Pink Encounter (Chu Yen-Ping)
After somewhat correctly teasing us with the title card that there will be lesbian action, it's all eventually as this story sets up the running theme of males (and females) losing their head whenever sex is on the top of the agenda. Bathtub salesman Niu Te-Hwa (Kau Ming-Woei) is paid a visit by a sexy woman (Rebecca Cheung) wanting to try out a tub before she commits to buying. Trying out means running the water, undressing and undressing some more. All while a goofy, sweaty salesman ponders if this is all too good to be true. Rebecca Cheung (who will also feature in our last story) gives a sexy performance, is certainly easy on the eyes but here's material that barely survives the short story format. It's literally just the basic plot synopsis, the sales pitch on screen and the story of the weak male mind isn't news to anyone.

House For Rent (Shieh Wen-Cheung)
A down on their luck couple moves into a house where the rich landlady and landlord aren't exactly living in bliss either. When not at home, he indulges in sex with prostitutes while her frustration (sexual of course) build up. The poor couple has to resort to donating blood and we meet them at a crossroads in their life where this seems to have gone on to the point where there's only survival in the air, not attraction. These scarred characters come together sexually but the name of the game is cheating. Clearly made so that the excuse is to feature nudity, despite that Shieh Wen-Cheung directs solid dramatic material. While somewhat corny and silly beats are on display, the final resolution is actually a work of admirable subtlety but of course it's nothing that will rival any solid dramatic FEATURE director.

Lady In Heat (Chu Yen-Ping)
While no English title card is ever shown, presumably this the longest part of the film is also the main attraction so the title applies. Making his own at times hyper stylized version of Basic Instinct, Chu Yen-Ping shows during a stormy night a sex session involving handcuffs and candle wax ending with the bloody murder of a wealthy businessman. Cop Chia Mei (Nomoto Miho - Sex Medusa) handles the case and suspects becomes the housekeeper (Li Bo) and the the lover of the businessman, Young Liu (Rebecca Cheung). Chia Mei is more drawn to Young Liu (sexually of course) and despite the ongoing murder investigation, lust takes over...

Everything has to happen quickly in these stories so there's little room for new interpretation of the material. Chu Yen-Ping is here to showcase the two women and does so in a manner that is pretty much inappropriate (in terms of what is logical for the movie). Sex-scenes feature wind machines making the leads hair blow in a supposed sexy way while they're indoors, Taiwan is apparently suffering from intense lighting storms at night whenever there's sexual encounters and a silly love montage strays way away from the sleazy, steamy mood of the short. Then again it's well sold, clearly manufactured by a male director (the lesbian night club-scene is a testament to this and on the soundtrack we get quite a selection of filthy songs too) and Chu's selection of females are attractive, alone or together.

It's all not very believable, involving or exciting once the twists have been flashed before us but combine all that with some truly, ultra-genuine WTF-moments created late in the tale, we're at least genuinely amazed by the mad mind of Chu's that take matters (seemingly anyway) into supernatural, symbolic directions. The reaction should be "Huh?" and the project that is Lady In Heat will and should be shrugged off. There's positive and suitable filmmaking available as this is a good ol' exploitation-venture but signs late in the last story confirms that the idea of not being dull should've been put forth earlier in the production.

The Trilogy Of Lust movies actually are Julie Lee's babies, as she acts as producer, writer and art director plus in front of the camera she goes all out as well. Or rather as far as the Hong Kong censors would let her and I was not thoroughly shocked to find out that the original cut contained hardcore sex scenes. Any chance of an uncut edit turning up in Hong Kong is slim to none but the first installment, also one that had hardcore elements, reportedly turned up uncut in Germany at one time. Go on your hunt boys!

Not that the direction, storytelling or the social commentary is particularly polished but the copious amounts of kinky sex, the originality behind some of the murders (one involving staples in particularly wonderfully out there), makes Trilogy of Lust II passable Hong Kong thrash. For those, like me, with that sick frame of mind, the movie can actually be darkly funny at times also. Elvis Tsui appears briefly at the beginning as one of the unlucky ones in this picture.

It's a very talky piece with quite an overabundance of characters, making The Dragon Family a generic borefest so the interruption of action should really redeem this downtime, right? No. While stunts are generally good (one fire stunt is quite admirably performed by actress Chiao Chiao), the gunplay is disturbingly stale and poorly staged for something that has Lau Kar Leung's name on it. One suspect he was only there for the final reel when things really take off or rather concentrated only on the final reel.

