It really pains me that the once mighty Philip Ko Fei, a name that to me use to meant quality, chose this path for himself. I also feel bad for poor Yukari Oshima, who he dragged through more B-movie schlock than I care to remember. And I doubt this would have happened had the two not been an item at this time. But I guess "the Osh" was just standing by her man, and I admire that.

This movie is as about as cheap as it gets. Well, maybe not, but it's pretty damn cheap. Philip, Yukari, and Sharon Kwok are the only known actors in the entire movie. The rest (including the male lead) are just Filipino no-names who look like they just stepped on the set in whatever clothes they were wearing, and whose sole motivation seems to be the paycheck at the end of the day. Forget the story, forget the characters. At this point, Philip had just stopped caring, so you don't have to either.

But at least the action delivers, right? Wrong! Yukari was one of the best female screen fighters of all time, and I love that little snaggletoothed Japanese tomboy to death. But not even she could save this clunker. There are odd moments of halfway-decent choreo. But for the most part, it is just a messy mix of awkward, acrobatic gunplay, retarded use of slo-mo, poorly edited fight scenes, and wonky wirework. What a waste.

But the silver lining here is the final showdown, which is pretty damn awesome! Actually, no, it's not, I'm lying. It's just more of the same crap, set to the theme from "The Terminator" and complete with a blatant rip-off of the car jousting battle from "Bullet In The Head". And they couldn't even get that right.

To sum up, this movie is piss poor, and a complete and utter waste of time. I wouldn't even recommend this for Yukari completists, 'cause this would be a shitstain on any movie collection; and I will in fact go and throw out my copy right now.

If you thought that you were running low on patience when watching "The Big Boss", when Bruce just kept taking it and clutching his little promise medallion, then give this one a whirl! And I'll guarantee that you will rip your hair out and scream at the screen, "FOR THE LOVE OF BUDDHA, STRAP ON A PAIR AND KICK SOME FUCKING AAAASSSSS!!!"

This guy makes Jesus look like he needs anger management. The bad guys beat, stab, rape and kill everyone that this guy cares about. They kick his ass repeatedly and stiff him out of his pay. And he just stands there and takes it, like a slab of meat with a stupid pudding bowl haircut. Aaaargh, it's so friggin' frustrating!

In the end, he finally grows some stones and wigs out on the villains. But by then, it is just too little, too late.

It also doesn't help that the actor, Chen Wo Fu, is dull as can be, and looks slightly retarded. Just a big lumbering lurch with a vacant stare, the grace of an epileptic at a laser show, and the charisma of wet cardboard. He apparently killed himself before the movie was released... yeah, no shit! He was probably embarrassed, or saw an early screening, and just couldn't take it anymore, much like I couldn't. It was like watching that one kid at the playground, who just kept getting picked on and picked on, without ever standing up for himself. Man, this was beyond aggravating.

The whole laid back Tai Chi-self restraint philosophy wasn't lost on me, but this was ridiculous. I don't wanna' see the hero (and I use the term loosely here) turn the other cheek, much less take it in the tailpipe, in my kung fu movies. If you do, then by all means, go ahead and watch this. I dare you to sit through it without grabbing your gat and shooting the TV, Elvis style, out of sheer anger and annoyance. Enjoy.

I didn't think the fights in this movie were anything special either. Not even the end fight, with Fei and Liu squaring off against my man Hwang Jang Lee. Most of it seemed slow and rehearsal-like, and you know something is terribly wrong when you even mention the words 'slow' and 'Hwang Jang Lee' in the same breath.

It also had Wong Yat Lung, that annoying kid from SLEEPING FIST and THUNDERING MANTIS in it, so that automatically drags it even further down a few notches. The whole premise was actually promising. Russian and Chinese spy styff, secret messages, cool techniques and just general skullduggery all around. But it just didn't come together at the end of the day, and ended up as a steaming pile of wasted opportunity. I can't give this more than a single star. One half for Hwang Jang Lee, and one half for Roy Horan, and that is only out of respect.

Outside of these, and a couple of decent training scenes, the movie is just slapstick, stupid comedy and boring story, which is really a shame.

