Tag: hong kong

Deaf Mute Heroine

  By

★★★½
“Silent but deadly.”

deafmuteheroineThe physically disabled hero has long been a staple of martial arts, to the extent that is is sometimes referred to, tongue-in-cheek, as “cripsploitation”. The One-armed Boxer, The Crippled Masters, Zatoichi – it’s a genre that survives more recently than you may think, with Mat Fraser, recently seen in American Horror Story: Freak Show, starring in 2009’s Kung Fu Flid. While this is rarer for heroines, they are not immune, with Japan giving us the Crimson Bat series, reviewed elsewhere on this site. This is another entry, Wong playing the titular heroine, Ya Ba, who is unable to speak or hear, but can still fight a mean battle, assisted by reflective wristbands that let her see who’s sneaking up from behind, in lieu of hearing them.

She comes into possession of a set of pearls, taking them off some robbers with extreme prejudice. However, this brings down the wrath of Miss Liu (Huang), leader of her own gang, and whose brother was one of the robbers. While her first attempt to kill Ya is unsuccessful, Lui’s poisoned flying daggers do injure her. Ya is found and nursed back to health by kindly cloth-dyer Yang Shun (Ching); romance blossoms, and the pair marry, with Ya figuratively hanging up her wristbands;  she actually puts them away in a box. That’s relevant, because her husband ends up entrapped into responsibility for a friend’s gambling debt by Liu, and she demands he steal Ya’s wristbands as payback. That opens the way for Liu and about five billion henchmen (count may be approximate) to launch their attack. But that’s not the only threat she faces, since lurking in the wings is another talented master, with a previously relationship to Ya and who was left with a nasty facial scar for his pains.

The fights are good. Really good. As in, the final battle between Ya and Lui (below) may be the best of the era I’ve seen between two women – like most of the action here, it’s fast, hard-hitting and imaginative, weakened only by some unsubtle wirework. The film is also bloodily messy, to a somewhat surprising extent, and both Wong and Huang make for highly-effective characters, the latter making up for the former’s silence.  However, the movie grinds to a halt in the middle, as the focus shifts off Ya to her husband, who is both a great deal less interesting and almost unlikeable. The film is also hampered by poor availability: while the version I watched was as close to complete as possible, that required a combination from three different sources, including one print dubbed into German(!) and another which was sub-VHS quality with a large logo in one corner. That helps leave this short of getting our “seal of approval,” but if a good copy ever becomes available, we might re-visit it. For as I said to Chris, what’s not to love about a wife who never says a word?

Y’know, our couch really isn’t so bad, when you get used to it. :)

Dir: Wu Ma
Star: Sally Wong (a.k.a. Helen Ma), Shirley Huang, Ching Tang, Wu Ma

Beauty Investigator

  By

★★
“Beauties and the beasts.”

beautyinvestigatorEllen (Lee) and Grace (Kim) are police officers, who are first on to arrive when the latest victim of a serial sexual predator is found in a dumpster. After a brief diversion to catch a purse snatcher – really, how dumb must you be to do that at a murder scene? – they are sent undercover as nightclub hostesses, since that’s the profession of all the victims. While fending off both lecherous customers and employers, they stumble across an arms smuggling outfit, whose leader Bill (Tsui) has pulled a fast one over his Yakuza partners, with the help of a hired hitwoman (Oshima, whose character in the end credits is named as, I kid you not, “Japanese Jap”!). Rather than letting their superiors know, they decided to investigate themselves. Probably not the wisest of moves: as they’ll discover by the end of the movie, discretion is indeed the better part of valour…

Very quickly, the bar for this one is set low, with the creators’ idea of comedy gold being to have Grace throw up over the corpse on seeing it: oh, hold my sides, for I fear they may split. If you’d be thinking the only way to go from there is up, the next hour seems to take a sadistic pleasure in proving otherwise, with Ellen and Grace doing the “mismatched cop” thing, which was already about 20 years past its sell-by date, when this came out in 1993. Then, with about 20 minutes to go, the film inexplicably takes a far darker turn (especially considering how lightly the previous carnage has been played), with the mission become one of personal revenge rather than law enforcement. In cinematic terms, it’s like putting a sprig of parsley on a cow-pat, and calling it a salad: I was left wondering if someone had sloppily spliced on the final reel of an entirely different movie.