That finale, although too short, sees Lau mixing gunplay, stunts and even weapons action, much of it involving actors Andy Lau, Alan Tam and Max Mok, to a truly exhilarating effect. It's further proof of Lau Kar Leung's excellent transition from traditional martial arts to modern day action. The Dragon Family is short enough to easily get to the final reel but you'll probably return to that many times rather than sit through the feature.

From Joseph Lai and Tomas Tang comes a real movie? Yep, no insertions of bad gwailo actors or ninjas (that they did much later with The Magnificent), this is way early where the duo stood together and produced movies in the old school vein instead. The Magnificent is aided by a wise combo to have its serious plot basically be the framework for a pretty constant assault of kung-fu. No extensive talking or filmmaking thinking it's better than it is, because of it director Chan Siu-Pang comes off as an actual genre filmmaker. Especially so when the basic but intriguing ideas of a Ching Dynasty princess (the kickass Doris Lung) siding with Carter Wong's Yao's are brought forth without feeling the need to put the narrative drive in a tub of glue. Betrayal, power struggles and training scenes featuring vital pressure point-mastering, you all know where that is heading... fast. Casanova Wong lights up the screen with kicking every single time he's called into action and while uneven, the rest of the choreography done by leads such as Carter Wong and Chen Sing excites to a decent degree. Well-rounded isn't a very common verdict to slap on an independent martial arts movie but The Magnificent deserves that and a pat on the back.

Also with some returning cast members from Righting Wrongs that includes Roy Chiao (in a turn echoing his future award winning performance in Summer Snow), Wu Ma and Melvin Wong. Elizabeth Lee, Mang Hoi, Chin Siu Ho, Billy Chow, Jeff Falcon, Chung Fat and Ronny Yu (as the villain!) appears as well.

With Yam prancing about his apartment surrounded by high-tech camera setups, mannequins, all while acting up a storm, it's definitely a rape-fantasy movie with equally humorous and disturbing touches blended together. There's nothing really inappropriately light on display. It's just giggle-inducing to see Yam go for it. As a tale, the film addresses real issues of fan devotion but that doesn't get in the way of a fair amount of grim behaviour from director Hon Wai Daat's chair. Including Yam posing as Yvonne's boyfriend at a costume party, practically making love while dancing and a highlight reel, grim murder during the finale. Capping it all off with the memorable subtitle: "You shot my dicky! You are that cruel!" and Crazy Love For You cements its status as a suitable mixture for its exploitation audience.

Step right up, ladies and gentlemen! We've got rape, we've got gore and we've got obnoxious misplaced comedy. Iiiiitt's Ivan Lai's Daughter Of Darkness, obviously rated Cat III if anyone was ever doubting. Have I got your attention now, readers? This version, if my understanding is correct, reinstates a fair amount of footage, previously unavailable on dvd, into the cut Hong Kong censors felt satisfied with.

Captain Lui (Anthony Wong) finally gets a case in the small village where he's stationed. It's a crime involving the brutal slaughter of a family and with his new assistant (Money Lo from Red To Kill), they begin to untangle what led up to this grisly act of violence. Their investigations leads them to questioning Fong (Lily Chung, also in Red To Kill), the only surviving member of the dead family. She claims she has an alibi but when her boyfriend Kin (Ng Do Yung from Jiang Hu - "The Triad Zone") is arrested, suspected of the killing, Fong finally admits and sits down to reveal the true story...

In many respects, Daughter Of Darkness II is a straight remake of this first installment, even down to the execution of certain shots. This fact means that the reviews for the films will bear the same traits and quality wise, the films are pretty equal. Again, Ivan Lai has done a film for the male audiences primarily (with features such as softcore sex, silly comedy and gore) but I have to give him credit again for managing to inject a nice dark atmosphere into the piece where needed. The opening frames clearly showcases that with it's stillness and the effective reveal of the prison cell. Cut to....Anthony Wong's cop character goofing around! As usual, mixing the dark and comedic elements doesn't really work but it was apparently a staple of Cat III cinema that didn't need fixing. Only Billy Tang's Run And Kill managed to be genuinely funny, in a very dark sense.

