Tag: kung-fu

Broken Oath

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★★★★
“Lady Snowblood, Hong Kong edition”

I guess, the old saying “just there for Godzilla” definitely applies to me. This movie is far from perfect, but as long as I see some skilled fighters in fancy costumes battling it out, I’m in. Additional points are given if the respective dub is at least tolerable. Broken Oath is actually an interesting movie. It is kind of a remake of Japanese classic Lady Snowblood with Meiko Kaji from 1973. The difference is that this Golden Harvest production, from producer Raymond Chow, stars Angela Mao.

She was probably the biggest female martial arts star at the time in Asian movies and had the status of a female Bruce Lee. She had starred with Lee in Enter the Dragon and one-time James Bond George Lazenby in two other movies, and also worked with classic directors like Chang Cheh and King Hu. Some of her famous films include Lady Whirlwind, When Taekwondo Strikes, Hapkido, The Fate of Lee Khan and many others. In the seventies. she could hardly walk down a street without being instantly recognized.

Broken Oath was to be her last movie for Golden Harvest which is quite inexplicable because she was a major star – did they let her go or was that her own decision? After that, she began working in Taiwanese movies with obviously lesser budgets. She lasted in movies for quite some time until the early 90s when she retired from film business. In a way it’s a pity that her golden era more or less ended in the 1970s, considering the success stars such as Michelle Yeoh, Jackie Chan, Jet Li or Donnie Yen would later enjoy – and continue to do so – in the West.

Broken Oath follows the story beats of Lady Snowblood quite closely – until it slowly becomes its own thing. It’s comparable to how Temptress of a Thousand Faces freely emulated the French Fantomas movies of the sixties. Like the Japanese original, it starts with a woman sent to prison where she gives birth to a child. On her death-bed she reveals her story of how her husband, General Liu, was killed by a gang of hoodlums; after resisting a rape attempt by one of them, she was sent to prison because the police didn’t believe her. 

She gives birth to a girl and asks her “sisters” (inmates) to take care of the child, and to raise it to take revenge for the death of her parents. Instead, one of them, subsequently referred to as the girl’s godmother, gives her to a Buddhist nunnery with the blessings of the abbess who doesn’t think that the cycle of violence should continue. In the English dub, the little girl is called “Lotus”; the subtitles call her Jie Lian, though her original name was Xiao Mei. In any case, she has violent tendencies, though for some unspecified reason these Buddhist scholars are constantly fighting when not listening to the wisdom of Buddha. Lotus ends up killing three drifters in the wood when they try to rape her.

As she has “broken her oath” (to Buddha, I guess), she has to leave the nunnery and goes to live with her godmother, from whom she learns how to become a pickpocket and gets to know her friend and colleague Ah Shu. From there on, the movie loses connection to the original movie which I see as a good thing. Jie Lian finds the murderers, though the plot is essentially hardly more than the bones of a story, rather than a fully fleshed-out narrative. It unnecessarily complicates itself with the introduction of new characters and side-stories, but in the end the overall simplicity is indeed for the better of the movie.

For some time, I wondered if this movie was really worth my attention: I just wanted to see Angela Mao show me how hard and high she could kick. Fortunately, the film didn’t let me down. But it has to be said, it needed more than half of the movie until the whole martial arts machinery kicked – as it were! – into high gear. After being saved by an old, wise man named Qi Feng from the poisonous dust of one opponent. and his subsequent death at the hands of uber-villain Zhao Cai (both took part in the raid on Jie Lian’s parents, with Qi Feng now getting redemption by saving Lotus), things escalated quite quickly.

I have to say, I personally still prefer the melancholic elegiac beauty of Lady Snowblood and Meiko Kaji’s unmistakable charisma (I’m aware that Jim gave that movie a low rating, but for me that Japanese chanbara movie is an absolute high-ranking classic. To each their own, as they say), but the sheer number of ideas that this movie here bombards you with is remarkable. Let’s see… Steel claws as weapons; a liquid, one villain uses to spit fire and burn his victims to death; blades on a string used like a yo-yo. by an opponent played by Sammo Hung; a hat that goes over the whole head of Master Yun (later revealed to be Zhao Cai); sword fights; butterfly needles; group attacks, attack scorpions; and secret passages through stone caves hidden behind book shelves.