The only redeeming aspect – and even this falls well short of making it recommendable – is the action, which is quite frequent and high in intensity. Lee and Oshima are both in fine form, and watching the pair of them go toe-to-toe with each other is a joy, as always: that’s particularly so for the end battle, in which all the previously mentioned participants are involved, along with Sophia Crawford, who plays the villain’s mistress (she also takes an entirely gratuitous shower in some versions of the film). However, the truth is, you can see Lee and Oshima in any number of other movies, without having to endure the feeble efforts at buddy comedy attempted here. And you’d be well advised to do just that.

Dir: Tso Nam Lee
Star: Moon Lee, Kim Je Kee, Tsui Zen Aie, Yukari Oshima

Lady Whirlwind

  By

★★½
“Because Lady Moderate Breeze wouldn’t sell as many copies.”

deepthrustI’m not saying this is a bad film. But when I watch one called Lady Whirlwind (though here is as good a place as any to acknowledge the wonderfully tacky alternate title featured on the poster at the right), I expect a good deal more lady whirlwinding. The focus is instead on Ling Shi-Hao (Chang), beaten and left for dead after trying to leave a gang. Wisely, he decides to continue with his death, hiding out in the country for three years with girlfriend Hsuang Hsuang (We). This anonymity is shattered by the arrival of Tien Li-Chun (Mao), who wants a word with Ling, along with ripping the beating heart out of his chest. For it turns out, he was a bit of a bastard who jilted Tien’s sister, leading to her suicide. Hence, when he thanks Tien for saving him, she replies, “I just didn’t want somebody else to kill you.”

Ling admits he deserves his fate, but asks for a stay of execution, so he can first take revenge on his former colleagues (who include Sammo Hung in an early role). Tien is clearly pretty laid-back about the whole vengeance thing, since she’s nowhere to be seen during the lengthy training montage that follows, after Ling helps a Korean herbalist, bitten by a snake, and is taught the deadly Tai Chi Palm style. Will that help him beat the bad guys? And will Tien then stop lurking off-screen and goddamn do something?

There’s certainly no shortage of action, though in comparison to some other Mao films I’ve seen recently, the fight scenes doesn’t seem as smoothly choreographed and frankly, get a bit boring – it also suffers too much from the “we’ll attack you one at a time, while everyone else circles about aimlessly” trope, common to many movies of the time. Indeed, I must admit, there was one of Ling’s battles in the middle where I actually fell asleep: never a good sign where a martial-arts films is concerned. The frequent use of musical cues definitely not composed for the film is also rather distracting: one, in particular, will be particularly familiar if you’ve watched James Bond movies, but other sources say the pillaging also includes the works of Ennio Morricone and Bernard Herrmann. Hey, if you’re going to steal, do it from the best, I suppose.

Mao does have some good fight scenes, particularly going one-on-many with a copious line of henchmen. But you wonder why she’s so apparently disinterested in her revenge, particularly at the end, which is entirely ludicrous, and all but negates everything that happened over the previous 80 minutes. Not one of her best, with not enough going on beyond her usual graceful performance, to merit your attention.

Dir: Huang Feng
Star: Chang Yi, Angela Mao, Pai Ying, June Wu
a.k.a. Deep Thrust

Beach Spike

  By

★★
“Shaolin Volleyball.”

beachspikeSharon (Chau) and Rachel (Fu) have a pretty idyllic life, spending their days mostly on the beach playing volleyball, with occasional bouts of clubbing and very occasional work. But this relaxed approach to things is threatened by the Brewer family, who plan to turn the entire seafront into a megaresort, displacing all the happy local beach-bums. Leading the charge is family daughter Natalie (C, whom I can only presume was named by the same model-actress-whatever department to give us Maggie Q), who has a hatred for the “little people” and, along with her sister, kicks the arse of Sharon and Rachel in an early contest.