The fact that we have Anthony in a main role does help in the pacing department somewhat. He has fun and projects that with his energetic performance. It's all rather tasteless humour overall but at least there was 3 laughs on record in Daughter Of Darkness. Compare that to the sequel that only had one! I did like that Wong's character, while being very outrageous, seems to know what he's doing and has good instincts about solving crime. His methods may be unconventional at first glance, immoral even (he fondles a corpse to determine how long ago she died!), but in the end he has made several important steps forward in the investigation via his way. It has to be said though, despite Wong's starpower and sense of fun, the trip towards the real meat of the story is a long one. Dialogue is tiresome even with this simple plot and the funniest bits comes only physically from Wong. When talking, most of the time, he is as boring as anyone else on screen. Finally around the 40 minute mark, the push in on Lily Chung's face leads us into the flashback scenes of Daughter Of Darkness. The scenes telling the story we've been waiting quite impatiently for. The story with rapes, erotic scenes, melodrama and gore.

Here we can begin talking about actors performances and I think Ivan had a spot on instinct when casting Lily Chung. Oh no, she's not a particularly great actress and can't rival the fierceness of Cheng Yim Lai in the sequel but her sweet, innocent look really compliments the bullied character of Fong. A girl with dreams about to come true with the help of boyfriend Kin but shattered at the hands of the bullying family of hers, for a reason totally unfair. Unfair is the feeling the viewer will be left with after finishing Daughter Of Darkness also. Ivan gives Kin and Fong enough development and attention for us to feel for them. We're hoping for something better for her in particular but ultimately she's given very little of what she deserves. That 'little thing' is the comeuppance of her bullies. In a way, for me, the most disturbing scenes are those with verbal abuse of Fong by the mother (she nowhere near redeems herself when she objects to the rape of Fong by the father, played suitably over the top evil by William Ho), sister and brother even if the two rape scenes stand out more in actuality.

Herman Yau, director of The Untold Story, once talked about the inclusion of rape scenes in Cat III movies as a commercial aspect. Asian audiences apparently liked watching humiliating scenes like this and it's truly a sad comment to hear. That comment applies more to this era than it does nowadays however. If you're going to feature rape in this film, letting us watch Fong being degraded like this, there better be consequences for the man, in this case her father. Comeuppance was the word I used and while violence isn't the legal solution. Fong's been driven to that point where there's no other way than to punish hard. If the rape scenes excite you, that's your thing (General Kwan will deal with you...) but they aren't made as entertainment in my opinion, which the comment by Herman Yau sounded like.

By the time we reach the climax, the final 20 minutes or so, this genre piece finally reaches it's keeper status. Ivan delivers a decent finale in terms of gore (censor cuts still exists in this version) and because we do feel sympathy for Chung's character, it's rather sad to see her fate play out in the final frames. Ivan shows decent skill for lower key melodrama here and does end the story on a strong note. Comedy hasn't completely left the film and Anthony sneeks in a final good gag towards the end (falls asleep in the court room).

Why do we like these Category III rated flicks? Sick humour, sex and gore are commonly featured aspects and while rarely really good films, there is something unashamedly watchable about entries like Daughter Of Darkness. If you're curious about the genre, I always suggest starting with Dr.Lamb or The Untold Story before exploring any further. As a final note FOR fans, I personally give the edge to Daughter Of Darkness II because of the better finale and female lead.

A young couple attempt suicide together but thanks to the blood donation by Lok (Bernard Chow), Eric (Cyrus Chow) and Joy (Niki Chow), the boy survives while the girl eventually dies after being in a coma. Soon thereafter, the three donators are being haunted by the spirit of the dead girl...

Leave it to horror to make not one lick of sense! Actually, it applies to many genres, if not all, but you have a lot more freedom when plotting out horror, in particular when dealing with the supernatural. There's always a danger then to go way too overboard with the unwritten movie laws but thankfully Soi Cheang's goal with New Blood is to keep things as accessible as possible. While not up to the standards of the nightmarish The Eye, New Blood represents the better part of Hong Kong's flawed horror output lately.

The screenplay by Soi Cheang and Szeto Kam Yuen is not what carries this movie as a whole. It doesn't fill the plot with characters but doesn't go for character depth either. The filmmakers are not aiming at making a horror effort with originality behind every corner. Here, Soi and his co-writer want to make the best of the familiar and that my friends is a great big challenge in itself today. The plot does make sense and the main element, the love between the suicidal couple is expanded upon enough so Soi and Szeto lay the ground nicely. If anything, I mentioned that there's not much character depth, it is hurt a little by the fact that you have an acting trio of not yet established actors. That can work to your advantage and provide huge disadvantages as well. Name actors, even the best ones, can't sometimes avoid the star factor they project and that way overshadowing the character. An unknown face can make a character more believable and real if there's effort in there. In New Blood's case, I'm sure it was a conscious choice to cast these faces, only Niki Chow puts in a performance of noteworthy status. Bernard Chow and Cyrus Chow are decent but are also trying too hard in certain scenes. Now, all this isn't an annoyance throughout because it's Soi Cheang's horror vision that carries this movie, at times really well.

