Tag: china

The Queen of Kung Fu franchise

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Of late, it seems that the Western action heroine has been staggering from one disaster to another, culminating in one of the year’s biggest flops, Supergirl. I’m not too concerned. The business is cyclical, and I’ve been covering the genre long enough to have survived similar downturns in the past. We lived through Cutthroat Island, Catwoman and Aeon Flux. I think we’ll survive the commercial failures of Furiosa, Ballerina and Madam Web. But a reduction in quantity out of the major Hollywood studios seems likely. However, as in other fields, the Chinese appear willing to step in and pick up the slack, filling the need with lower-cost imports, of varying quality. 

I first got into the Chinese streaming services like Youku and iQIYI for their creature features, in early 2022. The oddly charming title Escape of Shark proved the gateway through which I discovered the kind of movies that the late, lamented SyFy Channel used to screen on Saturdays. Not just sharks, but crocodiles, snakes, bees and even cockroaches were the threat to humanity, and I’ve been covering these When Chinese Animals Attack films on my other site. Of course, YouTube gonna YouTube, and the more of direct-to-streaming Chinese films you watch, the more crop up in your feed. I realized they weren’t limited to those movies, but regular action as well. And that included titles which were very much a fit for this site.

It looks like the first such was a cross-over title: Huge Shark, an entry definitely inspired by The Shallows. But since then, there have been a steady stream of such entries: while the quality has been variable (to put it mildly), the best of them are as good as any straight-to-streaming product produced in the West. Sniper Goddess, for example, was among the most purely enjoyable films I saw in 2025. Some have proved successful enough to kick-start their own franchise – that’s not something we’ve seen much here of late. I previously wrote about the Angels of Vengeance trilogy, and figured it was high time to dip my toe into the Chinese waters once again. So, here’s another trilogy: this time, three period pieces set in and around Shanghai between the wars. 

The Queen of Kung Fu

★★★
“The queen is crowned.”

For a film which barely scrapes past the seventy-five minute mark, it feels like there’s a lot going on here. In addition, of course, to the martial arts promised by the title. It likely also claims the title for heroine with the shortest name, this being A Xi (Li). I’d have said her first name might be “Ah”, but the subtitles and other sources are quite insistent on her being “A”. Anyway, she’s a rural village girl, who is being brought to Shanghai to act as a nightclub hostess. Except the martial arts skills she rapidly demonstrates after her arrival, killing one of the local crime bosses after he murders another hostess, make her better suited for another position. 

After further proof of her abilities, she’s taken under the wing of the overall head of the area, the eunuch Pei Xiang Lan. She is given her own nightclub to run, and adopts a strict policy of wholesome fun: so, no opium, prostitution or gambling. Whether despite or because of this, the venue flourishes. But when she tries to expand this policy to the rest of the entertainment district, she begins to get significant push back. She is helped by her consigliere (or whatever the Chinese equivalent might be!), Huo Yun Sheng (Ye). He has the schooling to assist the illiterate Xi, who is smart, but more inclined to solve problems with her fists than her brain or tongue. 

Not helping matters: the increasing influence of the Japanese in Shanghai, who regard the local population as their inferiors. Or the cops, both good and bad. Oh, and Xi faints at the sight of blood, which is probably not the best trait for a martial artist. So, yeah. this is a busy little film, which helps ensure that the (sometimes sizeable) gaps between the fights are generally interesting enough to keep your attention engaged. I think it’s the characters which are key here. Even relatively minor supporting players are efficiently drawn in a way which I found engaged them. Although there were some plot points and elements which I strongly suspect lost a considerable amount in translation. This applies particularly to the comedic aspects: some moments had the pacing of humour, but I was baffled regarding the joke. 

In terms of martial arts, it’s solid rather than spectacular. The action is quite heavily wire-fu, but it’s not as if it’s trying to hide this in any way. While the editing can charitably be designed as crisp, there are occasional moments where Li is present for long enough to give the impression she knows what she is doing. I also have to give a special shout-out to the sets and overall production design. These have a quality which is at a level befitting a movie of a far bigger budget, and the whole thing looks a solid piece of cinema. Good enough to leave me interested where things might go. 

