante who, “As an IRA member, took part in the theft of paintings worth IR£8 million, a bomb attack on a Royal Ulster Constabulary station using a hijacked helicopter, and developed a rocket launcher” which used – I kid you not – packets of biscuits to absorb the recoil. There’s so much there, it feels a shame the movie focuses almost entirely on the art theft. This was carried out in 1974, raiding a stately home in rural Ireland (fun fact: the house was used as a location in Haywire), with the aim of swapping the paintings for the release of prisoners. 

That said, the film does a good job of weaving several strands together. Firstly, Rose’s upbringing, and her conversion from a wealthy upbringing to political firebrand, and subsequently terrorist for the Irish Republican cause. Then there’s the actual robbery itself, and finally, the aftermath as Rose (Poots) and her two accomplices (Vaughan-Lawlor and Brophy) hide out and try to make their demands. It is definitely a sympathetic portrayal, which quietly ignores her role in civilian deaths. For instance, Dugdale made the device for the 1992 Baltic Exchange bombing in London, which killed three. And incidentally, blew up the office where I worked, around the corner in Bevis Marks. This may explain why I feel less charitably inclined towards her than the story wants.

Poots’s performance is solid enough to overcome my kneejerk aversion, and Rose as a character is depicted as someone who’s worthy of respect. You definitely get the sense she was genuine about her commitment to ‘The Cause’, born of an honest rejection of her privileged life. In this rebellion against her upbringing, she feels somewhat like a more ideologically committed, English version of Patty Hearst. [Hearst was kidnapped the same year as Rose’s robbery, and ended up robbing banks with the Symbionese Liberation Army] The film does skip over exactly how she went from activist, to hijacking a helicopter in order to drop milk churns on police stations – an incident only referenced in passing on a radio broadcast. 

What this does, it does well though. There’s an escalating sense of tension and paranoia, with Rose eventually ending up on her own (her accomplices were never caught, according to a final caption), as the net closes in. She agonizes over whether to kill a local who might suspect her, and if she should tell her boyfriend (Meade) about her pregnancy. However, while it’s far superior to Poots’s terrible Black Christmas remake, after reading the Wikipedia page, I was left hungry for further details. This feels closer to an episode of a TV series about Dugdale, rather than a fully rounded depiction of her life. I think I might end up going deeper into an apparently fascinating woman who, at her trial, pronounced herself “proudly and incorruptibly guilty”.

Dir: Joe Lawlor and Christine Molloy
Star: Imogen Poots, Tom Vaughan-Lawlor, Lewis Brophy, Jack Meade
a.k.a. Rose’s War

The ‘Angels of Vengeance’ trilogy

  By

The history of action heroines can’t be told without a chapter on China and Hong Kong. When we watched Michelle Yeoh kick butt in Yes, Madam, did we ever think she’d be an Oscar winner? She’s just the best-known product of a system which also gave us the likes of Moon Lee, Cynthia Khan and Maggie Q. The golden era for Hong Kong Girls With Guns films, was arguably the late eighties, but it’s never died away entirely. In the past few years, I’ve been finding a rich vein of recent Chinese GWG movies on YouTube. Streaming films took off there during COVID, with makers churning out a high-volume of films, in the action, horror and SF genre. Naturally, some fall under our remit.

Though researching them has been a bit problematic. Certain… “unofficial” channels, shall we say, will post the films with titles which are largely useless in terms of finding cast, crew, or even the film’s name. For instance, I discovered this franchise via a post titled, and I quote, “【FULL MOVIE】The beautiful police officers compete with criminal gangs in a battle of wits and courag”. In the comments, someone revealed it was called Angels of Vengeance 2. I thought I’d found part one on YT… But despite having the title Angels of Vengeance, none of the synopsis or cast info matched up. It turned out to be a mis-titled copy of Angel Warriors.

This issue actually feels like a throwback to the eighties, when the In the Line of Duty series, for example, had almost different titles in every country. Similarly, you’re sometimes dealing with subtitles that are less than optimal, and as we’ll see, audio is a sadly common problem too. However, after some further research, I eventually hit the mother lode, finding all three movies with English subs on Youku’s YouTube channel. The Chinese title of the franchise is 辣警狂花, which according to Google translates as “Hot policeman crazy flower.” I guess Angels of Vengeance will do under the circumstances.

Information on the franchise, director or actresses involved is hard to come by. In fact, at the time of writing in late 2024, this would appear to be the first English-language coverage the trilogy will have ever received. I love that: discovering obscurities is, to me, one of the joys of the site, especially when they end up being generally more entertaining than many a better-known production. But to quote the lyrics to the song which close out the third installment.

