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Insee Payong

Insee Payong (Review)

Insee Payong

aka Proud Eagle

1986
Directed by ???

By the 1980s and 90s, Thai film had entered a funk of low budget action fare, uninspiring plots, and studio bosses who feuded with each other, hampering the efforts of the few rays of light. It is no surprise that in the midst of all the random action films, someone would try to capitalize on the awesome action films of the 1960s and break out an Insee Daeng film. But what to do? Mitr Chaibancha is long dead. None of the new action stars had his kind of swagger. Nor could you hit them on their burner, prepaid wireless. The bigger money (as far as I can tell) was with female action stars. Thus, Insee Daeng got chick-ified!

Thai action queen Jarunee Suksawat became Rome’s long-overseas daughter, who takes up the Insee Daeng mantle to defeat and evil gang of evil guys who are doing something evil. I’m not quite sure what, but it’s evil. Evil, I tell you! Don’t worry, fellow 80s action hero Sorrapong Chatree is along for the ride, and we even have a secondary female character, a tough cop played by an actress that I sadly do not know the name of. All the violence you know and love is back, along with some other tropes such as the costume switcheroo, an evil Insee Daeng, the cops getting into huge gunfights, Insee Daeng’s real persona being friends with many cops, and Insee Daeng killing scores of people.

Jarunee Suksawat was one of the action queens of the 1980s (another is Suriwan Suriyong, two of whose films show up in the Catman films) Jarunee was dubbed an action queen despite not having the proper training (which she will readily admit!) but ended up starring in scores of action films over the years. Eventually, Thai cinema became even less profitable thanks to television and the aforementioned feuding studio bosses, leading to less movie roles. Combine this with Jarunee being sued by someone for slander, who did nothing but travel around Thailand suing her in every province until he died, causing her to waste her time defending herself constantly, and it was time for a break from film that lasted for years, until she returned recently to television dramas and shows up in the film Queens of Langkasuka.

What we also have is another Thai VCD encoded so awesomely it makes VLC kick out lots of random extra video screens that do nothing but will kill the program if I close them instead of minimizing them. Weird, but a habit of some of the shoddy VCDs (Whoever puts out the Dara Singh VCDs is also guilty of this!) My favorite part is when the end of disc one glitches and the sound gets an echo effect that doesn’t go away for ten minutes. It makes everyone sound like aliens from V (the original, not the awful remake.)

The score is now synthesizer stuff or just outright stolen (possible the synthesizer stuff is also stolen and I just don’t recognize it.) I’ll point out when the Battle of Hoth theme is used down below. I’m a little lost as the only problems with the print is overbled colors and it doesn’t look like it was dragged through a pack of wolverines on crack. But I think I can get used to it! Once again, we don’t need no stinking subtitles! For more Insee Daeng information, please see our reviews of Awasan Insee Daeng, Jao Insee, and Insee Thong.

The Girl (Jarunee Suksawat) – I don’t know her character name, so I’ll just call her Jarunee. Returns from overseas and takes up a job at the police station. Also takes up the mantle of her father, becoming…
Insee Daeng (Jarunee Suksawat) – Yes, a female Insee Daeng shows up exactly when Jarunee returns to Thailand. But that’s not suspicious at all. This Insee Daeng murders everyone who is evil with poison darts. There is more dart action in Insee Payong than in Darts, the Movie. Which isn’t a real movie. Or maybe it is…
Cop (Sorrapong Chatree) – The main cop who also goes after bad guys and has to worry about Insee Daeng cutting in on his action. Sorrapong Chatree was like “Hey, it’s the 1980s in Thailand and you’re making a film, that means I’m in it!” and just kept coming to the set each day so the producers made him the lead actor. What else could they do?
Female Cop (Marisa Udomporn) – She’s a cop, she’s a female, she’s Female Cop! Female Cop doesn’t put up with crap from rich jerks who tear up tickets and will arrest them in front of crowds. She also hates Insee Daeng and dedicates herself to catching her. I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s supposed to be Detective Chart’s daughter. But I can’t tell.

Insee Thong

Insee Thong (Review)

Insee Thong

aka Golden Eagle

1970
Directed by Mitr Chaibancha

Insee Thong is a legendary film in the annals of Thai cinema, and would be legendary even if lead actor Mitr Chaibancha hadn’t died filming the last scene of the film. As we’ve seen in our reviews of Awasan Insee Daeng and Jao Insee, the Insee Daeng/Red Eagle films have been increasing in pace, scope, and vision. The villains Insee Daeng faces become more Bond villainesque, and the secret conspiracies are grander, more dangerous, and better armed. In Insee Thong, a gang of communists are using Insee Daeng’s persona and a mad scientist hypnotist to assassinate journalists, while their group prepares to overthrow the government of Thailand. To combat them, Insee Daeng becomes a new hero, Insee Thong (Golden Eagle), and sets out to bring down the gang, clear his name, take out the impostor, and once again save the day.