Continuing on from his style in Horror Hotline...Big Head Monster, Soi's eye for horror takes part of a page out of Hideo Nakata's book and injects the right touches the right way. Soi is a stylish filmmaker, not necessarily one that speeds up a film for style but one that has proven to be effective when he is tossing the camera around in otherworldly angles. One thing he does know is that the best horror comes out of stillness and he continues to live by that motto in New Blood. His horror imagery isn't exactly outstanding but he's out to give his best without overdoing it. The moody opening, featuring the couple committing their act of love via slitting of the wrists has intercutting very familiar to the trained movie eye and the creepiness seems to be consciously toned down compared to Horror Hotline. It makes sense, that film's premise needed to be more amped, straight horror to win audiences over while New Blood has less of a tricky road to it's horror. At the beginning, Soi logs probably the best scare without any noise but the majority of the fairly creepy atmosphere, unease etc. comes out of solid, again, familiar, sound design, editing and cinematography. The quick-cuts to reveal the spirits true form work best in that form but disappointingly not as much when we get calmer, revealing shots of her. The shrill sound design helps immensely and is particular effective in a scene set at a construction site.

As the movie progresses, director Soi maintains a firm grip on the audience without reaching greatness. It's an involving tale or involving enough that features a few well-timed jumps via editing and the atmosphere The cinematography leads us into some criticisms of the film. As was the case of Horror Hotline, the desolated environment is made up of primarily green, blue and blacks (plus a bit of red seeing as we're dealing with a blood theme). It does not intrude on the viewing but doesn't feel needed either. Not that I have the solution but there has only been few cases where strong colours actually add. I think you can achieve great things with a minimalistic stylized colour palette. Also, most noticeable in the beginning, the choosen colour scheme and a few locations really seem out of touch with reality and only fitting for a horror movie. Especially the construction site is not something, realistically even an established architect (Cyrus Chow's character's profession) would voluntarily set his foot in. However, strong points ARE the film's desolated settings. They only show the outside world when needed and purely concentrates on the individuals that are the focus of the film. Long, deep shots of hallways and different locations are an effective mood setter, even in its simplicity.

Soi Cheang has taken steps forward since Horror Hotline...Big Head Monster and amongst all the bad entries in this genre out of Hong Kong, he and The Pang Brothers have produced the best work. They have the better eyes for it. Next, Soi Cheang is directing The Twins...

Nothing astonishing happens in terms of storyline or characters but the mentioned look of the production and the likable stars Miriam Yeung & Richie Ren, makes this a rather pleasant 100 minutes of Hong Kong romance and fun. Admittedly, some of the comedy sadly is on the less sophisticated side but Riley's script still manages to find time for emotions to be invested in characters and there's clearly a few more notches of effort in Elixir Of Love than in most Lunar New Year offerings. Pace is brisk overall although in the end, the feeling is that somewhere in the middle material could've been trimmed. This film does nothing to progress Riley Yip as a director, nor is the romance the greatest. However, it clearly doesn't stink. Co-starring Kenny Bee, Eric Kot and Lam Suet.

Zhang Yuan (Green Tea) doesn't abandon the stage roots of East Palace, West Palace and rightly so. He does superbly expands on the premise via several flashbacks and fantasy sequences though, mainly from the perspective of Han Si's character. A young man who gladly lusts for the definition of love the extreme way (him being gay doesn't matter), being viewed upon as actually sick by the cop. But through what seems like endless and even pointless conversations going round and round, director Zhang reaches the desired boiling point where especially the Hu Jun character displays more bottled up conflicted emotions. How and if they will manifest themselves in front of his "prisoner" becomes a strong driving force for East Palace, West Palace and Zhang Yuan delivers a strikingly, poignant ending. Be prepared to be jerked around a little because this reserved cinematic landscape holds keys to substance of the greater kind. Vicky Zhao (Shaolin Soccer) appears briefly.

The Chinese government didn't approve of the taboo ridden film and revoked director Zhang Yuan's passport as well as putting him under house arrest. Friends smuggled out a print of the film out of the country in order for the film to be screened at Cannes.