Really, the last 30-40 minutes of this go like gangbusters! I only wish the first half of the movie would have been like that, too. Granted, a story needs time to be built up, but let’s be honest: there is not much of a story here. Just the outspoken will for revenge, and that only happens after the godmother tells Lotus about her past. It is revealed at the end that the villains had planned to overthrow the government 20 years ago; General Liu discovered their treachery and was therefore killed. Better a good reason late than never, I guess. These things can’t quite disguise some carelessness in the story-development.

For example, Ah Shu seemed to be built up as a love interest. But he is killed off in a way, as well as the heroine’s reaction to it, which is so casual I wondered why he was even in the story. There is another character supposedly killed – silly me, believing that – who is suddenly back there to support the combatants in their fight again. The whole “she is poisoned and has to be cured” episode feels like a pointless story element, with no good reason except for extending the movie’s run time (admittedly I saw the theatrical version at 98 minutes; there is an extended version around 5 minutes longer), and giving Mao the chance to lay down and take a short break.

The actors here… well, they are Chinese actors in seventies wuxia and act accordingly. One shouldn’t expect Oscar-worthy performances here. The evil villains are evil and the rest of the actors hardly make much of an impression. Angela Mao is adequate as expected, though of course I’m more interested in her fighting skills than her acting talents. She moves elegantly and swiftly and I do believe she can fight off and kill more than half a dozen men, attacking her all at once. She is great “hero material”, and I applaud every action of hers. But I can hardly detect any burning pain underneath, or an insatiably hot appetite for revenge. Comparing that with the painful, tragic, almost longing for death portrayal of Kaji might be unjust. But it is also inevitable.

Of course, the dubbing doesn’t help. Yes, one should see movies like this in the original language version with subtitles, but I prefer a dub when I can get one. I don’t know from when this one comes (possibly the movie’s release in 1977), but the performances aren’t Anthony Hopkins and Jodie Foster acting, to say the least. I’m just happy to get lip-synched dialogue. It mostly plays inside buildings, temples or halls, giving the impression this is first and foremost a studio production. There are only a few scenes on location, though these are nice to look at. While I don’t rank the movie lower for it, I liked the beautiful, natural surroundings of Lady Snowblood much more. It’s just a matter of taste.

That said, as a whole I liked the production design, which makes you feel that the movie’s budget went into it, along with the historical Chinese costumes and some effects. It’s in contrast to Mao’s later Taiwanese films, where I can confirm she was working on a notably lower quality standard. This movie definitely has its qualities. As an old saying (incorrectly attributed to Oscar Wilde) goes: “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery”. This might be true not only for Lady Snowblood, which Quentin Tarantino paid tribute to in Kill Bill – Vol. 1,  but also for Broken Oath, as the fight between Sammo Hung and Angela Mao is definitely mirrored in the one between Chiaki Kuriyama and Uma Thurman.

Dir: Chang-hwa Jeong
Star: Angela Mao, Michael Wai-Man Chan, Siu-Lung Leung, Shan Kwan

Terminal Angels

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★★½
“Justice is more than a match for evil!”

This is not our first time here attending the Godfrey Ho rodeo. Indeed we wrote quite warmly about Lethal Panther., and Cynthia Rothrock vehicle Undefeatable had its moments. But this is our first experience on this side of the heady, WTF? to be obtained when Ho does what he’s best known for doing. Which is, splicing entirely new footage into an unrelated movie, to fit whatever marketing end he’s aiming towards. He was most notorious for this during the ninja film craze of the eighties, when he used this tactic to splice a couple of scenes into either cheap or unfinished movies from the far East, so they could be sold to the ninja-crazy VHS audience.

