Dark Lady of Kung Fu (Review)
Dark Lady of Kung Fu
aka 蝶無影 aka Di wu ying aka Butterfly Pearl aka Dark Lady of Butterfly
1983
Written and directed by Pearl Cheung Ling
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What happens when you buy cheap drugstore makeup!
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When evil dudes with bad ‘tudes are up to no goods, the Dark Lady of Kung Fu will fly in and rob the crap out of them, and then go all Robin Hood with their money! Yes, Pearl Cheung Ling has the director’s chair and the writing chair, and the world will never be the same! Dark Lady of Kung Fu is a remake of the Shaw Brothers’ film The Black Butterfly, which is a sort of remake of Black Rose and other female noble thief flicks. It’s all about the connections, man!
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Goth Zorro vs the Spray Paint Kid!
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This is one of several films written and directed by Pearl Cheung Ling, one of the few female directors out of Taiwan, who became an auteur force directing and writing three films and being heavily involved in the production of a few more, as well as television series and music. She has a very distinct fantasy style that has garnered her many loyal fans and many shared clips on YouTube. Because this is a Pearl Cheung Ling flick, you can expect lots of goofy things going on. Morons in positions of authority will be humiliated by Pearl Cheung Ling’s character’s brilliance. Pearl will wear crazy elaborate pre-gothic lolita costumes. There will be wirework.
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Someone gave those hands from Labyrinth their own show!
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The worst part of Dark Lady of Kung Fu is I own two versions of it, and they both are either fullscreen or fake widescreen where it’s obvious there is things going on just off camera. Both copies also suffer from the same awful English dubbing. How many of the puns are native to the script vs. made up by the dubbers is a mystery that won’t be solved until we get a proper subtitled verison. So we’ll not know if henchmen Laurel and Hardy are really named those names. Not to mention the guy named Cool Han Look. Come to think of it, there is no way those names are native to the script.
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More Batman than Batman
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How dare you say this movie is hard to follow! Only I may say that!
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Categories: Bad, Movie Reviews Tags: martial arts, Pearl Cheung Ling, Taiwan, Tien Feng, Tien Peng, Wang Hsieh, Wong Chi-Sang, Yeung Hung
Golden Nun (Review)
Golden Nun
1977HKMDB Link
Directed and written by Tyrone Hsu Tien-Yung
Golden Nun is another in a long line of Taiwanese flicks that are pretty much unknown here and filled with goofy things. In this instance, we got a bald headed lady monk who fights a ghost girl, and at one point this bald nun becomes golden. Thus, the title. Does it make sense? Hell no! But why let that stop you? Taiwanese films are like…films…that….stuff. Yeah. Uh. Okay, maybe I need an actual metaphor and should stop winging it. So there have been more Taiwanese films than usual reviewed here recently, largely due to the fact I got a hold of a bunch of odd ones and am cranking them out slowly but surely.
What is weirdest about Golden Nun is that it is a musical! Inspired by Chinese opera stuff so there are a few random songs. The first one comes out of nowhere, but you get used to them.
Names are best guesses based on dialogue, they might be completely wrong, but too bad! Since this review is about it for English language mentions of Golden Nun, you are going to take what you can get and like it! We have no subtitles and no patience. But at TarsTarkas.NET, we don’t need no stinkin’ subtitles!
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Categories: Movie Reviews, Ugly Tags: Hopping Vampires, Hu Chin, Lam Dai, Lee Tao Hung, Lor Tok, Taiwan, Tien Feng, Tyrone Hsu Tien-Yung, We don't need no stinking subtitles