Outside of the story of Ling and her looking at the world (heard much in voiceover) The Blade is a familiar revenge tale brought to greater heights thanks to the design of the film. To the best of my knowledge only Ringo Lam's Burning Paradise (which Tsui Hark also produced) attempted this look and feel to a 90s martial arts production. Both are true stand outs because of it. Chiu Man Cheuk gives an intense, charismatic performance while also displaying terrific moves with his blade. Hung Yan Yan and him go at it during the ultra intense finale that is unlike anything I've ever seen. Not Hark's best movie from a storytelling point (some slow passages occur) but visually I would regard it as his most memorable.

David Chiang takes on the valid social issues concerning class differences and by stroking gently for his first half, My Dear Son is a down to earth, light hearted drama kept buoyant by a warm lead performance by Bill Tung. However things turn a little too predictable when the film goes ultra pessimistic on us (bringing in a triad angle that Lau Ching-Wan's character is part of) and it's unfortunate sledgehammer techniques are used to enhance the escalating darkness. Still, My Dear Son is solid enough filmmaking from a very underrated filmmaker. Maggie Cheung co-stars as a hostess stuck in development while Kathy Chow, Paul Chun and Ricky Yi also appear.

Proving once more that headlines can green light movie projects even way past the 90s streak of "golden" Category III cinema, Marco Mak (A Gambler's Story, The Blood Rules) directs this story based on a political scandal in Taiwan (1*). Working with the higher rating, the often slick visualist Mak has an opportunity here to inject the basic ingredients of sleaze, sex and thrills. Final tally: fairly pleasing but all too teasing sleaze and sex. No thrills either.

Not that aspirations to provide a full psychological portrayal of voyeurism, politics and naughty upper class behaviour are on display but the script penned by the alias Not A Woman (2*) thinks it can get away with barely touching upon potentially interesting depth. For one, every glimpse into the mind of Daniel Wu's Calvin, be it his nervous trembling or need to take sleeping pills to rest at ease is so painfully obviously setup for a payoff in the third act and here Mak can't exactly inject substance at the points where we're supposed to gasp or go "aaaah..." either. Touching again upon some interesting turns the film does seem to want to take, the unexplained attraction of Calvin's to Kwai, the annoyance of journalists in a turbulent political world of Taiwan, herein lies detours that neither Not A Woman or director Mak utilizes.

The Peeping as a thriller is therefore extremely pedestrian and with director Mak letting his over the top/welcome visual trickery take a backseat in favour of so called storytelling instead, this whole production sets itself up for a whole lot of trouble. Truth be told, it probably could've needed a Wong Jing excess-boast of poor jokes, violence and wild sex but still, when an aspiration exists to draw yourself away from bonk-a-thon status, then there's slight things to admire about The Peeping. The sex never goes the full frontal nudity route and at times still feel titillating but as these are part of obvious attempts to weave a surprising story, a feeling of failure enters as it's evident these become running time padding interludes instead. Then the story can go on in its flat ways and viewer frustration over the LACK OF nudity sets in! Mak isn't making any friends with his choices here.

It's no surprise then that the filmmakers manages to inject zero life in the performers such as Daniel Wu and Jenny Yam. Way too low of a project even for the arguably talented American born Chinese, Wu's participation in The Peeping reeks of a desperation to work up a filmography but it would've been so easy to have a plant doing Wu's acting. It's that lifeless. I do like the casting of Teresa Mak's looks as she's no ordinary screen beauty but behind that exterior lies wild erotic auras and mystery, at least for a little while. Her character especially crumbles thanks to strange, unwarranted dialogue about penis function and a breast comparison contest in a ladies bathroom is laughable instead of being character building. Frequent triad character actor Samuel Leung comes of surprisingly well though as the righteous best friend of Calvin's.

But even minor points of interest crumble when Mak unleashes his final conclusions that are scripted and acted out with a great, big sledgehammer, working neither as well injected exposition or as thrilling twists. A quick cash in on a real life scandal in this case rather...like that's the first cinematic crime ever committed, especially by Hong Kong filmmakers. Knowing a director like Billy Tang, he could've easily made this package light up along with his cinematographer Tony Miu, in order for it to at least reach decent level. Marco Mak usually does reach that but even if he's never been part of a league, he IS out of his league here and definitely has made almost 100% better films.

(1) Meaning it's just the story outline used here and by tweaking a name or two, the filmmakers even add the end credits disclaimer that all events are fictional! Producers know their stuff. For the record, the real life incident involved politician Chu Mei-Feng's sexual encounter with a married man being taped and sold on bootleg vcd's around town.