Peter Chen is not the most charismatic leading man ever. But he is a great acrobat and a good screen fighter. However, he is just wasted here. Actually the whole movie stinks of wasted opportunity. You have all this talent onhand, and still you waste 90% of the movie on insipid comedy and pointless plot, that nobody cares about. Had the rest of the movie been up to the standards of the three aforementioned fights, then you would really have something here. But that is sadly not the case.

Bradley is actually a better actor and screen fighter than the wooden Dudikoff, but not by much. And it is just as well, because there is very little to work with in this formulaic piece of ninja trash. Just the fact that the script is written by Gary Conway, the guy who played the bad guy in Part 2, and also wrote that one, should tell you something. There is nothing new here. The setup is almost the same, and the action is nothing to write home about either. Bradley has decent form, and delivers a couple of cool kicks here and there, but it is far from enough to save the movie.

However the worst offense here is that the movie is boring. The first two entries in the series had 80's style and B-movie cheese to spare. They were not masterpieces, but they were fun to watch and you could, at the very least, laugh at them. There is nothing to laugh about in this one. Some scenes are just ass-numbingly dull, and the whole thing just feels lazy and uninspired.

The one redeeming factor here is the great Steve James, once again playing second fiddle to yet another generic white boy, when he clearly had more energy and screen presence than the entire cast put together. But even he couldn't have saved this turd of a movie. There is really little to recommend here. If you watch it at all, then watch it for Steve James. He's the only thing with any spark in here, futile as it may seem. And whatever you do, avoid the two last parts in the series. You have officially been warned.

The mix of comedy and gritty violence is par for the course in HK cinema, and has been for decades. But it doesn't work well here. The movie seems undecided as to what direction it wants to go and ultimately ends up betting on all horses. A losing formula, in most cases--it certainly is the case here. There are also too many principal characters to try and keep track of, none of which are especially fleshed out. So after awhile, you just stop caring about any of them.

Beardy's character is the most interesting and could have been further developed with some tighter writing. But he too ends up a bland hitman figure with little rhyme or reason to his actions. After his old school kung fu days, Beardy was never really given a chance to do his thing in modern day movies and was sadly relegated to star in dreck such as this, like an old, sad circus horse taking a last lap around the ring before it is put out to pasture... or worse. He continues to work in minor roles and TV shows to this day, but rarely in something that is worthy of him, his beard, and his talents.

This movie is a big steaming pile of missed opportunity that seems unsure of where its going or what it's trying to say. And for the record, throwing in a little cute kid to tug at the heart strings, and some sappy, social commentary on HK gun violence, does NOT a profound movie make.

If you like ol' Beardy, then do him and yourself a favor and watch "The Victim", "Thundering Mantis", or "Legend Of A Fighter" instead.

I've never bought Yuen Shun Yee as a leading man, nor did I this time. He is great as a villain, but that's about it. Yuen Siu Tin more or less reprises his role as beggar So here, and I actually find it slightly depressing and sad to see the ailing master heavily doubled in movie after movie from this era. His workload in the late 70's, was more than any man his age should have to endure, and eventually it killed him I guess.

Hwang Jang Lee as Rubberlegs is definitely the saving grace here, as he was in so many mediocre kung fu flicks from this time. He really gets to show his stuff in the end fight, that drunken mantis style is cool. I also liked Corey Yuen as Hwang's arrogant student, and Linda Lin Jing as the old lady, also seen in DRUNKEN MASTER.

But as a whole, those things combined was just not enough to redeem the movie in my mind; and in the end, I was left rather unimpressed.

The fights are fine. And Lee Yi Min looks good when showing his skills, as do most of the others involved. But it just feels somewhat generic, and more-of-the-same-ish.

Chang Yi delivers another white-haired master character, spouting off odd kung fu commandments, in which I found little rhyme or reason.

The movie does have its moments though. I guess Lee Yi Min's elaborate straw mantis contraption is sort of innovative, although it doesn't make a whole lot of sense. And the end fight, although far from mind blowing, is at least well executed.

So all in all, this one really failed to move me in any way, shape or form. But there's no accounting for taste. So maybe you should just check it out for yourself, if you haven't already.