However, as this example shows, he wasn’t above taking basically the same approach for the then popular girls-with-guns genre out of Hong Kong. We’ve already covered many examples of these, such as Angel. Its success spawned any number of follow-up, both official sequels, and unofficial knock-offs with the word “angel” in the title, e.g. Angel Force or Angel Terminators 2. This would be one of the latter, which takes what appears to be a Thai action film of the same general kind – cops vs. drug dealers – and wraps around it footage about Paula (Bells), an American reporter who gets hold of photos incriminating a businessman as a drug lord. She has to survive, while back in Thailand, the police do battle with the drug runners.

You can tell, because the only points at which the original film overlaps with the new footage is during awkward phone conversations. I think I would far rather have watched a decent i.e. wide-screen print of the original movie, rather than this badly-dubbed hack job. Sadly, I’ve not been able to determine the original movie used, but we’ve seen our share of decent Thai girls-with-guns action. I won’t lie, I was amused here by the pirating of various New Wave songs from the Pet Shop Boys and The Art of Noise. This reaches its ludicrous peak during a disco scene where customers dance to A Flock of Seagulls song, Telecommunication. The footage is sped-up, like some of the action scenes – which is a shame, because the fights really do not need it.

It’s very equal opportunity too, with both sides having their share of women, giving and receiving damage. Indeed, the best fight sees two female cops brawl against four thugs sent to kidnap them. It escalates from fists to crossbow-fu, with a number of highly wince-inducing moments. But all too soon, you’re back in the crappy insert footage, which ends with the laughable line of dialogue quoted top. Though to be a hundred percent sure you get the point, this is followed up with, “Criminals aren’t able to escape the net of justice.” There’s likely a decent film buried somewhere in here. You just need a pick-axe and a wheelbarrow to find it.

Dir: Godfrey Ho
Star: Laura Bells, Richard Gibb, Brent Gilbert, Daniel Welk

Unleashing the Tiger, by Jerry Furnell

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Literary rating: ★½
Kick-butt quotient: ☆☆☆½

I don’t subscribe to the belief that authors need to be the same sex, race, religion or whatever as their characters. A good author can put you inside the head of their heroine, even if they’re a different species, an extra-terrestrial, or whatever. But there needs to be an authenticity of voice for it to work. This is where, for example, Quentin Tarantino fails for me: his characters almost always end up sounding like Quentin Tarantino. And I wrote that before noticing the blurb on Amazon actually says, “Jerry Furnell exudes a Quentin Tarantino vibe in his narrative.” That’s meant as an incentive; I’d have taken it as a warning.

For the problem here is similar, exacerbated by the adoption of a first-person narrative. The heroine is Camilla Lee, described as “an eighteen-year-old Kung Fu black belt”, of Chinese extraction, who lives in Australia. The author, however, is a British man in his sixties, and frankly, it shows. Camilla never comes off as anything except sounding like a fairly dubious fantasy of what a teenage girl is like. Not least because the instant Camilla turns eighteen, she immediately becomes a raging nympho. It’s borderline creepy. And indeed, one scene of sexual assault removes the word “borderline” from that sentence. I’m not sure if it’s intended to be repellent or arousing, and as a result ends up in a very odd place.

The story is okay, if familiar. Camilla’s parents are murdered in a home invasion, and she barely survives. She’s convinced this wasn’t a burglary gone wrong, and eventually discovers it’s connected to her father having betrayed his Triad employers back when he lived in Hong Kong. She heads back there – pausing only to give the passenger sitting next to her a hand-job, I kid you not – to confront Mr. Wu, the leader of the Seven Dragons gang and make him pay for his crimes. Oh, and she’s also getting bullied at school. She makes them pay too, in no uncertain fashion. Although only after Camilla has engaged in self-mutilation, and been prevented from committing suicide by the unexpected arrival of a friendly dog in the park.

To be fair, in the “From the author” section on Amazon, Furnell cheerfully admits, “The mix of sex and violence will appeal to some readers and appall others. Reviews suggest you will either love it or hate it.” He’s not wrong, and no prizes for guessing on what side of the fence I fall. Which is weird, because regular site visitors will know, I’m hardly averse to gratuitous sex and senseless violence. Here, the latter is fine, with some interesting fights as Camilla works her way through the Seven Dragons to meet her nemesis. But even here, she has to dress up as a prostitute to get into the building. And did I mention the lesbian sex? Though Furnell does lag Tarantino in one department. At least there’s no foot fetishism. 