Insee Thong (and most other Thai films of this era) was shot on 16mm color reversal stock with no synchronised sound, meaning the sound was added live as the films played by film dubbers employed by the regional theater house. Dubbers would follow the script for the most part, but were known to add regional references and topical humor. Some of the film dubbers became famous in their own (similar to how playback singers in Indian film become famous in their own right), Sin Sibunruang aka Tit Khiaw being the first famous dubber. Local dubbing continued until somewhat recently in some regional theaters. You can see Thai film dubbers at work in movies such as Monrak Transistor and Bangkok Loco.

Older Thai films have a distinctive look due to their 16mm reversal film stock origins. The reversal film stock keeps some colors longer than most other types of film, and when the films look washed out they still have vivid colors. There isn’t really another group of film that looks like it. The 16mm film means there was never an original negative, so there is nothing in archives except old scratched up 16mm prints, if anything at all. Most prints where projected until the stock was dead, and any surviving prints were scratched to hell and back. Luckily, Insee Thong is a particularly popular film so a lot of copies were made, causing the surviving prints to not be as scratched up as usual.

The limited amount of original prints the producers made were distributed around the country, both to cinemas and to traveling exhibitors who would project the film onto sheets from the back of a truck in rural areas. Some of these stories remind me of the old US drive-in circuit and stories from David Friedman, as well as some of the tales of how low budget horror is done in India.

From ThaiWorldview, here are the three kinds of open-air cinema:

  • Nang kai ya (หนังขายยา) – promotional shows by traveling herbal-medicine salesmen at temple gatherings. Informally called “movies to sell drugs”.
  • Nang lom pha (หนังล้อมผ้า) – shown in conjunction with a big feast. Dinner and a movie!
  • Nang klang plaeng (หนังกลางแปลง) – special event open-air shows, usually free due to a sponsor and timed with events such as funerals.

The studio system in Thailand at the time consisted of pumping out hundreds of films a year, as there was no TV to take up the entertainment slack. Movie stars such as Mitr and Petchara Chaowarat would film dozens of films simultaneously, sometimes moving non-stop from set to set working all day and getting no sleep. These were called klang plang films, and the half-dozen big stars like Mitr couldn’t even change their hairstyles, because it would affect multiple films. Some companies would combine parts of worn out prints with the same stars into new films, and give a new script to the dubbers. And sometimes the dubbers and theaters would do it on their own!

Mitr Chaibancha appeared in 1/3 to 1/2 of the movies made each year between 1958-1970. Exact numbers are not known due to scattered record keeping from the frantic pace of filming. Mitr and Petchara Chaowarat were the leading couple during the 1960s. Their luk thung musical Monrak luk thung played in cinemas for six months. Nang rim maung (หนังริมเมือง) is a term referring to films that make more money in the suburban areas than the urban cities. Many modern Thais look down on these old films, derisively calling them nam nao (น้ำเน่า) – stinky water. This term even applies to the cheap action films from the 1970s and 1980s. The films from this era did inspire director Wisit Sasanatieng to make Tears of the Black Tiger, and we all know he then went on to direct the disappointing reboot of Insee Daeng (more on that in the Insee Daeng 2010 review!)

Mitr Chaibancha’s death on Oct 8, 1970, lead to the incompletion of at least 20 films (I’ve seen estimations of almost 40!), most of which were junked or quickly finished with doubles for Mitr. As those films were using the 16mm reversal film stock, the death of Mitr lead to a transformation of the Thai film industry, so when production companies regrouped and began to promote new talent, they had switched to 35mm film with synch sound.

Successors to Mitr Chaibancha include Sombat Metanee and then Sorapong Chatree. Petchara Chaowarat was followed by Aranya Namwong as the next big box office draw. Other names of note are Pitsamai Wilaisak, Yodchai Meksuwan, Jarunee Suksawat (who stars in Insee Payong), and the last superstar couple, Santisuk Promsiri and Jintara Sukapat. By the 1990s, most Thai stars had moved to tv drama soap operas called lakorn toratat (ละครโทรทัศน์). But those decades are stories best told in reviews of films from those periods. There has been some resurgence in Thai film this past decade, largely led by Panna Rittikrai/Tony Jaa/Jeeja Yanin martial arts movies, but also spillover from the Asian horror boom, a few big budget action spectacles, and some intellectual/art house films.

