Fight for Survival (Review)
Fight for Survival
aka 十大掌門闖少林 aka The Fight for Shaolin Tamo Mystique aka Shi da zhang men chuang Shao Lin aka Lady Wu Tang
1977
Written and directed by Hou Cheng
Hold on to your hats with shock, as here is a Polly Shang Kuan film where things are weird! I know, right? Who would have thought! As usual, it’s a good weird, part of the kung fu comedy atmosphere of the late 1970s. Fight for Survival/Fight for Shaolin Tamo Mystique (the much cooler name I first learned of the film as!) is packed with a bunch of big named cameos, characters who developed odd body modifications thanks to whatever kung fu specialty they have, gender bending, cornball comedy, and terrible dubbing. If you enjoy characters with extending arms and legs, who employ weird headbutts and walk on their hands, or who are randomly painted up as animals and waiting in rooms at the Shaolin Temple, then you are in for a treat.
The version I have is fullscreen and dubbed, which is a shame, as this film has a lot of neat choreography and costumes that requires a widescreen high-definition transfer to get the best effects. I guess I can expect that the same day the widescreen Monkey War shows up on remastered Blu-ray, aka NEVER! What a shame the wildest and craziest movies are also the most ignored when it comes to high quality.
In this film, Polly’s character Shih Pu Chuan sets out to recover 10 books stolen from the Shaolin Temple, each volume teaching one kung fu technique, and each technique has been mastered by the respective theif of that volume. But, if you only learn one of the kung fu skills, your body soon begins to modify itself based on that kung fu skill. Thus, the guy who learns to extend his arms has permanent long arms. The guy who stretched his legs looks like he’s walking around on stilts. The woman who stole the Positive Kung Fu book turns into a man, and the guy who stole the Negative Kung Fu book turns into a woman. The only way to not get physically screwed up is to learn all the skills so there is a balance. Even Shih Pu Chuan isn’t immune, her female character begins to turn into a man, and her sifu can’t remember how to do Negative Kung Fu. That leads him into discovering the Temple let the books get stolen and her subsequent quest. At one point it is declared that the villains can’t turn back to normal because they are evil, which might be saying that without balance, you are evil. Just remember, folks, every thing in moderation.
Of course, that also leads to yet another film where Polly Shang Kuan plays a gender bending character. This time she’s officially playing someone who is both sexes, though her long term goal is to stay a female. The only real disadvantage of turning male is gaining a faint mustache and having lots of ladies falling in love with you. As the main lady is the woman who used to be the man who stole the Negative Kung Fu book, things become tragic irony.
The main tale of the training and quest only eats up about an hour of the running time, we then have extended scenes where the many cameos attack Shaolin Temple because their followers (some of the followers were involved in the theft and some weren’t) are arrested in public. Now Shih has to defend her home from all these new people, but thankfully she now has lots of skills with which to do so.
The crazy specialties of the thieves gives us some awesome goofy kung fu, along with a whole host of guest stars who pop up when the thieves impersonate them in the beginning, and then return in the end when the real versions of the masters attack the temple. The cast is one of those ridiculously huge casts that makes me want to do a Roll Call 30 people long, and is filled with actors who aren’t identified very well. Luckily, I came to my senses, and it’s only 4 people long! We’re aren’t obsessively stupid at TarsTarkas.NET for nothing!
Like most of the Taiwanese kung fu comedies, the humor is a mix of slapstick and reaction shots. These aren’t films that are taken seriously by hardcore martial arts fans. Add to that the ridiculous dubbing and often awful fullscreen vhs presentation, and you can see why these flicks don’t get any respect. Which is a shame, because the ri-donk-ulousness is awesome! I’ll take a film that knows how to have fun over a dramafest that takes itself far too seriously any day!
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Categories: Movie Reviews, Ugly Tags: Chan Sam-Lam, Chan Wai-Lau, Che Chi-Sang, Chen Lei, Cheng Fu Hung, Chia Ling, Don Wong Tao, Elsa Yeung Wai San, Fang Mien, Gam Sai-Yuk, Hoh Si-Man, Kam Kong, Lee Keung, Lui Wan-Biu, Lung Suen, martial arts, Polly Shang Kuan, Sze Ma-Lung, Taiwan, Tang Gok-Yan, Wang Tai-Lang, Wen Chiang Lung, Weng Hsaio-Hu, Yuen Si-Wo
Thrilling Sword (Review)
Thrilling Sword
aka Shen jian dong shan he
1981
Directed by Cheung San-Yee
Written by Shing-Ming Huang
This film rules!