Author: Jerry Furnell
Publisher: Self-published, available through Amazon, both as a paperback and an e-book
Book 1 of 3 in the Naked Assassin Series.

The Girl of Destiny

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★★★
“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

Lady With a Sword

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★★★
“Can’t argue with that title.”

This was originally titled after its heroine, but since that obviously wouldn’t work in the West, it was changed to become about as generic a title as you could get. Behind this is a decent little flick, which is also worthy of note, because it may be the first Shaw Brothers action film to be directed by a woman. Pao-Shu Kao had been an actress with the studio since 1958, but this ended up being her sole movie as director for Shaw, as she started her own company, Park Films, with her husband. But this, her debut, is the highest-rated on the IMDb of the eleven features she helmed, at a respectable 6.8.

The heroine is Feng Fei Fei (Ho), who gets distressing news when her nephew, Hu Tou (Meng) shows up. He narrowly escaped with his young life after he and his mother, Fei Fei’s sister, were set upon by brigands, with Mom being killed. Fei Fei isn’t having that, so immediately sets out to take revenge on those responsible. She tracks down the first one, but this is where things get awkward. Because it turns out he’s Chin Lien Pai (Nam), the scion of a family friend, and worse, is the person to whom Fei Fei has been betrothed since they were young. While it’s a bit vague on the details, I guess vengeance would bring dishonour to her relations. Or, at least, make subsequent family get-togethers more than a little uncomfortable.

The first half-hour of this is really good, likely peaking with a hellacious fight at a brothel, where Fei Fei takes on what appears to be the entire population of China. It’s also notable, because next door, Hu Tou is also fighting, and it’s quite impressive too. East Asian films, be they Chinese, Taiwanese or from Hong Kong tend to use kids as comic relief, and the results tend to be grating and irritating. Not so here, with Hu Tou taken seriously, and allowed to take part in battles that work because he uses quickness and agility, not strength. But it is mostly Ho’s film and she gets a slew of solid fights, including against her fiancé’s mother, defending her son.

Unfortunately, after the brothel brawl, the film does tend to become a bit chatty and, worse, spends too much time on Chin and the other bad guys. It may be an attempt by Kao to deepen the portrayal of the villains beyond the shallow. However, guess what? I don’t care. The original attack firmly cements them as murderous scum-bags who deserve to die, and nothing is going to change my mind on this, thank you very much. The only interesting section sees Chin’s parents sharply differ in reaction to their son’s crimes: Dad thinks it brings shame on the family, Mum (as noted above), not so much. Fortunately, the ending gets back to the fighting, though it’s disappointing how Fei Fei needs help. Entertaining enough, yet after how if began, it seems a lost opportunity. 

Dir: Pao-Shu Kao
Star: Lily Ho, Seok-hoon Nam, Hsieh Wang, Yuen-Man Meng
a.k.a. Feng Fei Fei

Lady Scorpions

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★★★
“Growing old gracefully”

Cynthia Rothrock is 67 years old. That is considerably older than I am, and I consider it a victory if I manage to get out of bed in under ten minutes. I am certainly not kicking and punching my way through a slew of bad guys, in moderately convincing fashion. While this certainly has its flaws, it’s hard not to be impressed, especially for anyone familiar with Rothrock’s long career in action movies. Personally, I’m just glad she has moved on from the “erotic thriller” period of her career. Sixty-seven is too old for some things. But there’s also a passing of the torch here, introducing us to a potentially promising action actress in Caitlin Dechelle.

She was Gal Gadot’s main stunt double in Wonder Woman, and also doubled for Betty Gilpin in The Hunt. While still a little rough around the acting edges, you could certainly say the same about Rothrock’s early work, such as Yes, Madam. Here, she plays martial arts teacher Lacy Moore, who is estranged from her workaholic mother Alena (Rothrock). For several decades, Alena has been chasing after drug kingpin Lucien (Fahey), to no avail. He’s now ready to pass on the crown to his loose cannon offspring, Sonny (Manuel), After Alena interferes with Sonny’s activities, he decides to sideline her by kidnapping Lacy’s daughter, Ariel. Very poor judgment on his part I’d say. I suspect I need hardly bother outlining the rest of the film.