Dir: Liu Bayin
Star: Mengmeng Li, Leif Ye Xiao-Kai, Qing Feng, Shengli Wang

The Queen of Kung Fu 2

★★★½
“More fun when drunk than Supergirl…”

While this follows on from the events of its predecessor, the sequel seems very different in tone. Less comedic, it may also be more traditional, in particular with a heroine who uses a style of alcohol-enhanced fighting, most well-known through Jackie Chan’s Drunken Master films. After losing her one true love A Xi (Li) has abandoned city life in Shanghai, and become a wandering champion of the downtrodden. Her latest target is bandit and warlord wannabe Xia Ba Tian (Yang), who think she’s going to become his latest wife. Not only is he wrong, turns out his three existing wives are also vengeful undercover vixens, although he survives their initial attempt on his life.

He has a plan to set up a fake tea factory, in reality an opium plant, and compel the locals to work for him. Except, the village chosen for the location just happens to be the home town of A, and her parents still live there. Her mother falls victim to the brutality of Xia, driving her father into madness, not helped by opium addiction. Naturally, A isn’t going to stand for that. With the moral support of local guy Mo Bu Yan (Gong) and the more direct assistance of The Ex-Wives Club, she goes up against Xia and his pugilist sidekick, Huang (A). But there may be a more dangerous enemy at hand, in the shape of the army officer with whom Xia was working.

I think it’s interesting the makers opted for a very different direction, though it still has an underlying, and rather communist, subtext of liberating the workers. However, this improves simply by concentrating more on the action. It felt like the original movie put more effort into establishing the setting and the characters – which is why I was a little surprised to see both virtually discarded for the sequel. It does seem like the production values here are less impressive, with “generic Chinese village” replacing the neon glitz of thirties Shanghai. But against that, I found the pacing better, despite a notable lull in the second act. The way it ties back to A’s original sale to Shanghai works, though I’m surprised nobody in town recognizes her, even her own parents.

Yang makes for an impressively hissable villain, despite hair which reminded me of the late Keith Flint from The Prodigy. However, it’s actually Huang who has the best martial arts skills here, with a physical presence which is quite commanding. I wish the final battle had pitted him against our drunken mistress, as the army bosses who actually get that job are a bit underwhelming in comparison. While the editing does continue to teeter on the edge of nausea-inducing at times, I think the fights here are better overall. Li definitely looks to have learned from her previous experience, to the extent I initially thought she was a new, better trained actress entirely. 

Dir: Liu Bayin
Star: Mengmeng Li, Da Chuan Yang, Xiao Jun Gong, Nuo A

The Queen of Kung Fu 3

★★★
“One more for the road.”

Our favourite drunken mistress, A Xi (Li), returns for the third – and, so far, final – installment of the series. After the rural excursion of part two, it’s back to a more urban setting. Albeit only after a quick excursion home because Xi is trying to escape the criminal life – this goes about as well as it usually does. She returns to Shanghai with her sister Yu (M. Ma) – at least, I’m assuming it’s her sister, explanations are kinda vague. Could be they just trained under the same martial arts master, rather than sharing DNA. However, Shanghai is under the control of Western gangster Hanks (C. Ma – seriously, half the people in this film have the same last name). 

As well as trying to put together a school of martial artists who can oppose Hanks, A has to deal with dissension in the ranks. Yu loses an eye during a fight, taking a thrown knife intended for her sister, and is fully intent on getting revenge, regardless of the problems it causes. This eventually leads to a split, and the final fight see A having to take on her friend. To be honest, it’s underwhelming, both in content and resolution. I’ve watched it twice now, and am still not exactly sure what happens at the end. There are certainly considerably better fights earlier on, with A leaning heavily into her drunken boxing style of martial arts from the second movie. 