Through a series of frankly implausible events, and clouded by the blossoming relationship between Sharon and Brewer scion Tim (Law), the future of the resort project hangs on a rematch, the two teams making their way through a tournament to face each other in the final. However, anyone familiar with kung-fu movies will not be surprised to hear the good girls have been getting training from relatives well-versed in martial arts, and they won’t be such a pushover in the second battle.

It’s hard to work out exactly who the audience for this mess is supposed to be. Beach volleyball fans will hate the dreadful CGI, used to portray any protracted rallies, in lieu of actual skill, and likely find the heroines implausibly unmuscled (one in particular looks like she will shatter if dropped). Action fans will find little to remember here either, despite the presence of veteran heroine Yeung Pan Pan as Mrs Tao, and despite an obvious influence being Shaolin Soccer, there isn’t a trace of Stephen Chow’s wit. Even those looking for pleasures of a more exploitative nature will likely get bored, sitting through the lengthy comedic and romantic interludes.

I suppose those fascinated by Acting Performances In A Second Language might get a kick out of the Brewer family, who deliver lines in English about as well as I could in Cantonese. But I think the main intended market for this is a fetish one, and fairly specific at that. If you like seeing women hit in the face by balls, this is the movie for you. No, really. particularly during a competitive montage at the end, where it becomes a virtual barrage of ball-to-face action, including in slow-mo. Otherwise, the idiocy of the plot and blandness of the lead characters overpower much of whatever potential this had, and Wanted: DOA did a much better job with the sport. Probably, this needed either to be taken completely seriously or go over-the-top entirely and head into total parody (like Soccer did). Instead, this does neither, and the end results just sit in front of you like a beached whale for 95 minutes.

Dir: Tony Tang
Star: Chrissie Chau, Theresa Fu, Him Law, Jessica C

Hapkido

  By

★★★
“Forbearance. It’s vastly over-rated…”

lady_kung_fu_poster_011934 Korea is under the yoke of Japanese occupation. At the hapkido school of martial arts, Yu Ying (Mao), Kao Chang (Wong) and Fan Wei (Hung) are learning the form. On graduation, they return to China and open an establishment of their own, only to fall foul of the Japanese Black Bear group, who bully both local residents and other schools, and try to run the hapkido practitioners out of town. Despite their teacher’s mantra of “Forbearance,” of which Ying has frequently to remind her colleagues, hot-headed Wei is eventually baited into fighting and killing some of the Black Bear students, and has to go into hiding. Chang’s efforts at diplomacy fare no better, leaving him beaten within an inch of his life, and the Bears seize the opportunity to tell Ying they’ll be incorporating her school into theirs. She finally realizes that turning the other cheek can only go so far before you have stand up for what’s right. Which, in this case, is some kicking of asses belong to the Japanese and their minions.

The film certainly loses points for obviously cloning Bruce Lee’s Fist of Fury, also released in 1972 and similarly based on a conflict between Japanese and Chinese martial arts schools. The strong anti-Japanese sentiment is no less shrill and strident here, and the style adopted for the fights is also largely similar, with one or other of our hero(in)es taking on a large group of rival students, before finally battling the big boss (or The Big Boss, if you prefer…).  Still, this is remarkable for the future output of those involved in the film. As well as being an early entry in the careers of Mao, Wong and Hung, there are minor roles for Billy Chan, Lam Ching-Ying (Mr. Vampire), Yuen Biao, Corey Yuen (director of Yes, Madam, She Shoots Straight and DOA: Dead or Alive) and Jackie Chan, who plays one of the Black Bear students.