Though just in case there is someone who has never seen a film in this genre: Lacy reunites with Alena, and they team up to go after Sonny and rescue their mutual descendant. This involves them working their way through minor henchmen, until they extract Ariel’s location. There’s a rescue attempt, the duo get captured, we learn why Alena is so obsessed, they escape thanks to the help of a bad guy with a conscience, and the expected large fight ensues. There’s not much new here, and what there is, tends to be irritating. Del Castillo worked as a grip on a number of Tarantino films and it seems to have rubbed off, in the shape of inappropriate needle drops and villains who love the sound of their own voice.

In between the rolling of eyes these provoked, however, this has its moments. While it’s clear Rothrock won’t be scorpion kicking anyone, she has a grace and fluidity that’s inspiring. Or, would be, if only I could get up off this damn couch. Wisely, it’s left to Dechelle to do the heavy lifting in the action scenes, and she delivers, especially in a fight against fellow stuntwoman Mamyi Ithou, which I wanted to see go longer. I’ll admit to being a bit disappointed in the ending, since this goes from sixty to zero – more specifically, sixty to a “Six months later” caption – far too quickly. But it remains the best Rothrock vehicle I’ve seen in a while. If this is the way she chooses to go out, I’m fine with it.

Dir: Bruce Del Castillo
Star: Cynthia Rothrock, Caitlin Dechelle, Jeff Fahey, Jose Manuel

Operation Kick-ass

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★★★½
“Just don’t ask what’s going on.”

This ended up turning into an Internet investigation. The title above is the one by which it appeared on Tubi. But it’s clearly pasted onto the opening credits, and I ended up having to go through the IMDb credits for the one identifiable actress to find it there – where it appears under another title, with some promo materials giving it a third name. The end credits are entirely in Chinese, and provide absolutely no information as to who is playing who. So that also had to be pieced together. But least helpful of all, were subtitles that may be generated by a drunk AI, operated by a seven-year-old

Seriously, I’ve only the vaguest idea of what’s going on. Do not take what follows as more than my best guess, and it may be wrong in any number of ways. It seems to be a battle between two groups: the good guys (and gals) of GWS, under Uncle Liao (Zhang), versus the bad guys (and gal) of Alpha, run by cartoon villain Davis, who frequently sounds like he is being dubbed by Borat. Are these two factions industrial organizations? Agencies of rival governments? Criminal gangs? No idea. They’re clearly both very well-funded, and are fighting over a computer program called “Blue Sword and Shield”, which can be used to blackmail the rich and powerful. Key to this is a programmer (Wei), whose loyalties are… flexible.

But it becomes personal for GWS’s top agent, Chen You (Li), after Alpha kill her friend and colleague, Merrill Lynch. Yes, that’s what those subtitles assure me is a character’s name. Maybe this was a not-so subtle form of product placement. More likely, it’s just another example of how this is a grab-bag of elements taken from elsewhere. Most obviously, in its basic structure of “three women with an older, male boss” is Charlie’s Angels, though this is considerably less fluffy. Put it this way: Uncle Liao will have some recruiting to do by the time the movie is over. But there is clear influence from old-school Hong Kong girls-with-guns movies as well, such as Naked Weapon, and also the John Wick franchise. 

At less than seventy minutes, it doesn’t have time to hang around, and the action is pretty decent as well. Although sometimes it is a little over-edited and CGI’d, it’s always stylishly shot and imaginative. The highlight is probably the knife fight between Chen and Davis’s lieutenant (Zina Blahusova), with the two women going at each other hard: by this point it’s very personal for Chen. I would like see more of both actresses. It’s just a shame the presentation, in both sub and dubbing, is so slipshod. Had it not been, this could well have been looking at a seal of approval. While I get these films are not intended for a Western audience, with a little more care, they could be; the quality elsewhere is there.