When reviewing "Game Of Death", you are really reviewing two movies: the 1972 Bruce Lee pagoda footage, and the awful, incoherent 1978 mess directed by Robert Clouse. Let's begin with the latter, shall we?

Well, it's bad, simple as that. It's bad, it's boring, it's freaking brutal. The scenes with the American actors are just a chore to sit through. And I truly believe that Gig Young committed suicide 'cause he couldn't live with the shame of having been in this movie. The rest of the cast should have taken a cue from him.

The "Billy Lo" scenes with Kim Tai Jung and the other Bruce clones are no better. I mean, the ham-handed way they try to make all the crumbling pieces of this utter disaster fit together is downright embarrassing. The awful disguises, the intercut footage of Bruce's other films, the cardboard cutout head...oh my word! What were these people thinking?

The only things that make this part of the movie remotely watchable are Sammo's choreo, Yuen Biao's nimble doubling, and John Barry's excellent "Bondian" score, that for all its effort deserved to be in a better movie. But even those things combined are not enough to save this stinking pile. I might not be the world's biggest Bruce Lee fan, but this is unworthy of any man's legacy. And I don't see homage here. I see shameless and disrespectful cash-in. This isn't Bruce Lee, this is Bruceplotation--of the worst kind.

Now, for the actual Bruce Lee part of the movie. Is this Bruce at the top of his game? Pretty close, I say. This is more what I wanted to see from him, had he lived on and continued to do movies. Here you really get to see Bruce applying the principles of Jeet Kune Do to his choreo. No fixed forms, adapting to your opponent's style, using their own strengths against them...all that good stuff. You saw some of that in the Coliseum showdown in "Way Of The Dragon". But it is more fully realized here. I mean, it's still just Bruce kicking ass with great superiority, but more complex and energetic.

To the filmmakers' credit, it is edited very well. All the rest of the so-called "long lost footage" is just lag and drag. They used just the best of the Bruce footage in the original release.

To be quite honest, I would rather have seen Bruce turn down "Enter The Dragon" to finish a fully realized "Game Of Death". But that was not to be. So what we are left with is this uneven mess of a movie. Do yourself a favor and watch "Game Of Death 2" instead.

In the grand tradition of weird and wonderful kung fu movie villains, of all shapes and sizes, this old broad takes the cake. You can punch her, kick her, beat her with a stick, or run her over with your cab--repeatedly. She won't go down. She is the saving grace here. And honestly one of the most fun and far out villains of the early 70's.

Her three students, played by the awesome Yasuaki Kurata, Taiwanese badguy actor Lung Fei, and Shaw Bros. veteran Shan Mao, get in on the action as well. The choreo is the typical basher style, with Jimmy swinging his arms around 'til he hits someone, and people just generally flailing about and falling over a lot.

It is a pretty straight up revenge story, involving the three Japanese students seeking vengeance for their dead parents. But quite why these three guys would go through decades of grueling karate training to kill one elderly man, whom they feel is responsible, and then just lead him through a sawmill, tripping him and trying to make his death look accidental, is beyond me. Doesn't really make a whole lot of sense.

There is also some subplot about Jimmy being a troublemaker, and a blind sister needing an eye operation. But who cares? The main reason, or dare I say the only reason, to watch this flick is Karate Grandma, or Lady With Ironfists, as she is billed here. Her performance alone earns my recommendation.

I've watched this movie a dozen or so times over the years, and I still have no idea what it's about, really. The story is boring and convoluted. The characters are uninteresting and/or annoying. And even the action isn't that great. There are a few cool fights, sure. But for the most part, the choreo feels stiff and uninspired, as does the gunplay and stuntwork. I would have expected more from Chris Li.

Cynthia Khan is cute as always, and proficient in the action scenes--and was doubled less and less as the series progressed. But with little to work with here, even she couldn't have saved this movie.

David Ng annoyed me in "Tiger Cage 2" and he annoys me here. There are a few of my favorite gwailos on hand as well, like Steve Tartalia, Vincent Lyn, and old timer John Ladalski. But they are not given much to do either, so what's the point? The one westerner that does get to let loose is the always entertaining Kim Maree Penn, who squares off with Cynthia in the final showdown. A decent bout, but sadly not enough to end this clunker on a high note.