The resounding song is the sword of justice
Police badges shine with firm faith
Fear no flying bullets, guns in my hands, shield on my shoulder
I’m fearless to any dangers.
We undertake missions, we maintain the faith
Proceeding with firm steps, we keep going
We’re thunderbolts, charging forward
We safeguard the peace by fighting crime.

Can’t say more than that, really. Here are reviews of each film in the series, and a YouTube playlist of the trilogy.

Angels of Vengeance: Blood Trails

★★★½

This introduces us to the main protagonist, Tang Shi-Yu (Yan), a member of a Chinese SWAT team. She is recruited to infiltrate the drug-running gang belonging to Zhao Wen-jiu (Bai), doing so by rescuing Jiu’s younger sister, Ya-Ya (Mu), who is oblivious to her sibling’s criminal activities, from an attack in a nightclub. Tang’s undercover identity is someone in debt to loan sharks, and Jiu offers to take care of this, if she comes to work for him. After proving her loyalty, and also rescuing Jiu from an assassination attempt, she’s successfully embedded in the organization. But things are complicated, due to the reason behind the hit. Jiu killed someone close to his rival, Chen Jia-hua (Zheng), and Chen is out for revenge.

The obvious target for that is Ya-Ya, who is kidnapped, luring Jiu into a confrontation. Eventually, an uneasy peace between producer and distributoris brokered, setting the scene for a major drug deal going down at the docks. Tang informs her colleagues, and plans are put in place for a raid which will sweep up both sets of traffickers. This does a fair amount right, in particular the lead performances of Yan and Bai, which are thoughtful and well-considered. Both come over as smart individuals, and there is a complexity to the gangster which is a little surprising. Indeed, you could argue that, with his relationship to Ya-Ya, and their history, Wen-Jiu is given depth which is largely missing from Shi-yu. She is almost entirely defined by her career.

Tang does an excellent job of maintaining her undercover status, even when drenched in gasoline and threatened with immolation, and takes care of business on the action front when necessary too. I’d like to have seen more from the female members of her support team; outside of a little at the beginning, and a raid on Jiu’s offices, they don’t particularly get to show off their skills much. The ending feels a little underwhelming too, though that may partly be a result of the severely muffled audio during almost the entire sequence [It’s something you sadly need to live with on a lot of Chinese YouTube channels, even the legitimate ones like Youku]

I appreciate the practical effects: especially during the rescue attempt on Ya-Ya, there are real explosions rather than CGI.  It feel like there was good effort put into the script as well, which always keeps moving forward, and Chen’s presence adds an extra twist or two. There’s a great scene when the two gangsters have a meeting in a restaurant; the intensity and tension here is off the charts, and you can sense Tang’s nervousness as she can do nothing except standby and watch. This feels like the kind of film which could easily be remade for a Western audience, and I’d be happy to watch it again. A pretty solid and promising start, delivering a better story and performances than I expected.

Dir: Yuan Shuo
Star: Jessie Yan Jia-ying, Bai Yun-Feng, Mu Lan, Zheng He-Cheng

Angels of Vengeance 2: Top Fugitive 

★★★

This is based around “P2P lending” which was a major thing in China during the mid-2010’s, before the government cracked down on the various dubious pyramid schemes operating under it. A significant number of people lost a lot of money, but going by this relatively contemporary film, it’s still happening, and still problematic. In this case, young women are lured into running up large debts, and when they’re unable to pay, are abducted and sold into sex slavery, to cover the amount owed. I have some questions about exactly how this would operate, but I’m just going to presume the basic scenario makes sense in context for the local audience.

It’s a bit more of an ensemble piece here, with Tang’s SWAT group in Hanjiang City becoming involved after being called in to resolve a hostage situation at a petrol station. Turns out, the two women were victims in the scheme, but as the investigation proceeds, the criminals involved are covering their traces in no uncertain i.e. murderous fashion. Things become rather personal, since SWAT member Hao Miaomiao (Zhao) has lent money to her cousin, Zhang Le-Le (@@@), supposed for education purposes. Turns out Lele’s boyfriend is part of the gang, but when it comes time to kidnap the victim, an administrative mix-up leads to Miaomaio being snatched off the street, rather than Le-Le.