But it’s mainly a showcase for the leads, and the action demonstrates why they’d all go on, to varying extents, and become stars in their own right. Mao is, obviously, of most interest here. After an early demonstration in Korea, which shows her as the smartest and sharpest of the trio, she largely takes a back seat in the middle, trying to keep the peace and practice that whole “forbearance” thing, before exploding into action again at the end. Particularly cool is the use of her weighted braids as a weapon, to whip her opponent about the face – you never saw Bruce Lee do that! And this is probably what defines the film. When it’s trying to be no more than a Lee-mitator, it comes off as second best, for obvious reasons. However, when the creators go their own way, it’s inventive and much more entertaining as a result. Shame the ratio isn’t tilted more heavily towards the latter.

Dir: Huang Feng
Star: Angela Mao, Carter Wong, Sammo Hung, Bai Ying
a.k.a. Lady Kung Fu

Lady Punisher

  By

★★
“Lan, our relation is abnormal.”

lady punisherThis obscurist Hong Kong revenge flick is a little different, mainly because the couple at the heart of the film are lesbians. Admittedly, this is largely for crass, exploitative purposes: the dialogue quoted above, pretty much confirms the makers want to tut-tut disapprovingly at the love that dare not speak its name, while simultaneously depicting it in salacious detail. Such is the nature of Cat III in the mid-90’s, this seems to want to be something like Naked Killer, released two years earlier to this in 1992, but just doesn’t have the desire to go for the full delirious insanity, necessary to pull the concept off. Particularly in the middle section, it drags horribly, with the story diverting off into the usual triad drug-smuggling, betrayal and cop investigations that we’ve seen a million times before.

Quite what our heroine (Yi – some sources call the actress Tsui Man Wah, who may or may not be the same person!) is doing during this time isn’t clear. She initially seems all gung-ho for it, after her girlfriend is raped and murdered during a holiday in Thailand, and even takes out a pimp, whom she sees smacking around one of his employees. But then, she seems to forget all about her vengeance, until one of the perps comes strolling into the dress shop she runs – looking to make a bulk purchase, bizarrely. She lures him back to her apartment with the promise of dressmaking tips or something (okay, it’s more the something), and kills him. To help with the rest of the gang, she enlists the services of a female neighbour, who has been courting her with flowers, creepy phone messages and generally behaving more like a problem than a solution. But, whatever. This is a Cat III movie, and people exercising common sense is not something to expect. Especially where lesbians are concerned.

Down the stretch, this does finally manage to generate some energy, with a final confrontation which is not unimpressive. However, it’s definitely a case of too little, too late, and this is one of those “forgotten films,” where you can understand exactly why it ended up on the discard pile. I’m in agreement with history on this one.

Dir: Tony Liu
Star: Sophia Yi, Tommy Wong, Gong Hiu-Hung, Shing Fui-On

Fire Dragon

  By

★★★
“Giant Fireballs, Volume 2.”

firedragonPrince Six (Tan) is plotting rebellion against the legitimate government, but Ming (Chu) has obtained a piece of compromising evidence from a dying Imperial guard. Before he can deliver it, the seal proving his identity is lifted by Tang Lyn-Yu (Ng), who runs a circus troupe, but has set her amorous eyes on Mind. He returns to the troupe, to try and locate the seal, but also there, undercover, is Fire Devil (Lin), who has been tasked by Six with locating and destroying the evidence of his treachery. However, after her involvement in a battle which leaves a young child orphaned, along with her beginning to fall for Ming, she begins to question whether she is on the right side of the fight. It doesn’t count as much of a spoiler to say that it ends with Fire Devil taking on Six, in a finale which involves so many things blowing up, you’d be forgiven for thinking the title of the film was as given at the top.

As usual, the fight scenes show why Yuen Woo-Ping is the greatest action director in modern cinema. Unfortunately, the bits between the fight scenes, also show why he is not the greatest director in modern cinema; it’s as if all the invention and imagination went into the wire-fu. Yuen appears content for the rest to be told with a series of bland characters (Chu is entirely forgettable, and shows the range of a wardrobe), desperately unfunny stabs at comedic mugging (courtesy of the Empress of Comedic Mugging, Ng, who has basically made her entire career out of that sort of thing), and broad cliché (Taotao the orphan, who could only be more obviously designed to be Adorable with a capital A, if he was carrying a box of sneezing baby pandas). The results are never less than unsubtle, and rarely pass as adequate.