He’s dead, Jim

So let’s get to Insee Thong! Insee Thong is awesome, and I don’t say that lightly. It is a good introduction to Thai action films, and holds up pretty well 40 years later with its quick pace and near-constant action. There is plenty of weird cool stuff going on, and you won’t be disappointed. Insee Daeng must deal with an impostor working for the communist Red Bamboo gang (it is never addressed if it is the same Red Bamboo gang as the ones in Godzilla vs. the Sea Monster, but I’ll just declare it so and that makes the Red Bamboo the unluckiest communist gang ever.

By now age is starting to show on Mitr Chaibancha, he looks a bit out of shape, less trim than his previous outings. But he’s still physically fit enough to run around and shoot people and seduce women. For more information on Mitr Chaibancha, you can check out the best biography in English I’ve seen at the Bangkok Post. We’ve also included a gallery of photos at the bottom of this review.

Women have more spots than leopards!

This release has subtitles? I’m so confused…now I’ll know what’s going on!

Insee Thong (Mitr Chaibancha) – Red Eagle is now Golden Eagle so he can stop a fake Red Eagle who is evil.
Rome Rittichai (Mitr Chaibancha) – And Rome is still running around being drunk and getting into trouble despite being retired from Insee Daeng.
Oy (Petchara Chaowarat) – Rome’s girl is around to still get him out of jams and help save the day.
Detective Chart (???) – That cop is back again! And this time he’s involved in the crazy communist journalist murder fake Red Eagle case. It’s a very famous case. It’s this case! I’m again guessing he’s Adul Dulyarat but not certain.
Poowanat (Kanchit Kwanpracha) – The son of Preeda Panayan and evil dude who helps run the Red Bamboo communist gang
Impostor Insee Daeng (Kanchit Kwanpracha) – He’s fake, he kills people, and it’s amazing no one figured out this scam before.
Bakin (Ob Boontid) – The bald mastermind behind Red Bamboo and who sends red Buddhas Don’t tell anyone that Preeda Panayan is Bakin. Bakin studied hypnotism where Rasputin did, but is more powerful because he can hypnotize himself and his soul into multiple pieces

Awasan Insee Daeng

Jao Insee (Review)

Jao Insee

aka The Eagle

1968
Directed by Chalong Pakddivijit

In the beginning of the Awasan Insee Daeng review, we went over the origins of the pulp heroes and the violence romance stories. Now we’ll specifically look at the character of Insee Daeng. From what I can put together from bad translations of Thai websites, there were 9 original Red Eagle tales, and author Sek Dusit quit writing them after the death of Mitr Chaibancha in 1970. That wasn’t the end of the film series, nor the end of the stories, as pulp comics and stories would continue to be published for decades. Here is a collection of covers from various Thai pulp comics.

Insee Daeng would make occasional returns to the silver screen after Mitr Chaibancha’s death, but it would be an irregular occurrence. Information on some of the movies are so scarce I don’t know if they are supposed to be part of the canon or their own reboots. Insee Payong features the daughter of the original Insee Daeng, Rome Rittichai, returning to Thailand, while the 2010 film Insee Daeng is a clean reboot.

Sek Dusit has revealed that Insee Daeng was inspired by Rock Hudson in Captain Lightfoot, and Insee Daeng became one of the most popular pulp heroes. It is no surprise that Mitr Chaibancha would be chosen to portray Insee Daeng on screen, as he was the most popular actor in Thailand at the time, appearing in 1/3-1/2 of the films produced each year. More discussion on the Thai film industry at the time and Mitr Chaibancha and Petchara Chaowarat will be in the opening to the Insee Thong review. I gotta leave some sort of hook to get you to come back (and it also fits in better there, as you will see!)

Sek Dusit Insee Daeng stories:
The Red Eagle
Dragon’s Claws
Black Rose
Savage Battle
Death Roars
Dragon’s Flight (later renamed White Dragon)

Red Eagle Filmography:
Jao Nak Leng aka The Gangster (1959) – Deals with the origins of Red Eagle and his first big case against gangsters.
Thap Samingkhla (1962) – Red Eagle fights against The Snake Gang with the help of the police and a female detective from Hong Kong.
Awasan Red Eagle aka The End of The Red Eagle (1963) – Insee Daeng retires after a defeating more bad guys. Or will he….?
Pisat Dam aka Black Demon (1966) – Red Eagle fights against a spooky villain Black Demon
Jao Insee aka The Eagle (1968) – You are currently reading the review of this. Don’t you pay attention?
Insee Thong aka Golden Eagle (1970) – The final film of the main series, Red Eagle becomes Golden Eagle to take down an impostor Red Eagle who is murdering journalists and is part of a secret communist gang.