This pushes Shi-Yu’s investigation into overdrive, because they need to find their colleague before she gets shipped permanently out of the country. After Miaomiao is able to get her hands on a phone, she contacts Shi-Yu and is able to send her location. This allows the SWAT team to tool up, and head to the rescue of their colleague. To be honest, the resulting battle represents a clear majority of the action in this installment. Up until that point, there’s a good urban chase sequence, as the team tries to stop a witness from being offed, but this is probably more of a thriller than an action movie. Although it’s still interesting, because of the cultural differences, there are points where it teeters on the edge of TVM territory.

As noted, there  is a better sense of team here, and you get a feeling for the camaraderie between the various members. Witness the affectionate hazing at the end, when Miaomiao tries to skimp on the “thank you” meal for her rescuers. It’s novel to see SWAT people like Ting actively involved in a criminal investigation. This is presumably how things work in China, rather than the sharp demarcation of responsibility with detectives they have in the West. It could have use additional intensity, for example, a greater sense of threat to the victims, as it’s rather too vague on the specifics to present any real peril. The lack of a well-defined antagonist also keeps this one below the bar set by the first installment. It remains a pleasant enough way to pass 85 minutes.

Dir: Yuan Shuo
Star: Jessie Yan Jia-ying, Zhao Jing, Zhang Zi-Yue, Li Ran

Angels of Vengeance 3: Shadow Repose

★★★½

This gets off to an excellent start, depicting the kidnapping and subsequent ransom attempt of Ni-ni, the daughter of industrialist Yang Shi-ke (Bin). He’s getting instructions from the kidnapper, Li Zi-Xiong (Zhou), by phone in order to shake the tail on him, before the drop. As well as following Yang, Tang and her colleagues try to locate the victim, but neither side of this goes perfectly: while they don’t lose the ransom, there’s a trap which leaves Miaomiao badly injured in hospital, and the team with egg on their face. However, SWAT member An Qi (Zhang) suspects there’s more going on than meets the eye, with elements of Yang’s behaviour seeming suspicious.

As seems common throughout the series, we get more time than I expected spent on the villains. In this case, one of them is killed in the first pick-up attempt, which causes his friend to want to kill Ni-Ni. When Li refuses to allow that, the friend swears vengeance against the cops he considers responsible. No prizes for guessing who that is. This adds an additional wrinkle to what might otherwise be a fairly straightforward (though effective enough) kidnapping plot. Between that and Yang’s murky actions, the story is pretty interesting. We’re kept uncertain whether what Yang is doing, is simply to get Ni-ni back safely. Especially after we learn that Li has a long track record of kidnaps – and that the victims there have not come back alive. 

In effect, we have tension between Yang, who is prepared to do anything to recover his daughter, and the authorities, whose main interest seems to be in arresting the criminals, with the hostage’s health falling under the “optional” category. To what extent this reflects the reality of Chinese policy, I can’t say. It makes for an interesting point of consideration. The action has its moments too: there’s a particularly good brawl in a hotel kitchen. The finale is, at least initially, more stealth-oriented than the second part. The team capture one of the kidnappers during another attempt to collect the ransom, and successfully turn him, reminding him of the death penalty he could face – China does not mess about with punishing criminals!

He then returns to the lair, carrying the ransom, and with Tang, An and third member of the team,Yang Fan (Hong Shuang), hidden in the bag. They’re just able to free Ni-Ni before the deception is discovered, leading to an enjoysble and hard-hitting battle against Li and his henchmen (albeit with an ending which merits an “I’m so sure…” comment from this viewer!). Annoyingly, this film suffers from even worse audio problems than the first two entries, in the version provided by Youku. The sound completely vanishes at points, and when it goes, it takes the subtitles with it. The film is strong enough to survive the issue with most of the entertainment value intact. I can’t help thinking, if there had been a better presentation, this one might well have merited our Seal of Approval. Hopefully, there will be more entries to come.

Dir: Yuan Shuo, Wang Ke
Star: Jessie Yan Jia-ying, Zhou Yan, Zhang Lin, Xue Bin

Abigail (2023)

  By

★★★½
“Heathers: the seventies remix.”

This is now the third film with the same title to be reviewed on the site: no vampires or Russian sorceresses to be found here. This does get an extra half star for genuinely surprising me. In the early stages, I had a strong feeling I knew exactly where this was going to end up going. Men bad, white people bad – and white men? Well, they’re the worst of all. Call it a spoiler perhaps – we’ll get to those – but that is definitely not how this unfolds. It takes place in 1976 Alabama, where teenager Abigail Cole (Cantrell) and her mother Eve (Lynch) have just moved from California. It’s clear this was to get away from “something”.  Exactly what is unclear, but it seems to have had something to do with Abigail’s father.