Dir: Liu Bayin
Star: Mengmeng Li, Shuangli Zhang, Wei Chen, Zhang Dong
a.k.a. Action team overlord flower or Secret Agent Dangerous Flowers.

Undefeatable

  By

★★★
“Keep an eye out for you, Stingray.”

The traditional rule of thumb is, Cynthia Rothrock’s Hong Kong movies are good, but her American ones are bad. The question is, what category should this one be placed? On the one hand, it’s a Hong Kong production. On the other, it’s filmed in America, with an American cast. On the third hand, it’s directed by notorious schlockmeister Ho, as “Godfrey Hall”. I’m painfully aware how much his work can vary in quality, though I’ll confess, I am generally adequately amused. The results here are a real grab-bad of the good, the bad and the laughable. Put it this way: Cynthia is probably close to the best actor. That’s not something you’ll hear often.

She plays former gang member Kristi Jones, now trying to go straight. But in order to put her sister through medical school, Kristi raises money by taking part in street fights, arranged through her former colleagues in the Red Dragons. Meanwhile, Paul (Niam), a.k.a. “Stingray”, another fighter on the underground circuit, goes mad after his wife leaves him. He begins kidnapping, torturing and killing any woman who resembled his departed spouse. Unfortunately, his victims include Kristi’s sister, and she’s not happy about it. With the help of police detective Nick DiMarco (Miller) and psychiatrist Dr. Jennifer Simmons (Jason), Kristi makes her way through various opponents who might be involved, before focusing on Paul, and the warehouse from which he operates.

This is all, quite obviously, total nonsense. It’s the kind of film where everyone is adept at martial arts – even Dr. Simmons throws a few punches when she gets a visit from Stingray. It’s also the kind of film where a police officer will let the sister of a murder victim tag along on his investigation, because reasons. One wonders how much direction Ho was actually giving the cast. In particular, Niam, whose entire performance seems to revolve around making veins pop in his forehead. There is one (1) decent scene, where Dr. Simmons tries to figure out Stingray’s traumas and issues (his Mommy was bad to him or someting), in order to use them against him and escape. It’s the only moment this rises above the utterly basic.

On the other hand, we’re not here for the psychology. We’re here for the ass-kicking, and the film has no shortage of this, with Ms. Rothrock in decent form, both with her fists and some weapons. There’s a nice – if entirely pointless – scene of her doing forms on the lawn outside her house. But it’s mostly reasonably well-staged hand-to-hand fights, and there’s no question Rothrock acquits herself well. The end fight is slightly disappointing, in that Kristi has been hurt in a previous encounter with Stingray, so has one arm in a sling, and needs help from DiMarco. However, there are not one but two groanworthy eighties action one-liners there: the one in the tag-line above is perhaps only second worst. I couldn’t call this good, yet was I not entertained? Yes. Yes, I was.

Dir: Godfrey Ho
Star: Cynthia Rothrock, John Miller, Don Niam, Donna Jason

Revenge of Lady Fighter

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★★★
“It’s not just Harlin and Anderson that work with their spouses.”

In various places, the title for this is “a Lady”or “the Lady” fighter: I’m going with what’s firmly stated on the opening credits of the print, ungrammatical as that may be. It’s a Filipino product, but unlike the New World Pictures of the early seventies, is an entirely domestic production. Though in many ways, it feels almost like a Taiwanese chop-socky flick, taking place in a rural village, beset by bandits. Into town strolls wandering martial arts master Ming (Ortega), who agrees to teach the locals his self-defense skills, albeit only following a stern warning about what will happen if they use them for revenge or gain.

While the bandits are defeated, naturally, not everyone listens. In particular, Nardo (Gonzalez) turns to the dark side, killing Ming and setting up his own, even worse, group of brigands: the Black Band. This leaves Rosa (Aristorenas, the director’s wife, and more or less the queen of local action in the seventies – credited typically as just “Virginia”) to level up her own skills – why, yes, there is a training montage, thank you for asking. This could hardly be more cliched if it tried, and even includes her sitting in the lotus position under a waterfall. With her talents suitably enhanced, she can now defend the town from the new threat, and reclaim the medallions which Ming handed out to the members of his one and only graduating class. Though she has repeatedly to be reminded not to kill her opponents: I guess Ming’s teachings weren’t quite as embedded as they could have been.