(2) This alias has credits on other Marco Mak films, specifically writer of Cop On A Mission and a directing credit on Haunted Office. The latter three story project was also helmed by Mak and Bowie Lau.

Lau's choices may disappoint genre fans as the structure of Challenge Of The Masters doesn't always follow laid down rules, especially in regards to the climactic fight BEFORE the final reel. Sure there's rivalry between martial arts schools and training sequences but the tone set is different due to the mentioned themes.

When it does deliver action, combining hand to hand combat, weapons and a sport scenario not unlike the opening reel of Dragon Lord, it's simply terrific and exhilarating. Once again Lau also proves that when he steps in front of the camera as well, the most magic happens, and his fights with brothers Lau Kar Wing and Gordon Lau is classic martial arts cinema. Both from a choreographing viewpoint and thematically. Perhaps the dramatic storytelling qualities Chang Cheh had carried over in some shape of form to Lau Kar Leung? Nonetheless, Challenge Of The Masters ranks as one of Lau's finest in terms of impact on the viewing audience. Lily Li, Ricky Hui, Fung Hark On, Wong Yu and co-stars plus many recognizable faces out of Hong Kong cinema flash by.

Fay (Chow Yun-Fat), Nam (Cecilia Yip) and Keung (Alex Man) are three young Hong Kong citizens that becomes friends through their hopes and dreams during the pending invasion by Japan. Nam and Keung are lovers but he's not accepted by her family as a suiting husband. The three takes the strength of their dreams and tries to flee Hong Kong during the invasion but fails to do so. They will have to try and stick together during the dark times that will follow...

Produced by D & B (Dickson Poon and Sammo Hung's production company), Hong Kong 1941 is a splendid example of finely tuned storytelling but even more, a superior showcase of what you can achieve on a low budget. Told in flashback with voice-over by Cecilia Yip's character to guide us along, this drama beginning just a few days before Japan's occupation of Hong Kong on Christmas Day 1941 begins quietly enough, almost pleasant. This is one of many moods that the film will go through and it does so remarkably well.

Director Po Chi-Leung first faces the task of getting the main characters Fay, Nam and Keung together and we couldn't ask for a more natural meeting between the three. These times prior to the invasion are portrayed as not oppressed times but clearly tense ones. That means that the Hong Kong people are seen as joyous in bursts but inside, quite strongly so, they are dreaming of a better living somewhere else in the world. Hong Kong definitely already is a harsh place to live in, jobs are few, pay is low and the rice hard to come by. There's an early scene where Chow Yun-Fat's character, the incredibly good hearted anchor of this film, tries to smuggle himself out of Hong Kong by boat but is there immediately faced with being an underdog in order to get out. No difference than staying and not what the dream of going to Gold Mountain, as he describes it, is all about. Instead through the pain and good times, he gets aquatinted with two young lovers that are the picture perfect image of hope still brewing, even if they somewhat share the mindset many Hong Kong people are in at this point.

The mood set by Po Chi-Leung isn't about the oppression, the poverty or depression and compared to what we're going to see, it's kind of lighthearted and suitably low key. Only at times throughout the movie, the melodrama kicks into high gear but the directorial choices are so spot on throughout. When Hong Kong 1941 then shows the invasion of Hong Kong by Japan (through a wonderful sequence that can't show too much because of the low budget but doesn't have to) the film turns more grim and if the darkness had a bit of joy prior, it's that that holds the horror now. Hong Kong people are forced to divert from British laws and ways (even street signs are changed to feature Chinese writing only) and with that comes an anarchy that turns the people against themselves, just so you can have your rice for instance. The director isn't always concentrating on Fay, Nam and Keung but makes sure he conveys their development through all this eventually. Most of the people around turns selfish quick but these young ones do not. They instead, mainly Fay, uses the invasion to their advantage and still keeps dreaming despite many hardships along the way.

I described the first part of the movie as being lighthearted while the second really holds some disturbing violence and imagery. The anarchy generates looting, meaningless raping of the country and the critique presented by the filmmakers is a valid one. They don't take sides, to me it seems like that anyway, because it's equally a comment on how Hong Kong people turn bad but obviously it is due to the invasion of a foreign force. The event presented in the film are true still today, it's human nature like it's always been. As we roll along, we realize that the running time is filled with surprises. We're not seeing a conventional narrative and all up to the end there are revelations, shocks and character development of the highest level to keep us interested. It's a story that deals with what it takes to survive and while, as I described, very much low-key, it hits you where it aims; the head, the stomach and the heart.