Overall, this movie is a subpar effort with mediocre action. Not much to get excited about actually.

He was a Karate champion in Japan and student of many Japanese styles, one of them being Ninjitsu. He came to America in the late 60's, attending college, teaching martial arts, and doing bit parts in movies. But his big break came when cast opposite spaghetti western veteran Franco Nero in Cannon Films' first ninja effort, ENTER THE NINJA, in 1981. Suddenly, ninjas were everywhere--movies, TV, comic books, and so on--some of it good, a lot of it bad.

And while this was no doubt a well meaning and serious effort on the part of the filmmakers, there is just no way that you can watch this movie with a straight face if you're over five years old. This is definitely one of those "so bad it's good" movies. But there is actually a lot to learn here. Apparantly, you can walk around in full ninja garb, on American streets, in broad daylight no less, without anyone raising an eyebrow. Common thugs in Salt Lake City are dressed like the Village People and hang out at playgrounds. Slutty blondes are easily hypnotized, and the mob employs full on Indian chiefs to do their dirty work. Oh yes, this is educational stuff.

And damn it if the action isn't as hilarious as the story is stupid--a lot of Shurikens to the face, spikes to the face, axe to the face...well, just general mutilation of the face area, for maximum gore effect. Cheesy as all hell, but tons of fun.

Shô Kosugi was no great thespian, or even a very good screen fighter, but his relentless effort to bring us loads of corny ninja goodness in the 80's deserves applause.

Outside of a few novel touches, such as the deaf and blind guy, killer duo, and some other things, there is really nothing to distinguish this one from the hundreds of other kung fu comedies that came out at this time. The story is the same, all the usual stereotypes are present, and the cross-eyed Canto comedy is as insipid as ever. So it is really up to the action to make or break this movie. And the fights are indeed passable--one might say good--but not much different from what you see in all the other movies from this era and ilk.

Billy Chong was a good screen fighter and a decent leading man with a lot of charisma. But at this time the market was flooded with young, muscular guys, sporting shoulder long hair and martial arts skills, trying to be the next big thing. So poor Billy got lost in the crowd, as just a another poor man's Jackie Chan, and would eventually return to his native Indonesia, only to fade into obscurity in cheap B-movies and local TV shows.

The final showdown is actually pretty tight. Billy really gets to show his stuff here, against the equally proficient Chu Tiet Wo. And it gives you an idea of how far this guy could have gone, had the circumstances been different. He had the looks, skills and screen presence needed to be a bigger star. Sadly, that was not to be. He did, however, manage to do a handful of HK movies before vanishing into the horizon. And, out of those, I would recommend SUPER POWER and FIST FULL OF TALONS if you dig the guy's style. Buddah bless you, Billy, you are not forgotten.

I thought this movie had a lot going for it. It's full of novel touches, nice little moments, and a lot of the scenes worked well individually. But as a whole, the movie didn't really gel. It's not a bad movie. It just feels somewhat disjointed, and rushed in some places. And what you end up with is another uneven Wong Jing actioner--one of many. But one thing you can always count on with Wong Jing is that he rarely leaves you unentertained. And that is also true with this one.

Nic Tse and Edison (shouldn't have brought my computer in for repair) Chen, are a good screen duo. And when they are not busy looking cool, they collectively deliver some decent dramatic performances. Simon Yam is always good. And he more or less plays the same role here that he did in twenty other movies. But he's never bad, so why knock it? Gillian (Edison shouldn't have brought his computer in for repair) Chung (or Ah Gil, if you will) doesn't really have much to do in her wallflower role here and merely serves as eye candy. Rounding off the cast are Ken Tong and Roderick Lam as two stereotypical triad brothers. And the ever present Lam Suet chimes in with another quirky and tragic character.

The action plays well. Semi-stylized gun play, mixed with brutal beatings. Not much intricate martial arts choreo on sight in this one, and the movie is better for it. Wong Jing also plays around with all kinds of film techniques here, such as slo-mo, rapid rewind, morphing, picture in picture, etc. And it works to greater or lesser degree. He doesn't go overboard with it though, just enough to give certain scenes a boost of energy through editing, without it becoming distracting or disorienting. ("Dragon Squad" anyone?)