After the death of Mitr Chaibancha, Insee Daeng films would occasionally be made…
Bin Diao aka Solo Flight (1977) – The main character wears a black mask, but I don’t know if he is supposed to be the same character or not.
Phrai Mahagan (1980) – The title means “Ghost” something, and it looks like the main character is supposed to be the original Red Eagle
Insee Payong aka Proud Eagle (1988) – Features Thai action queen Jarunee Suksawat as the long-overseas daughter of the original Red Eagle returned to Thailand to take up his legacy and killing lots of bad dudes.
Insee Daeng aka Red Eagle (2010) – The reboot of the series updating it into a modern superhero.

There was also a Red Eagle TV series in the 90s that’s now impossible to find out much about thanks to the flood of 2010 Red Eagle links. And for you die hard fans, there is a softcore version of Insee Daeng called Nang Paya Insree Daeng (นางพญาอินทรีแดง) that features a female Insee Daeng. I am unable to find out what year this was made, but it is almost certainly not official.

Posters for all of these films are included at the bottom of this review.

Jao Insee features Red Eagle getting drawn into the middle of a big conspiracy of murder and mayhem, causing him to go undercover once again, not as Insee Daeng, but as a safecracker in need of a razor blade as he joins the evil gang lead by a guy in a white mask. Who is killing important people with knives with skulls on the end? No, not the Dolph Lundgren Punisher! Featuring Rome’s partner Oy suiting up as a masked crimefighter herself and machine-gunning down dudes.

The print on this still looks terrible, but only small sections are missing huge chunks of the film. It clocks in at close to two hours, so it probably mostly complete. It still features the semi-modern dubbing, due the Thai films at the time being shot on 16mm film with no synch sound, thus sound was provided by the theaters by actors giving lines as the film played. Like most of these films, there are just way too many damn characters, so here are the most important ones:

Insee Daeng (Mitr Chaibancha) – He’s Red Eagle, he’s awesome, and he’s busting bad guys while seducing the ladies.
Lynx (Petchara Chaowarat) – Rome’s long-suffering wife now has to pick up some slack and put on a costume to save cops from being murdered by the evil assassination gang. Luckily, she’s an expert at gunning down multiple armed men like most Thai women.
Rome Rittichai (Mitr Chaibancha) – Rome spends most of his time drunker than Barney Gumble at the Duff Beer Factory. But he is secretly Insee Daeng, the coolest man ever.
Oy (Petchara Chaowarat) – Oy helps Rome in his investigations and helps cover his slack while he’s undercover, when she decides to become Lynx.
Sing aka Undercover Rome (Mitr Chaibancha) – Rome goes undercover to infiltrate the evil gang who may know that Rome is Insee Daeng.
Detective Chart (???) – Detective Chart is still around, this time he has a new main partner and becomes marked for death by the assassination gang pretty early in the film (before the credits, even!) That’s some crack of dawn death marking if I ever did see it. I think he’s played by actor Adul Dulyarat, but I’m not positive.
Other Detective (???) – He’s the new detective on the beat who then gets beat by the bad guys, along with seduced, kidnapped, attempted murdered, and insulted. All in a day’s work for Thailand’s Finest…
Masked Evil Dude (???) – Masked Evil Dude is a criminal mastermind not afraid to run around with a ridiculous mask. Probably because he can teleport! Seriously, he can teleport! One would think with that skill you wouldn’t need a gang, just bamf your way into the local bank vault. Between the mask and the teleporting, he has a real Michael Meyers thing going on.
Bowtie Boss (???) – Mid-level boss in the gang that recruits Rome when he’s disguised as Sing.

Awasan Insee Daeng (Review)

Awasan Insee Daeng

aka The End of Red Eagle

1963
Directed by ???

Insee Daeng (Red Eagle) is the most famous super hero out of Thailand. Starting out as a pulp novel character, Insee Daeng was immortalized in film by popular actor Mitr Chaibancha, who became a legend before dying tragically while shooting the final scene of the sixth Insee Daeng film, Insee Thong. TarsTarkas.NET will review the surviving Insee Daeng films and the rebooted film, because that’s how we roll here.

