Tag: kung-fu

The Bod Squad

  By

★★★
“Several virgins short of a six-pack.”

7seasIn the 1970’s legendary Hong Kong studio Shaw Brothers sought to broaden their market with a series of co-productions. The results included the likes of Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires, from a partnership with Britain’s Hammer Studios, plus Cleopatra Jones and the Casino of Gold. But perhaps the most bizarre such product is this, which crosses martial arts with the softcore sex films from the time, the best-known of which is probably Hofbauer’s Schulmadchen Report (Schoolgirl Report). The results are… Well, I’d be hard-pushed to call them great cinema, but I would have to confess to being rather more entertained than I expected.

Contrary to one of the alternate titles, Enter the Seven Virgins, there are actually only five women here, and some of those aren’t exactly virgins. They are captured by pirates, and brought to their island lair, where buccaneer boss Chao (Hsieh) leers at them and puts them through a training course designed to get them ready to be sold into white slavery. Except, he doesn’t know that one of his minions, Ko Mei Me (Liu), is actually working, along with her brother, to take him down, and trains the captives in martial arts, as well as the ancient Chinese art of spitting olive pits at such high-velocity, they can punch a hole through a vase. After copious amounts of gratuitous nudity, the women eventually break free, get recaptured, escape again, and take on Chao and the rest of his henchmen in a battle which makes up for in duration, what it may lack in quality.

Actually, that’s a little unfair: considering the Western cast were more used to films with titles such as Campus Pussycats, they perform credibly enough. There’s not as much stunt doubling as I expected, and they’re clearly giving it all they have, occasionally impressively. Bray stands out in particular – and I mean that literally, since it seems she’s taller than most of the men in the cast. Liu, however, clearly has the most experience, and its understandable why she gets given most of the action. In some ways, this can be seen as a primitive ancestor of Category III films such as Naked Killer: while lacking quite the same lurid insanity, and featuring a degree of casual racism that’s fairly off-putting [apparently, the sight of Western flesh is enough to send most Chinese men into drooling imbeciles], it’s still fun for the undemandingly open-minded. Admittedly, a fondness for Benny Hill may help, and providing you can get past hearing Chinese people dubbed into German, as well as subtitles that may have lost their way a bit in translation. I’m still trying to figure out the meaning of, “It’s a bank holiday, it’s Mothers’ Day in Africa.”

Dir: Kuei Chih-Hung + Ernst Hofbauer
Star: Liu Hui-Ling, Wang Hsieh, Sonja Jeannine, Gillian Bray
a.k.a. Virgins of the Seven Seas
a.k.a. Enter the Seven Virgins
a.k.a. Karate, Küsse, blonde Katze [Karate, kisses, blonde cats]

Warrioress

  By

★★★
“Cecily, Warrior Princess”

warrioriessThis is one I’ve been aware of since as far back as 2010, but it seemed to have been lost in post-production hell, so I was surprised to see this had finally got a release, coming out on DVD in its home territory of the UK last May. It’s one of those films where you need to know, going in, that this is not a slick Hollywood blockbuster with massive production values, and instead is clearly a work of love for those involved, doing their best with limited resources. In fact, I can’t really do better in setting those expectations than another review, which said the film was, “Best described as ‘Xena filmed on a Doctor Who-circa-1980 budget by way of a Robin of Sherwood LARPing weekend'”. I can’t really improve much on that, though would perhaps add, “Set on Steampunk Sunday at your local Renaissance Festival.”

The story is triggered by a prophecy, which sees Boudiccu (Fey) first win custody of a pair of legendary weapons, then journey through a post-apocalyptic landscape, where humanity has largely reverted to tribal savagery. However, the crypto-fascist Falonex clan still appear to have a handle on some old-school technology and appear to be massing to establish their dominance. On the way to the prophesied location, where she will face another warrioress in a battle which will hopefully lead to a champion rising who can defeat the Falonex, Boudiccu is joined by White Arrow (Simpson), who is seeking revenge on those who killed her family. Or something. They have to fend off attacks, share flashback sequences and, eventually, have a twist revealed in their relationship that should come as absolutely no surprise to anyone paying attention.