It’s up to Lin to carry the emotional heart of the film, and she does well enough. At one point, Six tells her he doesn’t want her to be a dog, obeying him without question, he wants a hawk, soaring free. I guess he gets his wish: however, considering how that turns out (reminder: a large number of giant fireballs), it probably wasn’t the wisest of similes for him to choose. More exploration of their relationship, e.g. how did she come to work for him, would have been preferred over the less successful element that may well have you reaching for the fast-forward button.

Dir: Yuen Woo-ping
Star: Joe Chu, Brigitte Lin, Sandra Ng, Tan Lap-Man

Kick Ass Girls

  By

★★★
“Girls just wanna have… Boxing gyms?”

kickassgirls2Boo (Chow) owns a failing boxing gym, and largely survives only by catering to masochistic geeks, with fantasies of being beaten up by Lara Croft, etc. To try and recoup customers driven away by her abrasive style, she hires the bubbly Miu (Lo), as a replacement for childhood friend TT (Yu), with whom she broke up after a spat over a man. Just as Miu brokers a reconciliation, the trio get an unexpected job offer, to work in Indonesia as bodyguards for the mysterious Lady Zhuge (Tong). Except, they eventually discover, this was just a lure to bring them in as fresh meat for her all-female fight club, where they must battle to the death.

The intriguingly-named director is making her feature debut, having been an actress and screenwriter, after getting her start as a teenage DJ on Hong Kong radio. It’s certainly unusual to see this kind of film directed by a woman, but it seems to work, particularly in regard to the characters, who are rather more well-rounded than usual for the genre. GC also plays Zhuge’s Goth personal assistant, who may be the most endearing of the lot, and she nails the cliches of that group impeccably. The film can be divided into three sections. The first is mostly comedic; the second, after the women go to Indonesia, is the least successful, and appears to have strayed in from a chick flick; however, the third includes the bulk of the action, and is a satisfactorily crunchy finale.

There isn’t much of a character arc for anyone, and the interview used as a framing device is a mis-step, since it destroys any sense of suspense, over who will survive and what will be left of them. But I sense that suspense isn’t particularly what this is about; it’s rather concerned with light comedy, moderate martial arts, and lead actresses who generally look good doing whatever it is they’re doing. As such, even if these are undeniably low-hanging fruit, it succeeds admirably, and I’ll admit, I laughed more than I expected, especially in the early going. If this falls uncomfortably between about three different genres, and isn’t great at any of them, by no means is it horrible at them either, and I was more than adequately entertained.

Dir: Goo-Bi GC
Star: Chrissie Chow, Dada Lo, Hidy Yu, Chris Tong


Bonus: Behind the scenes footage

The Mini-skirt Gang

  By

★½
“So glad to have missed the seventies.”

miniskirtDear god, this is awful. The only reason this 1974 film manages the dizzy heights of 1 1/2 stars, is the finale, which is actually a pretty decent burst of comedy action, highlighted by the heroine receiving inspiration from a poster advertising a Peking Opera production of the Mulan legend. Up until then, it’s a rancid piece of film-making, wasting the talents of those involved. Well, the actresses anyway, since Lui Kei provides no evidence, in either his direction or script, that there was any talent present to begin with.

The gang in question are five female pickpockets, led by Ra Liao Liu (Danish actress Tove, whose presence in Hong Kong at the head of these thieves is never explained). When engaged on a job, they cross swords with a pair of bumbling male pickpockets, and inexplicably decide to join forces, even though the men are incompetent perverts. Cue the kind of behavior which would get you arrested these days, played by the movie in attempts at comedy which fall utterly flat. Man, if this is really what the decade was like, it must have been hell to be a woman. The rest of the film is filled with similarly “amusing” high-jinks, along with other scenes which serve little or no dramatic purpose, like the one where the good heart of Ra gets her deceived by a pair of con women, or an extended sequence where the whole gang pretend to be hookers. Oh, hold my aching sides, for I fear they may split.