The production design or rather the standing design is a star in its own in Hong Kong 1941. You can almost draw comparisons to another D & B classic, also starring Chow Yun-Fat, An Autumn's Tale. That production also utilized an already standing design, New Your city, to superb effect. Same is true for this movie and Po Chi-Leung here uses the run down architecture of Macau for his 1940s Hong Kong in a state of poverty. It's really believable and another reason why the film is so involving. Lai Siu-Ming's awardwinning cinematography captures all this wonderfully well. It's clean, crisp and very natural looking. Again, farfetched, but also something applicable to An Autumn's Tale.

Po Chi-Leung himself appears in the movie as a crazy old man everyone calls The Emperor. Totally insane but his direction of actors is far from that. He gets a natural and expressive performance from a relatively newcomer at that time, Cecilia Yip as Nam. You couldn't ask for a better look either as she's young, innocent looking and looks perfect standing next to either of her co-stars, Alex Man being one of them. I was only familiar with him through his bad guy turns in the average triad movies Rich & Famous and Tragic Hero so it wasn't with a whole lot of positive remarks about him that I went into Hong Kong 1941. Alex was an experienced TV-actor before and the slightly ruffian character is in good hands. There's an ignorance in him and he's someone not too far off the criminal side. He longs more than the others and becomes irrational at times because of it. You understand why Nam is in love with him though since he has a very sincere and loveable side to him despite shortcomings.

I wouldn't say the movie belongs to Chow Yun-Fat but he certainly makes an impression from frame one. You know perfectly well the different accolades he has received over the years regarding his acting and it applies to Hong Kong 1941 as well. Charismatic, suave, handsome and the character of Fay is one with a truly good heart. He represents one of the few Hong Kong people didn't become unselfish or gave up. However, as with other oppressed people throughout history, many didn't have a choice so it's not like the other citizens are totally unsympathetic in their ways. With Chow, director Po Chi-Leung effectively toys with the audience in terms of where the love triangle is going and Chow's strength at conveying those subtle but ever so important beats is nothing short of perfect. Stuart Ong, Wu Ma, Paul Chun and Sek Kin makes for a superb supporting cast as well.

Hong Kong Legends wisely choose not to market Hong Kong 1941 as an action film, despite the 18 rating by the BBFC. They instead gave the film a chance to strike a chord with the crowd that perhaps knew of or wanted to see who Chow Yun-Fat REALLY was. That's not neglecting the other strengths of the film though. It's an 80s drama classic with rare attention to detail in every department.

Yuen Biao plays Hsia Ling-Cheng, a newly examined prosecutor whose mentor, an outspoken judge, is brutally murdered in front of him. This triggers a series of events where all Hsia Ling-Cheng's key witnesses in a drug case are killed off and with no faith in the law anymore, he decides to take care of the bad guys himself. Hot on his tail is the female cop Cindy (Cynthia Rothrock from Yes, Madam) but she doesn't care whether the truly bad ones are solely arrested. For her a killer is a killer and therefore she is only out to catch Hsia Ling-Cheng. Through different turn of events it is discovered that the head of the criminal organization is a well respected police man (Melvin Wong from Eastern Condors) and now Hsia Ling-Cheng and Cindy have to join together to bring him to justice...

Corey Yuen has on several occasions worked as an action choreographer in films such as Jet Li's Hollywood efforts and you're pretty much guaranteed a good execution in that department when his name pops up on the screen. In Righting Wrongs, he has together with his team of choreographers, which include Yuen Biao himself, come up with some truly excellent fight- and action scenes. He never fails to show off Yuen Biao's amazing acrobatic- and martial arts skills but the feeling of these scenes is more towards brutality and grittiness. Something which suits the movie very much in tone. Among the highlights in the choreography is the garage scene where Biao is fighting both cars and humans plus the almost shocking climax of the movie with Yuen Biao, Cynthia Rothrock and Melvin Wong. There are only a few select times where the editing of the action is a bit hard to follow but this is just a minor point. The action generates wonderful entertainment despite the movies dark undertones.

Righting Wrongs is a pretty straightforward and simple story that one would argue shouldn't be analyzed to the extreme but I feel there were still flaws that needed to be addressed. It's mainly Corey's work as a director of actors and the way he shoots those scenes, that is really average. Most of the dialogue scenes are ok on a directorial level but they still feel somewhat flat and lifeless. All in all they work for this kind of movie and they're just really interludes in between the action.