If you’re expecting this to end in a battle against Nardo, you won’t be disappointed. You may, however, be underwhelmed by the amazingly abrupt ending, which leaves the viewer uncertain as to the bad guy’s actual fate. It does also take rather too long to get to the point where the lady fights, never mind begins taking revenge. The first half is much more about Ming, and then Nardo, with Rosa sidelined. There’s an opening battle which actually occurs considerably later in the movie, and you’ve then got a good forty minutes before this even brushes against qualifying for the site.

Once it does, Mr. and Mrs. Aristorenas do a good job of making up for lost time. She has decent skills, and he knows how to film them, with long, unbroken shots and in a way which makes it clear Virginia isn’t being doubled. The only print that appears available, is dubbed into English with Greek subtitles; it’s not bad, with the English being locally-accented, and sounding like it was done by Filipino natives rather than Eton graduates, as was often the case for Hong Kong films. However, it’s also cropped to 4:3 ratio, and this definitely does hamper the impact at some points. It’s still a brisk, energetic affair, with unexpected elements such as both heroes and villains being residents of the same village.

Dir: Jun Aristorenas
Star: Virginia Aristorenas, Rolando Gonzales, Ernie Ortega, Teroy De Guzman
a.k.a. Buhawi

Lady Whirlwind Against the Rangers

  By

★★½
“Gal force winds.”

Not to be confused, in the slightest bit, with Lady Whirlwind (though both Tubi and the IMDb do, affixing posters from it to their entries for this movie), it is a straightforward slice of chop-socky – with all that entails, both good and bad. The plot is simple in comparison to some. Lin Jo-Nan (Shang-Kuan) is the daughter of a law official, who tries to stop the salt hijacking operations of notorious bandit, Chang Piao (Kurata). After he refuses to let the criminals go, he’s framed and arrested. Jo-Nan and her little brother, Shao Lung (Yeh), try to take revenge on the bandit, but end up getting their butts kicked, so another, more subtle plan is clearly required.

This involves both siblings dressing as the opposite sex, with Jo-Nan getting a job as assistant foreman of a salt company. She gets her boss. Ma Wen (Ma) to agree to take the fight to Chang Piao, and hijack a few of his salt shipments. That gets her promoted to chief foreman, and the disgruntled man she replaces is ripe for recruitment on to Chang’s side. The section thereafter is likely the weakest, as the movie drifts into broad comedy, after someone discovers Jo-Nan’s true gender, and falls for her. Of course, as is usual in these things, the heroine is hardly convincing as a man, and the plot basically relies on everyone accepting her preferred pronouns without question. Though she at least has a short haircut to help the illusion.

Eventually, the core plot shows up again, with Chang Piao putting into action a plan to kill Ma Wen with a booby-trapped sculpture. Can anything then stop him from taking over? Well, you will likely not be surprised by the answer to that particular question. Though, again, it takes a while for Jo-Nan to get back into the action, after a brisk start where it seems like every scene is another battle for her. The annoying kid also falls into the category of “Things I could probably have used less of”, right down to the inevitable urine-based humour. His kidnapping does kick off the final battle, with Jo-Nan riding to the rescue, and storming Chang’s villa, where she has the inevitable final fight against him.

The kung-fu on view here is generally fine. Polly has a no-nonsense style, which fits in nicely with the larger opponents she has to battle, and it’s also apparent she’s doing all (or close to all) of her own work. Disappointingly, she ends up needing help to dispose of the main bad guy, from an undercover policeman, and the ending falls rather flat, without her getting to batter Chang Piao into oblivion. As kung-fu revenge flicks go, the way this finishes falls into the kinder, gentler, “let the law punish him appropriately” category, and that’s disappointing. However, the biggest problem is the lack of Polly-action in the middle, and your attention should be forgiven if it drifts elsewhere.

Dir: Cheng Hou
Star: Polly Shang-Kuan, Yasuaki Kurata, Chi Ma, Hsiao-Yi Yeh