What works? Simple: the action, led by Fay. She’s a tiny thing – 4’9″! – yet it’s entirely convincing, because the style of her fights don’t show her using strength and power to beat her opponents (which would be implausible), they instead emphasize skill, quickness and agility, which she has in spades. Credit, too, for Boyask, who consciously avoids the rapid-fire style of editing, knowing that the best thing he can do with a talent like Fay, is point the camera in her direction, then let her get on with it. [Sometimes, knowing not to do anything is more important than trying to do it] There’s a battle, not long after Boudiccu leaves her village, in which she takes on half-a-dozen other women, which is just glorious: it’s probably the best action heroine sequence ever to come out of the UK. But therein lies a problem, in that nothing during the hour thereafter is as great: good, sure, sometimes very good, but the final battle in particular feels like a letdown.

What doesn’t work? Sadly, way too much of the stuff between the fights, which feels like a slapdash grabbing of elements lifted from elsewhere, lobbed into a storyline which might just about have passed muster on a wet Sunday at my college D&D society. The efforts at generating any kind of broad, post-apocalyptic landscape are feeble, particularly the Falonex, who are represented by a ropey CGI backdrop and the interior of a single tent, which does not succeed in making them the kind of global threat they are supposed to be, especially since their scenes are play largely for laughs. But what’s really missing from the dialogue and performances, is any sense of intensity. They’re purely functional, intended to get the story from A to B (where A and B are almost certainly fight scenes). It’s clear from the action scenes, everyone involved had a passion for what they were doing there. Unfortunately, that passion is absent from everywhere else, and weakens the overall product to an extent that many will be unable to look past the flaws, and appreciate the positive attributes to be found here.

Dir: Ross Boyask
Star: Cecily Fay, Joelle Simpson, Christian Howard, Merrilees Fay Harris

Clash

  By

There used to be a review of Vietnamese movie Clash here, along with the movie’s trailer. However, in what can only be described as a bit of a dick move, Johnny Tri Nguyen, one of the film’s stars, submitted a takedown notice for the trailer. Yes, the trailer: footage specifically created and intended for promotional purposes. We emailed him politely asking how we could resolve this amicably. That was over a week ago. Not even the courtesy of a reply.

So, as a small protest at Nguyen’s high-handed and counter-productive actions, we’re pulling all reviews of films in which he appears from the site. I’m sorry to the rest of the cast and crew – particularly the action heroines whose presence is why the films were reviewed here to begin with. But if he’s going to behave this way, and act to shut down legitimate and reasonable coverage of his films. I’m happy to oblige.

Dir: Le Thanh Son
Star: Ngo Thanh Van, Johnny Tri Nguyen, Hoang Phuc, Lam Minh Thang
a.k.a. Bẫy Rồng

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

The Huntresses

  By

★★★
“Charlie’s Korean, Medieval Angels”

During the Joseon era in Korea, a trio of bounty hunters, Jin-Ok (Ha Ji-Won), Hong-Dan (Gang Ye-Won) and Ga-Bi (Son Ga-In), work with their agent, Moo-Myung (Ko Chang-Seok), capturing wanted bandits. But they get a different task, after a King’s envoy carrying an encoded message is the latest courier to go missing, and are charged with bringing him in. Needless to say, it’s not a simple task, and they find themselves facing a host of players opposed to the King receiving the message, which would threaten the fragile relationship with the Chinese emperor. But there’s also a personal angle, as Jin-Ok finds herself face-to-face with the man she remembers as having killed her father.

Huntresses-Poster-5Huntresses-Poster-1Huntresses-Poster-4

Early on, it becomes abundantly clear that this is not intended to be taken entirely seriously, probably from the time one of the heroines whips out her yo-yo, and takes out an entire platoon of enemies, Sukeban Deka style. Indeed, it’s probably the comedic elements that work best, such as the constable who follows him around, convinced his camo skills will stop him being seen – in a rarity for the humour often seen in Eastern films, it’s a joke which could have been used more, rather than being driven into the ground as normal. However, it feels that this lack of seriousness was taken by the makers as a reason to slap together the story, which lurches from set-piece to set-piece without any sense of logic or narrative flow – and don’t even get me started on the whole “dramatic amnesia” suffered by Jin-Ok.