She makes friends with Lucas (Reed-Brown), who lives next door and is the victim of bullies at school. Initially, Abigail’s behaviour is positively heroic, defending Lucas from his tormentors. Though the film never makes mention of it, Lucas is black. You feel this might have been an issue in seventies Alabama, but the insults hurled at Lucas are entirely of the f-word rather than the n-word, an interesting choice. Anyway, Abigail proves more than capable of taking care of both of them, wielding a baseball-bat, fire extinguisher and axe-handle to good effect.

[Spoilers] However, things are entirely upended when further incidents make it abundantly clear that Abigail is not a heroic vigilante, defender of the oppressed, so much as a psychopath who revels in the opportunity to use violence against others. I did not see that coming. From this point on, just about everything is reversed, because the character for whom you’ve been rooting the entire time, is now the villainess. Conversely, the local cop, who seemed the epitome of racist law-enforcement, turns out to be sympathetic to Lucas and his apparent plight. However, things only cascade further into darkness as we continue on. The truth about Abigail’s missing father comes out, and the body count continues to increase, as efforts are made to clear up the previous corpses. [End spoilers]

There are some plot-holes here: given Abigail and Lucas were hauled into the principal’s office for an incident involving one bully, they would (Lucas particularly, even if Abigail was discounted through seventies sexism) surely be prime suspects in his subsequent disappearance. However, I am prepared to cut it some slack, due to the glorious one-eighty pulled off in the middle, which can only be applauded. Credit in particular to Cantrell’s performance: I’m sure if you go back and watch it again, you would be able to spot the clues to her personality in the earlier scenes. However, I’ve a feeling the impact would likely be less on subsequent viewings, where you know what’s coming. This is likely to be a “one and done” for me, which is why it doesn’t get a seal of approval. Albeit a highly satisfactory “one”.

Dir: Melissa Vitello
Star: Ava Cantrell, Tren Reed-Brown, Hermione Lynch, Gene Farber

American Samurai

  By

★½
“Dollar-store samurai.”

If I’d realized earlier this was by the director of the underwhelming, non-GWG film, Once Upon a Time in the Apocalypse, I would likely have set my expectations considerably lower. This has much the same “running around the woods after civilization has collapsed” vibe, though I did see Willard has added some digital effects to enhance the post-apocalyptic atmosphere. It is likely an improvement technically, but there just isn’t enough going on here to sustain interest. In this version, the rich have abandoned the failing civilization on Earth and decamped in self-sustaining spaceships. Everyone else has been left to fend for themselves, and this includes the community here, who keep themselves to themselves, deep in the Oregon woods.

In charge of its security are Larkin (Hastings) and her acolyte, Alyssa (Fortuna). They go on regular patrols around the area, or when they get word of strangers who might pose a threat. On one such excursion, they meet Ryan (Pelfrey) who begs for their help, offering them tickets to space if they help him reach the take-off point. Alyssa wants to take him up on the offer, but Larkin over-rules her. However, they come across a couple of the elites, who have returned to Earth on a “hunting expedition”, and the encounter turns lethal. This puts them in the crosshairs of the accompanying, ‘enhanced’ bodyguard (Mann). It poses a dilemma, because the last thing Larkin wants is to bring the pursuer back to their settlement. 

The idea isn’t terrible. Unfortunately, the execution largely is, in a variety of ways. The most obvious one is the action. Using the S-word (incidentally, there is zero connection to the 1992 film of the same name, starring Mark Dacascos) sets… certain expectations in regard to your fight scenes, which Fortuny and Hastings are in no position to meet. Slowly and carefully waving swords about is not an acceptable answer, despite guns and bullets apparently (though not consistently) being in short supply. Too many plot threads never go anywhere of significance. These include both Ryan and his space tickets, as well as little girl Mary, back in the settlement, who is supposed to be in dire need of a doctor – though she looks pretty healthy to me.

Fortuny and Hastings aren’t terrible; the latter grew on me after a shaky start to her performance. Their two characters form a decent contrast, the cautious Larkin with the impetuous and more emotionally driven Alyssa. The individual scenes where they are talking with each other are okay. It’s just there are far too damn many of them, each bringing the film to a halt. Then, when we finally see the settlement, it looks like a well-maintained holiday camp, where a hippie festival is happening (fire dancers!). It’s salutary to contrast this with another recently reviewed low-budget slice of post-apocalyptic cheese, in Ride Hard: Live Free, which did a far better job of working round its limited resources, and retained my interest considerably better. Guess they don’t make apocalypses like they used to.

Dir: Nathan Willard
Star: Rosa Fortuny, Larkin Hastings, Rob Pelfrey, Mikel Mann