The Bravest Revenge (Review)

Posted on January 8, 2019 by Tars Tarkas

The Bravest Revenge

aka 武林龍虎鬥 aka Wu Lin Long Hu Dou

1970
Written by Tin Goh
Directed by Kim Lung

Can you believe there is a Polly Shang Kuan film where her parent is killed and she has to seek revenge? I know, right? That only happens in like 99% of the films she did, and it happens here! Revenge will be gotten, and of the bravest sort, at least that’s what the title claims! We all know who Polly Shang Kuan is, so no need to do a deep dive into her, but if you want to know more we covered her in an Infernal Brains podcast and she has an active tag on TarsTarkas.NET with plenty of wonderful films! Tien Peng is his usual heroic self as Sword King Tsai Ying-che, and Yee Yuen hams it up as the glorious villain like he usually does in films such as The Flying Swordgirl

Director Kim Lung (aka Chien Lung) helmed Taiwanese flicks in the 60s and 70s, many featuring revenge themes and many featured female protagonists. Among his films are these cool-sounding ones from 1966 – The Lady Spy, The Flying Killer, and Queen of Female Spies Jin Gang. He also directed 1967’s Dragon Inn, not to be confused with the classic King Hu 1967 Dragon Gate Inn. Most of his filmography is either unavailable or known only to those who collect Taiwanese kung fu movies, and Bravest Revenge might be his best known film now.

Bravest Revenge is actually pretty good for a standard murder revenge kung fu movie, because it has huge fight sequences. There are multiple scenes of characters carving their way through dozens of people like butter in giant choreographed fights, they are fantastic! The last 30 minutes is an almost non-stop battle through themed stages of a giant fortress as the heroes slice through goons and are only occasionally slowed by the various mini-bosses. If this came out today this would be accused of imitating a video game, but it is from 1970 and all we had for video games then was things like Spacewar!, so maybe it is more accurate to say all video games stole from Bravest Revenge!

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Dark Lady of Kung Fu (Review)

Posted on June 12, 2012 by Tars Tarkas

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

What happens when you buy cheap drugstore makeup!

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!

Goth Zorro vs the Spray Paint Kid!

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.

Someone gave those hands from Labyrinth their own show!

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.

More Batman than Batman

	Butterfly Bandit (Pearl Cheung Ling) – She’s a mystery and robbin’ from the rich to give to the neighborhood! Look out, evil rich dudes, you’re about to join the 99%!
	Monkey G (Pearl Cheung Ling) – The leader of the beggar group known as the Monkeys, and master thief. She used to be a lower case g, but now she’s full capital Monkey G. She’s totally not Butterfly Bandit, why would you ever think of such a thing? Just because she’s never in the same place at the same time is just a coincidence! Have YOU ever been at the same place as Hitler? I rest my case….HITLER!!!!!
	Shadow (Tien Peng) – A mysterious fighter searching for his missing mad father and he gets very angry when people disrespect his shadow. Way to take that Me and My Shadow song waaaaaaay too seriously, dude! He is the handsome love interest for Monkey G.
	Madam Kim Simon (???) – A crossdressing lady who owns the fighting club. Her father is evil and planning a rebellion, but Madam Kim doesn’t stand for his evil ways.
	Sheriff Feng (???) – A goofy guy with a fake mustache is ordered to track him down (at this point they think Butterfly is a dude) and recover all the stolen gold – or he’ll be killed and deducted the amount of missing gold.
	Houdini (???) – I knew that Magician was a jerk! Now he’s stopped his humbug quest and is trying to fund rebellions in China! Luckily for China, the Butterfly Bandit is on the case!

How dare you say this movie is hard to follow! Only I may say that!

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Jade Dagger Ninja (Review)

Posted on September 24, 2009 by Tars Tarkas

Jade Dagger Ninja

aka Han shan fei hu

1982
Directed by Li Chao-Yung

There are no ninjas here. Jade Dagger Ninja suffers from being brought over to America in the middle of the ninja craze. The dubbing is comedic, with cartoon effects as characters go flying or go to the bathroom (yes that happens.) Some of the lines are laugh out loud hilarious, but I am certain some of them aren’t the actual lines unless Taiwanese cinema has taken to including English puns in their Chinese dialogue.

Jade Dagger Ninja is known by many names: Han shan fei hu, Jade Dagger, Forest Duel, Shaolin Fox Conspiracy, and the Wu-Tang Clan “Liquid Sword Collection” VHS Title Celestial Souljas.

The plot is pretty ludicrous, and most of it isn’t explained until the end (and then only if you were paying attention) so most of the time you will have no idea what is going on. The basic story is everyone wants the Purple Jade Badger, because it has an elixir that will make your kung fu super powerful. There is also a battle brewing between Sunset Villa and the Heartbreak Red gang. Throw into all that an upcoming wedding and Liu Hsiao-Feng arriving hoping the events will draw out the killer of his wife and you have a film with plots so deep you need a flowchart. Everyone has multiple names, which only makes it even more confusing. So you get our best guess from watching the film twice.

	Liu Hsiao-Feng (Tien Peng) – The Flying Fox has been searching for his wife’s killer for three years. This leads him to get involved in the marriage of Aurora Liu and a battle between Sunset Villa and the Heartbreak Red gang. A pun master.
	Aurora Liu (Doris Lung Chun-Erh) – Aurora is called the Sunset Fairy. Aurora Liu spends the entire film getting attacked by all sorts of evil people and getting rescued from every one of these evil people by Liu Hsiao-Feng, who she isn’t even engaged to.
	Hao Yu Long (Tin Hok) – engaged to Aurora Liu and a big jerk. Spends most of the film fighting with Liu Hsiao-Feng even though Liu Hsiao-Feng has saved his fiancée like 2000 times. Then he turns out to be evil.
	Sai Chu-Chu (Chin Meng) – A woman with an enormous libido and very extreme sexuality. Directly asks men she just met if they want to have sex. For some reason everyone calls her ugly, despite the fact she is the best looking cast member. Was raised by Madam Sheng after her parents were killed.
	Governor Liu Tin Chi (Wang Hsieh) – Father of Aurora Liu, was engaged to Madam Sheng but left her to marry the dying daughter of a medic who saved his life. Keeper of the Purple Jade Badger. Is the Governor of Sunset Villa, which is the traditional enemy of the Heartbreak Red Gang.
	Madam Sheng (Gua Ah-Leh) – The bitter ex-lover of Liu Tin Chi is now the evil head of the Heartbreak Red gang. Yes, it is an outlaw gang of people whose hearts have been broken. This is what happened in a world before LiveJournal and MySpace let you write bad poetry online.
	Shen Liu Hen (Shut Chung-Tin) – Killer of Liu Hsiao-Feng’s wife three years ago, and has been pursued by Liu Hsiao-Feng ever sense. Was injured and lost his kung fu powers, but the Purple Jade Badger would restore him to a kung fu master. He is also known as Shining Death.
	Heartbreak Warrior (Yun Zhong-Yue) – Also known as the Whirlwind Warrior and as Wai Yu-lin. This guy has too many names. A big fan of rape.
	Master Cold Heart (Chung Wa) – Flute Guy! Flute Guy kills people with his flute. He also leaves a flower pin behind as his trademark in some sort of plot device that never got dealt with in the film as he dies halfway through. Where is Master Cold Stone Creamery?
	The Incredible Hulk (Shut Chung-Tin) – HULK SMASH!! Shen Liu Hen drinks of the purple jade badger and transformers into the great green menace. Now we know what was in the purple jade badger – gamma radiation!