| There's not much info to be found about this Category III rape-revenge thriller but notably it's an early role for Lily Chung who would go on to dedicate herself fully in victimized roles such as in Daughter Of Darkness and Red To Kill. Here she's fully clothed throughout but nonetheless a fine effect in director Cheung King-Nin's frame. She is conveniently enough Lily, scarred mentally from rape and after being saved from possibly yet another one by Po Wah (Ridley Tsui) and Ben (Karel Wong), she shacks up with the former while she regains her composure. But composure is hard to come by with memories of a dominating mother and a hungry Ben...
Quite amateurish partly as director Cheung exaggerates Lily's back story cinematically and the romance between Lily and Ridley's characters is certainly a poor man's hack job as created. But when turning conventions slightly on its head by having Lily planning her revenge on the innocent (in this case, on Ben's pregnant wife), a disturbing effect begins to loom over the proceedings. Our leading lady is fully focused in her distressing role, Ridley plays it weak which definitely fits but bad man veteran Karel Wong steals the film in yet another repelling act. Always with his clunky ass cell phone taped to his hand and after dishing out as much hurt as he can, through Wong we cringe at violence executed here. Be it his multiple scenes of raping Lily Chung, kicking other assorted women around or fighting brutally with Ridley, there's a cast effect over The Rapist Beckons that fits it firmly in the camp of films it belongs to. It stands out as a little bit more effective too. |
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