Eventually, what passes for a meaningful plot finally shows up, as the gang rescue a woman from being forced into prostitution. Of course, the morality on view is a bit dubious, when their rescuee is then made pregnant by one of the men, who refuses to ‘fess up until he is made to believe he had sex with a leper. Yes, the laughs just never stop start in this Shaw Brothers production. Subsequently, her pimps come after them, and that’s what leads to the inadequate redemption of the big final battle, as well as an ending which offers no resolution, consisting entirely of the gang yelling out “We are the weird and crazy thieves!” Maybe that line lost something in translation from Chinese.

I thought my loathing might be strictly personal, but the first review I found called it, “The worst Shaw Brothers film I’ve ever seen, and I’ve seen over 200 of them.” So, not just me, then. Any screen presence Tove and her co-heroines possess, is almost entirely countered by the crude and largely incompetent approach, resulting in a mix of comedy and sexploitation that is neither funny nor sexy. Maybe times have changed, but if this ever seemed other than creepy, change can only be a good thing.

Dir: Lui Kei
Star: Birte Tove, Chen Ping, Nancy Leung, Lee Fung-Laan

Her Vengeance

  By

★★★
“Revenge, with extra sleaze.”

hervengeanceDirector Lam is responsible for insane cult classic, The Story of Ricky, and if this is more restrained, it’s only by comparison. Casino manager Chieh Ying (Wong) is gang-raped by five sleazebags – and, wouldn’t you know it, they’re the same guys who killed her father. Worse is to come, as a trip to the doctor reveals a rather nasty case of venereal disease, and after some melancholic wandering around which occupies the rest of the first half (and, to be frank, is rather boring), our heroine gets tore into the villains, extracting the titular payback. Though you know the old saying, “She who seeks vengeance, must first dig two graves”? That’s a severe understatement here, because this roaring rampage will end needing an entire cemetery, costing Chieh Ying almost everybody she cares about, from her uncle, a wheelchair bound kung-fu wizard (Lam, best known for the Mr. Vampire series), to her wannabe boyfriend (Wong).

Once things kick off, this is impressive, and it’s clear that Lam does not give a damn about any kind of political correctness. The performances are (surprisingly?) decent, with Wong suitably angsty, and the villains entirely hissable, though their apparent inability to recognize her certainly defies explanation – I’ve never raped anyone, but if I did, think I would likely remember what they looked like. Lam is his usual great self, demonstrating some amazing moves as a crippled master, at one point whipping one of the wheels off his chair, and hurling it at an assailant. The main problem is poor pacing, to such an extent that it feels almost like two separate films, spliced together – and as we’ll see, that is indeed the case in some ways. The film gets credit for not hanging around, and gets the rape out of the way with admirable speed. However, things then grind to a halt for a good 30 minutes, Chieh Ying moping around from Macao to Hong Kong and back again, before eventually getting a job in her uncle’s bar. Your attention may drift away considerably during this spell.

Fortunately, things recover significantly when she starts taking out the trash, with a wicked combination of blades, acid and curtains constructed of fish hooks (!). And that’s not mentioning the F-sized crossbow she and her uncle construct: the poster isn’t quite accurate in the details, but does give you an idea. There’s a wonderfully bleak approach here: while Chieh Ying may get the retribution she has been craving, does it really help? Is she any happier as a result? I sincerely doubt it. If damaged by its unevenness, this remains a good example of “they don’t make ’em like this any more,” as far as Hong Kong cinema is concerned.

Dir: Ngai Kai Lam
Star: Pauline Wong, Ching-Ying Lam, Elaine Jin, Kelvin Wong

Note: there have been a couple of versions of this officially released: one with all the sex and violence, and another where that was cut, but containing other scenes that actually resulted in a longer running-time, by several minutes. Some enterprising individual took it upon themselves to splice the two together, and that’s the version reviewed here.