It does feel like the director is gradually getting a better handle on the comedy side. It’s more restrained in this installment, and consequently, more effective. I appreciated a particularly deadpan joke where Yu does, indeed, get revenge by stabbing one of the enemies in the eye, after he calls her a “single-eyed loser.” He then proceeds to stagger around in the background for the rest of the scene, while the rest of the characters calmly discuss their situation. Yet there are also moments of undeniably heartfelt drama, with Yu generally at the heart of these. It’s an odd combination, which probably shouldn’t work, yet in the main, I’d say it does the job well enough – albeit with varying degrees of success across the genres. 

Naturally, we’re here for the action in particular and that remains decent in the main. There’s a series of battles over that old standby, who’s the best martial artists, and the struggle for control of the city provides no shortage of opportunities for further conflict even if, as noted, the ending proves a bit of a damp squib. In addition to the unresolved sibling issues mentioned earlier, the storyline remains open in other ways as well, with A basically just wandering off. It appears the makers were interested in continuing the saga (perhaps with further conflict between the sisters). But four years later, we still await the further adventures of A Xi. Maybe the character decided to enter rehab instead and is now teetotal.

Dir: Liu Bayin
Star: Mengmeng Li, Muxuan Ma, Osborn Ma, Chao Ma

 

SWAT Angels in Mission

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★★
“Mission: Fairly possible.”

Despite an impressive poster, this is a fairly humdrum action film. If it had been a Western production in the nineties, I would have described it as “straight to video.” I imagine the appropriate comparison here would be “straight to iQIYI”, the streaming service through which I saw this. It’s technically competent, make no mistake. However, there’s not very much to stick in the mind, and it feels like both the script and performances have been carried out with the bare minimum of effort. It’s the kind of thing you could have on in the background, while carrying out light household chores, and it would not impact the level of entertainment value obtained very much.

Mei Jing (Wei) is a cop, who is part of the Thunderbolt Strike Team in Donghai, under Wang Jianing (He). Her all-woman group are often passed over for the most exciting jobs, but they are key in foiling an attempt to free a captive, San Lin Jie, during a prison transfer. The attempt was made by his brother, who goes by the name of Hummingbird (Zhou). However, this helps puts Mei and her father, who was instrumental in the capture of San, on the radar for revenge by Hummingbird and his female sidekick, Nightingale. However, Hummingbird’s dedication to his cause does not sit too well with the other members of his own gang, who would rather just get on with their nefarious activities. 

The first effort he makes is to interrupt a stakeout Mei and her colleagues are carrying out downtown. This involves a sniper and some thugs at street level, though quite how this is going to force the authorities to release San is a bit unclear. I also wondered how he know the team were going to be there: I kept expecting there to be a mole in the department or something. Never did turn up. This fails, mostly because the women do fight back, in what’s probably the best bit of action heroine stuff the film has to offer. The opening attack on the transfer convoy isn’t too bad, generating a fair bit of tension while moving the story on. It’s not particularly GWG-ish though. 

He then ups the ante, by storming a nursing home and taking the residents hostage. Which at least seems like a semblance of a plan, and might also let him take his vengeance against Mei and her father. However, instead of building to a climax, it feels like the film kinda peters out in a generally disappointing way. While I could see the male lead going up against Hummingbird, surely we would get a nice, long fight between Mei and Nightingale? Sadly, no – this film, thy name is disappointment. Although to be disappointed, I would first need to have had some level of emotional involvement, and I can’t honestly say I did. On the other hand, I did get the washing-up done, so there’s that. 

Dir: Xue Wenhua
Star: Wei Xiaoxuan, He Meixuan, Zhou Zhiwen, Shen Tai

Exquisite Bodyguard

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★★★
“Three’s Company”

I’m going with the title by which this is generally known. Not to be confused with the title given on the print – Female Bodyguards – or the one in the subtitles, Perfect Bodyguard. The Chinese title, per Google Translate is, The Stunning Bodyguard. Definitely something about bodyguards then: the rest is up to you. This is another one of these direct-to-streaming movies coming out of China, which I must confess to enjoying of late. They are, in many ways, the spiritual descendants of the Hong Kong GWG entries. This poster looks particularly like Heroic Trio. Though I have yet to see anyone in these films at the level of Moon Lee or Cynthia Khan – indeed, I doubt I recognise anyone. Still, thanks to Denis for pointing me in the direction of this specific one.