It’s also fairly obvious the actresses aren’t doing very much of their own action, putting them behind Drew Barrymore et al, and in another galaxy, far, far away, from the participants in another cinematic cousin, The Heroic Trio. Ha probably comes off the best of the three, but there’s an awful lot of scenes which consist largely of close-ups of the actresses flailing wildly, intercut with wide shots from behind of someone competent. However, it still passes the time easily, particularly after all the parties involved end up in the port city of Byeokrando – or, at least, a convincing CGI imitation thereof. This allows plenty of scope for some impressive bits of combat, regardless of who’s actually doing them, as well as exploding pagodas, and other chunks of mass destruction. It also helps that the performances are solid from just about everyone concerned, which shores up the flimsy constructs of the storyline.  I’m informed that the Korean title translates as “Three Beautiful Musketeers of Joseon,” and that’s probably an accurate an overall summary as the preceding 400 words.

Dir: Park Je-Hyun
Star: Ha Ji-Won, Gang Ye-Won, Son Ga-In, Ko Chang-Seok

The Lady Assassin (2013)

  By

★★★½
“A new territory of action heroines opens?”

ladyassassinThe first Vietnamese action heroine film I’ve seen is a credible effort, albeit one that is weakened by a couple of obvious flaws. Firstly, the middle section spends far too much time sitting around chatting (particularly in the hot-tub, though to Western eyes, it’s a peculiarly PG hot-tub, with the clothes remaining on), and the occasional game of beach volleyball is about the only concession to action. Secondly, the actresses are much too spindly for the sword-swinging fights they are called on to do here; I’m guessing they are models, but someone really needs to buy them a good meal or two. However, the premise is solid and the central performances are fine. There’s also a rousing finale which lasts a solid 20 minutes, with a surprisingly high body-count, and it’s always best to save the best for last, so your audience leaves the movie with a good final impression. In this case, it certainly upped the grade by at least one-half star.

The main setting is a group of four women, led by Kieu Thi (Thanh Hang) who operate a tavern by the sea, that offers rest and sustenance to passing travellers, with a side menu of more salacious offerings, if you know what I mean, and I think you do. They also have a further sideline: robbing and murdering those they deem appropriate, particularly including corrupt officials. They’re in for a shock though, as the cargo being transported by their latest victims is a young woman, Linh Lan (Tang Thanh Ha) . Her life is spared by Kieu, who realizes that they share a common goal, her and Linh seeking vengeance on the evil general Quan Du, who murdered both of their families. He’s very difficult to get to, but Quan Du has a particular fondness for virgins – while this may rule the more “experienced” Kieu out, it leaves Linh as the perfect assassin, if only she can be trained in the necessary skills.  Time for some wire-fu powered beach volleyball – and the sequences here are better than Beach Spike, at least. But not everyone in and around the tavern is who they seem, and neither might they need to find Quan Du, if he comes to find them first…

The action is a bit of a mixed bag, and that’s putting it mildly. Even in the same sequence, it’ll combine poorly-done CGI and questionable wirework, with stunningly well-executed shots and long takes of acrobatic action. Perhaps it works better seen in 3D, as originally intended, or perhaps that aspect simply acts as a distraction [something we’ve seen often enough in Western 3D films]. But overall, the balance is positive, helped by Thanh’s undeniable screen presence. Outside of her and Tang, the rest of the cast are closer to eye-candy, and this might be one of those cases where more is less. However, for an apparent first stab at the sub-genre of historical action heroines, I’ve seen an awful lot worse, and I’ll have to see if I can find anything else from the local movie industry.

Dir: Quang Dung Nguyen
Star: Tang Thanh Ha, Thanh Hang, Kim Dzung, Anh Khoa

Minty: The Assassin

  By

★★
“Walking in a Minty wonderland…”

mintyWhen a film clearly doesn’t take itself seriously, and in particular, when it almost takes delight in acknowledging its own flaws, this does convey a certain immunity to criticism. “Yes, we know this is crap,” it seems to be saying. “So what?” But on the other hand, it’s hard to be a parody of comic-book fan-service, when you actually are comic-book fan-service. The heroine here is Minty (Madison), an assassin who works for a man known only as Big Boss (Parker, channeling the spirit of Michael Clarke Duncan). When he is kidnapped by Dr. Brain Bender (Joslin), an evil scientist – really, how could he be anything else with that name? – and his vampire sidekick, Double Delicious (Taylor), Minty, powered by chocolate, has to fight her way up through the levels of the Cock Tower [sic], defeating Bender’s other minions, up to where Boss is being held. While Bender can’t beat Minty himself, he transfers his mind into DD’s body, and there’s only one way for our heroine to prevail…

If you guessed the answer is “lesbian canoodling,” give yourself two points.