All in all, a decent, yet structurally flawed, cop/triad flick from the master of the cheesy, the sleazy, the awful, the awesome, and the uneven. This one falls into the latter category.

Wong Yat Lung, playing the kid, has some incredible acrobatic skills and nice moves; but he is pretty damn annoying, mostly due to the awful [English] dubbing by the most nerve-grating woman's voice I have ever heard. Yet, somehow I doubt it's much better in the Cantonese version, since they also dubbed child actors with female voice artists.

Yuen Siu Tin plays the same role as always, and is doubled for more or less everything but close-ups, as usual.

Eddie Ko is a good screen fighter but doesn't have much to do as the villain of the piece. Overall, it's not a bad film per se. The sleeping fist style is cool, but you can see a better display of it in BUDDHA ASSASSINATOR, courtesy of Hwang Jang Lee.

I would say that, more or less all of the problems I have with this film were fixed in the semi sequel, THUNDERING MANTIS. So I recommend that instead.

Golden Harvest roped in Hark and a bunch of Hollywood effects guys to create this impressive spectacle of a fantasy flick, boasting a great cast and groundbreaking visuals for HK circa 1983. But somewhere between the flying fairies, fireballs, lightsabre duels, and all the other bells and whistles, the story and the characters got lost.

I mean, the actors are fine, and all do a good job--Yuen Biao, Meng Hoi, Moon Lee, etc.--but I feel that they are kinda' pushed into the background by all the special effects stuff, stifling their otherwise fine performances. And the already complicated story drowns in there as well. I've watched this movie a number of times and still have absolutely no idea what it's about. Sure, it keeps throwing crazy, flashy stuff at you, but it doesn't really go anywhere.

For the international version, a whole new plotline, involving Yuen Biao as a modern day fencing champion who goes into a coma and lands in an alternate reality, was shot and tacked on. The original fantasy stuff, being that reality, was recut, and the whole thing was sold as a slightly different movie. The modern day stuff is pretty fun. And I would like to see that full version some day.

I think the movie is a bit of a letdown in the action department as well. It is certainly competent. But I'm just not a big fan of fantastique wire fu. And the fact that there is so much visual effects stuff going on around it also distracts from the physical stuff.

In the end, I can enjoy this film as more of a curiosity than a fully fledged piece of cinema. To me, this is a good example of the dangers of big effects movies: if you lose the story and the characters, then all you are left with is bright lights and big bangs. And that in itself is not filmmaking.

The bad news: this movie is a big incoherent mess in every other way. The narrative is all over the place. The episodic nature of the story is vexing at best. And the comedy goes from sort of fun, to bad, to awful. But the worst offense has to be the rampant anachronisms. Seriously, I haven't seen it this bad since "Fantasy Mission Force".

Sammo is no dope, so this was obviously a conscious choice. Why? I have no idea, and no idea what to make of it this, really. First off all, WHERE is this supposed to take place? It was shot in Canada, Thailand, and HK but looks like some weird version of the old west.

Secondly, WHEN is this supposed to take place? There are people in cowboy gear, trenchcoats, and fedoras, classic Chinese garb, samurais, Russian soldiers...what the fuck!? Is this set in some kind of timewarp? Cynthia Rothrock and Richard Norton looks like American Civil War soldiers, Richard Ng looks like Sherlock Holmes, and people are driving 1930's cars and motorcycles! What in the name of Buddha's ballsack is going on here? Pick a style, a time, a place, and stick with it. This is ridiculous!

The cast is so impressive, and the action is so damn sweet, but everything else is on acid here. This was a real opportunity to make a great period spectacle, like "Project A" or "Pedicab Driver". But unless this is a time travel movie, you should stick to one period, and work your magic within that frame.

I don't know what Sammo was thinking with this misguided effort. I don't get it, nor do I like it. I'll give this pile of wasted potential a generous 2.5 stars for the cast and the action.

This movie is about as standard as it gets. It looks, feels, smells, and tastes like any other late 70's, low budget old schooler, with all the usual components present. Awful slapstick, fake beards, bad wigs, painted freckles, an old master, an evil villain, and so on.