As is sadly often the case, the presentation was less than whelming. In particular, a good chunk of the audio track had been replaced with generic stock footage, which may have strayed in from a video game, with just that and the dialogue present. This was particularly unimpressive during the opening sequence, which is a large-scale gun battle, definitely diluting its impact. This issue persisted throughout, though at least it didn’t impact understanding of the plot. Jiang Nanying (Gab), Hu Lififei and Ma Yanni (Liu) are three bodyguards. On a mission to protect pharmaceutical scientist Huang Jiadong (Lun), Ma is killed, but Jiang ends up marrying Huang. Except, he gets kidnapped at their wedding. 

Three years (!) later, Jiang is in for a couple of shocks. Not only is Ma not dead, she is now working for the people on whose behalf Huang has been working since his matrimonial abduction. He’s beginning to suffer second thoughts, because his boss is pushing for experimentation on human subjects. I should mention this all takes place around pre-war Shanghai, with Huang a specialist in finding an artificial alternative to opium. Needless to say, his employers are less than respectable. Jiang ends up breaking into the compound, and tries to persuade her husband to leave. Naturally, it isn’t going to be quite as easy as that, despite Ma also having qualms about her current choice of employment. 

There’s fifteen minutes of fights and things getting blown up real good at the start, and round about the same at the end. This is great stuff, a mix of hand-to-hand combat and gun-fu, which is as good as anything you’ll see out of far bigger, Western, action heroine movies. I dunno if the actresses concerned are doing their own stunts. I can’t say it matters much. Running a crisp 71 minutes, the middle section is a little dull in parts. The script is not apparently interested in doing much except hitting the obligatory points, and you can mostly see these coming. Audio issues aside, it looks slick, and not particularly low-budget. I’ve a feeling I’ll be reviewing more Chinese imports in the future. 

Dir: Yuan Guangan
Star: Tingting Gan, Wang Hui, Lun Bo Ke, Liu Sasa

Hot-Blooded Angel

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★★
“Luke-warm vigilantes.”

Watching this one, I had a very strong sense of deja-vu, to the point I started looking for a previous review. Turns out, none such existed, because I think my previous encounter with it was on one of those dodgy, “pirate” YouTube channels, under the different name of Scarlet Strike. I skipped writing about it, since I wasn’t able to determine any information off that, such as cast and crew. Because, it turns out, that wasn’t its real title. A month later, I watched this official copy one morning, while Chris was taking our new cat to the vet to be neutered. There were points where I suspect the cat had the better day. 

Ok, it was not quite that bad, but coming the morning after Lamb Game, the gap in quality was palpable. It takes place in Chinatown, so I guess… not in China? A dubious businessman, Mr. Ba is seeking to knock down all the small businesses and family homes for the usual property development reasons. Standing against him are a pair of orphan sisters (Feng and Sun), who run a sweet shop, as well as the “Guardian Angel” (Xu), a masked vigilante who keeps the area safe from predators of all kinds. Basically, it ends as a team-up, especially after Ba decides to kidnap one of the sisters for use as leverage. The other sister and Guardian Angel then have to go rescue her from his headquarters. 

From a technical point of view, it’s competent enough. However, the characters all seem the epitome of blandness. There is what appears to be an effort to inject some kind of romantic interest in the shape of honest cop, Officer Wu (Huang). However, there’s absolutely no chemistry between him and any of the three female leads, so I’m not sure why they bothered. There are also a series of confusing flashbacks to childhood, though I’m uncertain to which character they refer. I’m still trying to work out whether the Guardian Angel is intended to be a long-lost sibling. Between her and Ba’s pair of minions, it appears Chinese orphanages may be a hot-bed of martial arts training. 

Looking at the poster, it’s either generated by AI or bad PhotoShop. The former would make sense, if only because the script could be from the same source. The action is rarely better than mid-tier, and there’s a lengthy section in the middle where it vanishes entirely. Instead, we get some genuinely bad attempts at comic relief, and it’s at that point I would have happily swapped places with the house feline. A brief spurt of fighting towards the end briefly reawakened interest. However, we suffer through a poorly-conceived finale involving a device, not previously mentioned, that can decrypt Mr. Ba’s hard-drive, and a coda which feels longer than the one at the end of Return of the King. This one certainly coughs up a hair-ball. 