It’s very much a mixed bag here. Some moments fall entirely flat, and the film often isn’t as funny as it thinks it is. This is in part because most of the supporting characters don’t have the acting chops to pull off the satirical aspects, which is a lot harder than it looks. “Broad comic mugging” seems to be the main direction provided by Baldovino, and that rapidly becomes more tiresome than entertaining. However, there are some scenes which do work well. I particularly enjoyed Minty going up against a Bruce Lee look-alike (the fight here was nicely put together and edited), while there’s also an animated interlude featuring Minty being chased through a Prince of Persia-style level by a psychotic rabbit. This ends in an arterial way that feels like it comes out of a particularly twisted Tex Avery cartoon.

Unfortunately, the finale then gets itself bogged down in soft-core shenanigans with poor continuity e.g. in one shot, Delicious is topless, the next, she’s wearing butterfly-shaped pasties. [Look, you’re either willing to get undressed or you’re not. Have the courage of your convictions, and don’t change your mind mis-scene] Admittedly, it’s preceded by Dr. Bender explaining that the goal of all fanboys is to see the heroine naked, so this is simply delivering on that promise. But blatant foreshadowing doesn’t make it any more interesting or entertaining, and the movie doesn’t at all make it clear that Bender is actually a fanboy who has somehow come across into Minty’s comic-book world for nefarious purposes. Maybe there’s a director’s cut somewhere that explains all this. Instead, as seen here, it’s a probably over-ambitious and occasionally entertaining mess, not without its charms, yet some way short of being charming enough.

Dir: Eugene Baldovino
Star: Elina Madison, Chip Joslin, Tabitha Taylor, Anthony Ray Parker

Twins Mission

  By

★★½
“To bead, or not to bead, that is the question…”

Twins_Mission-posterTwins Effect, the first film starring the Cantopop duo, Twins, was a frothily entertaining mix of action and humour, that was surprisingly entertaining. Its sequel? Despite a stellar supporting cast, and some great action, not so much, with a historical setting, and a balance that tilted unfavourably towards comedy. This third entry does at least return to the modern era, and also continues some impressively slick fights – and more broken glass than any other movie I can immediately think of – but has a similarly lumpy attitude, feeling almost like two films spliced together.

The McGuffin is a Tibetan relic called the Heaven’s Bead, long alleged to have magical powers to cure illness – which is actually pretty damn big, since I was expecting something that could be measured in millimetres, rather than feet. On its way by train, a robbery attempted staged by an evil collective of twins (rather than Twins, if you see what I mean) leads to it ending up in a bag belonging to the owner of a store in a Hong Kong mall. Meanwhile, good twins Pearl (Chung) and Jade (Choi) are working as trapeze artists in the circus, but end up helping the guardian of the bead, Uncle Lucky (Hung) and his adopted son (Wu) to track down the artefact. But the evil twins also have their agent, Lillian, who is lured in with the promise of the bead’s power being use to cure her cancer-stricken little sister, the unfortunately-named Happy.

Yes, this doesn’t exactly take the high road in terms of pathos, milking child illness for every ounce of maudlin sentimentality it can muster, when not making xenophobic jokes about the funny way foreigners speak. There is also a fight over an autographed picture of David Copperfield [Jade + Pearl’s idol], which ends with it being eaten by a hippo. This apparently tells us two things about China: people still care about David Copperfield, and it may be the only place where circuses that use wild animals are still welcome. I’m not sure which is more surprising, but that’s the level of nonsense between the action that you will have to endure, and I’m not sure the plot makes any actual sense in terms of logic or motivation. Fortunately, the saving grace is said action, with one standout fight between the good twins and several sets of evil twins in the mall, and another at the end, in the evil twins’ lair. Both are long, inventive sequences on finding new and interesting ways to break plate glass, though both the wire-fu and the stunt doubling for the starlets are a bit excessive.

I originally gave this 2.5 stars, then upped it to three, when I realized that was what I gave Twins Effect II, and this surely wasn’t any worse, was it? But on further reflection, it probably was, and I downgraded it again: there’s about 20 good minutes in this, and even Sammo couldn’t save the rest.

Dir: Kong Tao-Hoi
Star: Charlene Choi, Gillian Chung, Wu Jing, Sammo Hung

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