It is a Taiwanese take on Snow White, which needed giant monsters, guys turned into bears, demon worship, and crystal swords. Take that, Disney! The film is filled with fantastic elements, just when you think the film has exhausted its supply of weird wonderness, it shows that Thrilling Sword has barely scratched the surface. Parts of the film remind me of He-Man, to the point where I suddenly became interested in He-Man again after years of not being interested and now know all sorts of new stuff about He-Man.
Thrilling Sword is one of many awesome fantasy films that came out of the Taiwanese film industry. At the time, they were competing with the Shaw Brothers and their elaborate and expensive productions. No Taiwanese company could compete in making their films look just as good, but that didn’t stop them from trying or from going over the top with the fantasy aspects. And that makes the films that came out of Taiwan from the 1970s and 80s some of the weirdest and most fun films. It is a shame that so many of the films are hard to find or even lost. Many of the surviving films are only found on fullscreen VHS tapes that are running on thirty years old (luckily, most have been archived digitally, so even if the film never is released again it won’t disappear.) This particular rip is taken from a TV broadcast, which is supposed to be more widescreen than the fullscreen VHS releases of Thrilling Sword, but then I saw a VCD case while looking up cast info on the film, so there is at least VCD copies around, which means there might be a DVD somewhere, but who knows how good that copy is. But this is one film I would put extra time into hunting down an upgrade for.
Thrilling Sword has also been released under the titles Heaven Sword and Thrilling Bloody Sword. So now you know. Director Cheung San Yee also directed a few classics such as Lady Constables and Snaky Knight Fights Against Mantis. He also wrote Island Warriors and came up with the story for Challenge of the Lady Ninja.
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The Dwarves!
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Raising the roof!
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Challenge of the Lady Ninja (Review)
Challenge of the Lady Ninja
aka Nu ren zhe
1983
Directed by Lee Tso-Nam
The movie takes place in sort of a weird universe where it is World War 2 between Japan and China, but everyone wears 1970s fashion and there are 1970s Cadillacs. Due to the weirdness, I postulate that Challenge of the Lady Ninja takes place in the same alternate universe as Fantasy Mission Force. If you are familiar with both flicks, you will see that makes perfect sense, even if Challenge of the Lady Ninja doesn’t jump genres at the drop of a hat.
Thanks to crafty distributors, the film goes by several names. The version watched for this review is supposedly the uncut version dubbed into English on a widescreen VHS release. Whether there is a superior Chinese language version with subtitles I do not know. What I do know is this film is cool and has a chick kicking lots of butt, so it gains points from that alone!
Challenge of the Lady Ninja has been released under a bunch of names, see if you can find the name you saw it under!: Chinese Super Ninja 2, Never Kiss a Ninja, or Nu ren zhe.
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Categories: Movie Reviews, Ugly Tags: Chen Kuan-Tai, Elsa Yeung Wai San, Kam Yin-Fei, Lee Tso-Nam, ninjas, Peng Kong, Robert Tai Chi-Hsien, Skeletor, Sun Jung-Chi, Taiwan, Women who kick butt, Yeung Hung, Yin Su-Li
Island Warriors (Review)
Island Warriors
aka Yang yang jun
1981
Directed by Ulysses Au Yeung-Jun
An ancient kingdom of women fight for survival in the brutal sea, facing a rival male tribe as well as marauding pirates. Along the way they learn to love men and not be Amazons, but until then we have plenty of scenes of women fighting guys, which is the kind of thing I enjoy on my TV screen. There are things I don’t enjoy, namely castration, but as the film seems to think you have no ill effects besides turning gay it is less difficult to watch than films with blood spewing everywhere. Island Warriors is a Taiwanese production, most noticeable with the cast names in the beginning, and a few Taiwanese actors who pop up.
Most of the names are just guesses, thanks to the ambiguous credits and terrible sound quality from the VHS tape (Restored DVD for Island Warriors? Why bother when Into the Blue 2 and Bratz Babyz are taking their place on the shelves! EDIT – I guess now there is one!) The worst part of explaining movies like this with 18 or so main characters is setting up who is who. No matter how organized the beginning section is, half of the time I get confused and I’m the one who writes the review! The confusion is doubled when the credits fail to say who the actors play, and character names become guesses or nicknames given due to them never being named on camera. Oddly enough, it is also one of the best parts of explaining these films, as even if I am completely wrong it is the movie’s fault and not mine. Taiwanese films around this time are one of the worst offenders on having dozens of semi-famous people popping up in the film that I feel obligated to recognize, and mixed up with several different ways of translating Chinese names so you will see a familiar actor running around with a completely different name. So the Roll Call will be long, confusing, but the best we can get with what information we have. If you see something that looks like an error, or know more information, feel free to shoot me an email or drop by the message board. I had help through *Kung Fu Films* and the HKMDB
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