Dir: Jin Xin
Star: Xu Dong Dong, Feng Yan Yan, Huang Tao, Sun Wen Xue

Female Special Police Officer

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★★★
“Die Hard in… um, a building?”

Really, this is so shameless in its appropriation as to be almost adorable. Cop Sheng Nan (Mu) is visiting her other half at a swanky function, when the event is attacked by thieves. Fortunately, when they take over the main room where everyone else is, she’s in the bathroom, and so is able to escape captivity. She is then forced to sneak around, using a combination of stealth and her cop skills to take on the criminals, who have to wait around for a time-locked safe to open. Does any of this sound familiar? If not, perhaps the scene where she drops a dead robber on a car to alert the authorities? Or where she leaps off the roof to avoid an explosion?

Be cautious if looking this up, because there’s another film, made the following year, with an almost identical title – it drops the final R off the title. This makes it seem as if they sit around filing memos and doing light paperwork, but given they’re called the Thunderbolt Women’s Commando Unit, I suspect they do not. There, the enemy is a drug cartel; here, it’s thieves. That all said, I have to deduct points for incredibly lazy script-writing in this. Even before we get to the wholesale lifting of elements from Die Hard, we get another trope so old it can be found carved onto the Pyramids. A hostage rescue, which is actually just a training mission? Never seen that before… [/sarcasm]

However, if the writer needs to be taken to a re-education camp, the execution is surprisingly good, to the point that I enjoyed this more than Cleaner, the considerably larger-budgeted Die Hard knock-off. It’s certainly less pretentious, and has no particular aspirations, beyond an attractive heroine kicking moderate ass. This lack of ambition is laudable, and running only seventy-eight minutes means it has no time for diversions, subplots or social commentary. Not when it has to copy the scene where a frontal assault by police gets explosively repelled (albeit less lethally, perhaps in deference to local cultural mores about killing cops). I may have yelled “The quarterback is toast!” at my television screen.

To be fair, it does become more of its own animal in the second half. The power is cut briefly, allowing two of Sheng Nan’s colleagues in to join her in the building. On the criminal side, things don’t unfold exactly as expected either. Not that anyone here exactly Alan Rickman, and this is probably the area where there’s the biggest gulf separating it from Die Hard. I will say, the finish is also weak sauce, with things just petering out, rather than ending in a satisfactory bang. At least the chief villain didn’t due in a long plummet, with a surprised look on their face. Not a patch on the inspiration, obviously. Yet I’ve seen equally shameless copies which were far less entertaining. 

Dir: Chang Chen
Star: Mu Qi Miya, Cheng Qi Meng, Wei Zi Qian, Mayela Magru 

Guilty Beauty

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★★★
“Thoroughly lost in translation.”

Well, this is a real roller-coaster ride of style and incompetence. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen a Chinese film where the subtitles were quite so incomprehensible. Even though this one is on the YouTube channel for an official Chinese streaming service (iQiYi), the soundtrack was entirely muted at some points, and the soundtrack replaced by jaunty elevator musak at others. Despite being a mere sixty-six minutes, the presentation is therefore something of a test of endurance, and I am also not prepared to guarantee the accuracy of the plot synopsis, character names or actors. There was heavy use of Google Translate required, there being no IMDb page for the movie. I did my best.