The movie has a furious pace in the beginning parts but after that it sort of drags a bit while we get to see the little but serviceable plot develop. Yuen Biao's character actually goes missing for a fair amount of time here while we follow Cynthia Rothrock and Corey Yuen's (yes, that's the director in a fairly significant role) investigation of the trails left behind by Hsia Ling-Cheng. Despite a less than complicated plot, characters enter the movie very quickly and we have to ponder a bit as to how they fit into the picture. You eventually have everyone and everything laid out clear and can enjoy the next hard hitting action scene. When Yuen Biao eventually goes into action again the remainder of the running time goes by at a smooth pace.

I do think that Righting Wrongs could've gained more power if it had been been played serious all the way through the end. Here and there, mainly in the first half, there are a few of your usual Hong Kong slapstick scenes thrown in. This is nothing new in Hong Kong filmmaking but it still doesn't really fit when we're soon after get to see a serious scene or a brutal one. It's not as extreme as the juxtaposition between the nasty stuff and the humour in Dr. Lamb though.

The theme of taking the law into your own hands is one we've seen before and the motivation of Yuen Biao's character is passable considering the genre of movie it is. The character of Hsia Ling-Cheng quickly loses confidence in the law and when he's asked which ones he thinks the law protects, he sorrowfully says: the bad guys. So almost from the beginning the character has hit the point of no return and from this the movie carries with it a very dark and pessimistic tone about a world with no real justice. I personally think that films need to put that message up on the big screen at times. We don't live in a perfect world and sometimes it's easy to forget that fact. Another movie that I think dealt with this subject is Alfred Cheung's On The Run.

In the above mentioned On The Run Yuen Biao showed me the definite sign that he has what it takes to to be a dramatic actor. In that film he threw one kick and the rest was him showing a dramatic and gritty side to his acting, something which made the character more human. In Righting Wrongs he does well in the balance act between playing the lost character of Hsia Ling-Cheng and the performance in the action scenes. It must be said though that the script isn't that well written even though Biao's character is the most fleshed out one. His acting doesn't quite reach the height that the movie aims for but Biao's central performance is still quite good despite those flaws.

I must admit that I hadn't seen any movie with Cynthia Rothrock prior to this one and I didn't expect a whole lot from this fast kicking American female. Her cop role isn't exactly multi layered and original but, despite the often horrible Cantonese dubbing of her, she handles herself in a perfectly acceptable way. She adds strength to the movie through her skills as an action actress and by the looks of it performs a good slew of the stunts herself. There were some very obvious doubling of her and you'll especially laugh at that during her introductory scene. While Biao beats her in the acting department, she is a good match and counterpart to him when it comes to the martial arts itself.

As the film's bad guy we see Melvin Wong and, once again, his character arc is nothing new to Hong Kong movies but I thought Melvin put in a good performance. He managed to show the almost cold blooded nature of his character who will stop at nothing when it comes to silencing people. There are some fairly gruesome scenes involving him and this is a movie bad guy that I will remember for a little while. Other actors could act out this role way over the top and almost make it comedic but Melvin stays well within those borders and is actually at times quite scary.

One supporting player worth mentioning is veteran actor and director Wu Ma who plays the father of Corey Yuen's character. Their scenes are the so called funny ones in the movie and while they were not entirely non-humerous, I could've done without them. Wu Ma does have a memorable dramatic scene later in the film that involves the death of one of the police men and his understated reaction in that scene is probably what earned him the supporting actor nomination that year.

When we start to approach the final 15 minutes of the film, the expectations are high for a killer climax and the choreographers certainly was at the top of their game when it came to the end. If the fight between Yuen Biao and Melvin Wong had been the final scene of the movie, I would've been very satisfied but there's more! Melvin's character takes off in a small air plane with Yuen Biao's character pursuing on foot! Here Yuen shows his most crazy side and the stunt work on display here is absolutely amazing. It doesn't even look like they took any security measures at all, they just did it apparently. Whether Yuen himself performed all the aerial stunts is unknown to me but regardless it's still a highly impressive climax to this movie. Just like the final reel of On The Run there's some sometimes shocking and brutal violence being shown but I think it's all very reasonable to present it that way since that tone has been set early on.

Righting Wrongs is a movie I will be revisiting many times but I think that it would've been even better if the filmmakers had chosen to leave out the humour and gone with the serious tone all throughout the movie. Don't let these negative remarks stop you from adding this movie to your collection though. It's a very good piece of Hong Kong cinema but if you want to see Yuen Biao showing his acting skills, I recommend watching On The Run before this. It will make a great double bill!