Personally I don't think that the Jackie Chan-esque mischievous student character fits Bruce Leung very well. He's better as the cool and cocky ass-kicker we know and love from his earlier films. But luckily he never disappoints in the action department, which is also one of the only things keeping this flick afloat.

The fights are tight and the training scenes are fun, but there is really nothing new here. Bruce Leung's display of crane style is really good though. Lots of fast and furious handwork, mixed with his usual flashy kicks, here used against Bolo and Ko Fei as the villains of the piece. And they are both fine as always.

As a whole, this movie probably won't rock your world. But if you are a fan of Bruce Leung or indeed the crane style, then this film is a safe but ultimately uninspired bet.

"Big Boss". Okay, first of all, why oh why would you choose to shoot a martial arts movie in Thailand, and not pay homage to, or at least include the native style of, Muay Thai in any way? The Thai badguys just flail their arms about and fall down when Bruce hits them. Chang Cheh shot the Shaw flick "Duel Of Fists" in Thailand that same year, using Muay Thai to great effect, and as part of the storyline. He also made great use of the beautiful Thai locations. This movie could really have been shot anywhere. It wouldn't affect the story one bit.

Bruce has charisma and screen presence up the ying yang. There is no getting around that. He is also a great martial artist. Is he a great screen fighter? Sure. But sadly he is the only one who gets to show his stuff here. It's a one man show. And this self serving approach to fight choreography is my main problem with him and his films. On the other hand, without Bruce, this would just have been another mediocre basher flick, which is evident from the fight scenes done by Hang Ying Chieh. And when you finally see the two men square off in the final showdown, you see an obvious clash of choreo styles, with Bruce, no doubt, coming off the best.

The movie as a whole is a pretty uneven affair. There are numerous instances of flawed logic, poor continuity, choppy editing, sloppy camerawork, and some of the most naive characters you'll ever come across. But these things are nothing that most movies of the genre weren't guilty of at this time. It's just that this movie is held in much higher regard than its contemporaries. And aside from Bruce Lee himself, there isn't really much here that warrants that kind of overhyped adulation. To be honest, I'd take "One Armed Boxer" or "Lady Whirlwind" over this one any day. But hey, that's just me.

To get any kind of enjoyment out of this maniacal mess of a movie, I would put forth that you either have to be a huge fan of Jackie, the original manga, or Wong Jing's style of infantile comedy. Now, I'm not familiar with the source material. But I love Jackie, and have been known to enjoy a Wong Jing movie or two. I do, however, have a really hard time getting into the wackiness on display here. The comedy is just too Looney Tunes for my taste. All the manga references are lost on me, and even the fights and the action are played for laughs, and not up to Jackie's usual standard, if you ask me.

So who can you blame for this misguided effort? Jackie or Wong Jing? Well, even though this is very much a Wong Jing movie, I think it's safe to assume that Jackie was somewhat on board with the weird and wacky style. It's not like him to bite his tongue if he's unsatisfied. Hell, he more or less booted none other than Lau Kar Leung off "Drunken Master 2", when he didn't like the way things were going. So I place the blame for this bastard child of a movie squarely on both Jackie and Wong, in equal measure.

It is not totally without merit though. The scene where Jackie fights the two towering black dudes, and takes them down by mimicking Bruce Lee's techniques against Kareem Abdul Jabbar from "Game Of Death", playing on a screen next to them, is kind of funny. As is the "Street Fighter" game parody, and a couple of other gags. Plus, there is the high babe factor to consider. But it is just not enough to save what is, in my mind, a pretty dire work of unrestrained silliness.

Jackie was not overly pleased with the finished result himself. And I think it's safe to say that there was no love lost between him and Wong Jing after this. Solid proof of that would be Wong Jing's 1995 Jet Li movie "High Risk", where Jackie, his manager, and father were lampooned in a rather unflattering manner.

In any event, "City Hunter" is probably one of Jackie's least appealing films of the 90's. And given his rather lackluster output in the latter half of that decade, that is saying a lot.