Though this is not immediately clear, it takes place in… 1930’s Shanghai, at a guess? Not sure if the Japanese are actually occupying the city, or if it’s just a Casablanca-style nest of spies and intrigue. Working for a quasi-governmental part of the Chinese authorities (yeah, it’s vague) are our trio of heroines: Qiu Di (Zhang Y.), gothette Lü Yun (Wang) and schoolgirl Cui Ya (Zhang T). They have to recover a roll of film stolen by the Japanese military, now in the possession of gangster Huang Sen. In order to get close to him, our trio opt to go through his godson, Kwok Tin-ming (Ke). Di’s mad musical skills make her best suited, so she makes contact with Kwok and becomes his girlfriend, while her two colleagues…

Um, well, I’m not sure exactly what the plan was here, because Di doesn’t do very much: her associates complete their mission without any real trouble, and we’re only twenty minutes in. Thereafter… more stuff happens. I remain vague, not out of a fear of spoilers, more because but I would not be prepared to wager money on many of the specifics. It seems like a former ally of the trio is now working for the Japanese? Maybe? I initially thought they already got the film back, but apparently not, because Di keeps hanging out with her target. He finally realizes he is being played, and Di looks surprisingly broken-up about it. Genuine feelings, maybe?

I was certainly hoping for more action, given the poster and brisk opening, something along the lines of a Chinese version of the original Charlie’s Angels movie. There’s an opening fight, a spot of action during the film recovery heist and then a long lull before a moderately rousing finale. Everyone suddenly remembers about the film again, Di has to fight a slew of kabuki-masked ninja types, and then try to rescue her boyfriend, before a final scene which… I have no clue about. I will say, the movie does look good overall, with super-crisp photography and a sense of style across its characters and settings. If you told me this was an adaptation of a local comic-book, I would believe you – it possesses that sort of aesthetic. The film is below: perhaps you can make more sense of it than I!

Dir: Sun Jiayi
Star: Zhang Yinan, Ke Jiahao, Wang Xiran, Zhang Tong

The Red Sparrow

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★★½
“Better red than… uh…”

This is not to be confused, in any way, with the Jennifer Lawrence spy movie, which is missing the definite article. What we have here is a hyperactive Chinese movie, where it feels as if almost nothing is real. Chris walked in during it, and her first reaction was, “Is that anime?” It’s not, but it definitely has a similar vibe to things like the Ghost in the Shell universe. The other obvious influence might be the first Matrix movie, both in the superkinetic action, and with its tale of a hero who rises to lead a human rebellion against a technological threat. Though as Wachowski movies go… Speed Racer is a better visual reference point.

That’s especially true in the opening scenes, which takes place in 2060. The corporation belonging to Mr. Ron (Zhang) is putting the finishing touches to their human/robot combination, with the first such child, Yi Ni, is about to be born. The facility comes under ferocious attack, and to be honest, the depiction was so frenetic, I needed a bit of a nap by the time it was over. We’re talking giant automated cannons popping up out of the landscape, mecha being dropped to aid in the assault, and thousands of rounds of ammo being expended. It’s all barking mad and completely over the top, ending in infant Yi Ni being sent out in an escape capsule and she’s lost to the company. 

Twenty years later, the now adult Yi (Han) is living on the edge of society in a megalopolis, when her innate abilities are triggered. The bad news, is this brings her back on the radar for Ron, who has never quite been able to reproduce the success of Yi, and wants to bring her in. He aims to use her DNA to create an army of super soldiers, with which he can conquer the world. After escaping his clutches, she teams up with the rebels, under Qiu De (Jiang), and becomes part of the resistance. If you’re thinking this might lead to further hypersonic action sequences? Yeah, especially as Yi approaches her final form of “Dark Phoenix”. Incoming cease and desist from Marvel in 3…

There’s a LOT to cram in to a mere seventy-six minutes, and doing so basically requires the sacrifice of any effort at characterization. From a technical point of view, it is quite impressive. I don’t know what the budget was: likely, less than it looks, and I sense it’s the wave of the future. However, this comes at the cost of almost any humanity. As a result, at times it feels you are simply watching someone playing a video-game on ultra-hard level. Certainly, the action sequences are closer to subliminal flashes, where you don’t follow the action, so much as desperately cling on for the ride. I hope this is not the wave of the future. And now, if you’ll excuse me, I am off for that nice lie-down in a dark room I mentioned. 

Dir: Ji Zhizhong
Star: Han Cong Cong, Jiang Zheng Hao, Zhu Hong, Zhang Xuan Mo

Sniper Goddess

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★★★★
“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

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

The ‘Angels of Vengeance’ trilogy

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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