The story here is full of more gaping plotholes, flawed logic, ridiculously convenient set ups, and more lame excuses for random fights to break out than I care to count. Rosamund Kwan is really testing my nerves here, and the futile attempts at comedy are just distracting. Donnie is a hell of a screen fighter, there's no doubt about it, but comedy was never his forté. Plus, his character is sort of a douche, so there is little sympathy to be had for him, or any of the other characters for that matter.

At least the action is good--well, sort of. Donnie is gracious with his mean kicks and punches, but he doesn't really fight a worthy foe until the last two bouts, which I have to say are pretty damn awesome. Robin Shou and gwailo mainstays Michael Woods and John Salvitti all bring their A game against the Don here. Gunplay, swordfighting, and some serious hand to hand. Man, I wish the rest of the film was like this.

Outside of the fight finalé and a couple of the other melees, there is not much of value here. This movie is pretty damn dire, even for HK B-movie stuff.

It is no secret that a lot of HK movies of this era were made on the fly, with little to no script as such. On some movies you can't tell, on some you can. Here it's fairly evident. Characters come and go, the story seems to go nowhere for long periods of time and is actually pretty boring when there is no action happening. There are too many main players to keep track of, or care about, and none of them are especially fleshed out.

Dick Wei is the one with the most interesting character arc, and I would have liked the movie to be more about him. It is also fun to see Benny Lai in a more prominent role, but he more or less disappears in the last half of the movie, only to briefly appear again towards the end. And some more of his awesome kicking skills would have been welcomed. I guess Mark Cheng is the leading man of sorts, and he and Yukari Oshima look pretty good in the fight scenes, but it's not exactly earth shattering stuff.

As is so often the case, the final showdown is the best part of the movie. And this one is pretty damn cool at that. I felt that the mighty Ken Lo was wasted for the majority of the movie. However, he brought the heat in the finalé for sure. It just wasn't enough to save the movie as a whole. Too bad.

There were already traces of it in earlier flicks like "Dance Of The Drunk Mantis", and again with this one. The comedy here is nothing that a lot of other kung fu comedies of the day weren't guilty of. But it is still a chore to sit through. Furthermore, it doesn't really fit with the more serious tone of the story. I mean, the ridiculous barber shop scene juxtaposed with the eerie and disturbing scene in the basement is an example. Also, weird stuff like San Kuai's ghostly hunchback character seems like he wandered in from a "Mr. Vampire" movie or something. I had the same problem with the sickly guy in the coffin in "Dance Of The Drunk Mantis". It just feels out of place, and unnecessary.

I never bought Yuen Shun Yee as a leading man. But he is one hell of a screen fighter, as is Tsui Siu Ming. And the choreo is of the usual high Yuen Clan standard. Too bad that all this awesome action has to be dispersed between all the lame gags and general weirdness that plagues the rest of the film. The end fight is so super tight, that it deserved to be in a better movie.

I guess this was sort of an attempt on GH's part to bring the black and white Wong Fei Hung series into the new era of HK action filmmaking. And you would think that now shooting in color, stuffing it with the studio's stars, putting Sammo in charge of the action, and letting "King Boxer" director Cheng Chang Ho take the reins would do the trick. But that is not quite the case. It is a noble effort for sure. But stacked against other GH movies like "Hapkido" or "When Taekwondo Strikes", this one comes off a little uninspired and lacklustre.

Bringing back Kwan Tak Hing was a nice touch. And the movie follows more or less the same template as the old series. Wong Fei Hung stays largely in the background--his students get into trouble, Wong Fei Hung returns to make things right in the final reel. This worked well in later efforts such as "Magnificent Butcher" and "Dreadnaught". But the problem here is a loosely structured and uninteresting story, and the action.

This is sadly one of Sammo's weaker choreo efforts from this period. He obviously upped the ante, actionwise, from "Lady Whirlwind" and on but somehow hit a wall with this and a few other mid-70's GH films. I don't know the reason for this. I only know that the fights are kind of slow and clunky compared to earlier efforts. It is not bad per se. And the end fight with Hwang In Sik is pretty decent. But, in my mind, it's still not up to the standard that Sammo had already set for himself.

On the whole, the movie is acceptable. But keep your expectations in check.