Awasan Insee Daeng is the third Insee Daeng film, but it is the earliest surviving Insee Daeng film. Unsurprisingly, the vcd release is just titled Insee Daeng, which is the title of the original entry in the series, but that film is believed lost. We will deal more of the history of the Insee Daeng film series in our review of Jao Insee, and information about the stars Mitr Chaibancha and Petchara Chaowarat and early Thai film industry in the review of Insee Thong. For now, we’ll instead have a history of post-World War 2 Thailand, gun culture, and the pulp stories movement that gave birth to Insee Daeng and his contemporaries.

Thailand’s love of pulp heroes who take the law into their own hand has its roots in World War 2. During the war, Siam (as Thailand was known then) was invaded and quickly made a deal with Imperial Japan. But there was a covert resistance movement, known as Seri Thai or the Free Thai Movement. Before World War 2, the amount of guns in Thailand was minuscule, and most guns were breech-loading one-shotters. Seri Thai was armed by the Allies, while Japan used Siam as a staging area and guns flowed through it. By the end of the war, hundreds of thousands of guns were spread all over Siam, and soon rural bandit gangs began to form and terrorized the populace. The lack of police ability to control the bandit gangs lead to much dissatisfaction and unrest. Eventually this resulted in a Thai tradition, overthrow of the government, installing the Sarit regime in 1958. The Sarit made it a priority to take out the bandit gangs, though many persisted for years, and resurfaced as mafia in less than a decade.

The gangs controlling the countryside mixed with urban populace hungry for books was a perfect storm for the rise of pulp heroes who confronted the bandit gangs or were bandit leaders themselves that acted in a Robin Hood fashion. The stories were serialized in daily magazines, some of which became so popular people would line up awaiting the next issue, sometimes right outside the printing press. The four major authors associated with the pulp hero stories were Poh. Intharapalit, Phanomthian, Sek Dusit, and Soh. Navaraj. There is scare information on some of these crime/violence romance novelists and most of this information is from a single source that pulls from other sources in Thai. The common themes of the stories are main characters who are rich and educated, usually with secret identities, who fight against gangs, corruption, communist plots, and grand conspiracies while outsmarting the villains and simultaneously staying ahead of the police at every turn.

Poh. Intharapalit first gained fame with the 1932 drama Nakrian Nai Roi, but it was his “Three Buddies” stories that started during World War 2 that established his writing popularity. By 1947, he was editing the daily serial fiction magazine Piyamit, as well as writing the serial story Sua Bai (Tiger Bai)/The Bandit Called Bai). Sua Bai began the romance violence genre, with its story of a noble bandit who fights against a corrupt government. The unofficial story in the publishing world is that Intharapalit was “requested” to end the story by the police to to avoid their looking bad for failing to catch a fictional character. He then began a new series, Sua Dam (“Tiger” Dam/The Bandit called Dam), who would in a later series meet Sua Bai and team up. His four other famous characters are Dao Chon (Bandit Chief), Luk Dao Chon (Son of the Bandit Chief), Nakak Dam (Black Mask), and Yiao Thale (Sea Hawk).

Phanomthian started writing as a high school student, and later went to university in India. Upon returning to Thailand in 1955, he began publishing his stories in the magazine Ploenjit. Hao Dong (Wild Cobra) stands out because it has a female costumed heroine in the lead, sporting an all-black costume except for the giant cobra pictured on her shirt. Later creation Lep Khrud (Garuda’s Nail) featured a secret agent Cheep Chuchai vs. secret Chinese communists lead by Chang Suliang.

Soh. Navaraj was the youngest of the violence romance writers. His most famous creation was Yiao Ratree (Night Hawk), a hero with black outfit and a black mask in the shape of a hawk that fought crime by night but during the day was pretend madman and rich scion Man Damkoengdej. Besides aping Red Eagle’s costume, Night Hawk was also involved in fighting secret communist societies.

Sek Dusit began writing in his early 20s, gaining fame with a hero named Khom Phayakharaj in stories See King (Four Kings) and Khrud Dam (Black Garuda). Khom fought against criminal organizations threatening Bangkok, and the stories . In 1954, the 25 year old Sek Dusit would start stories of his most famous creation, Insee Daeng (Red Eagle). Millionaire son Rome Ritthikrai went undercover as hero Insee Daeng and fought against criminal gangs and communist plots, often injecting the cold war paranoia into his classic bandit tales. He is still alive, but now just writes astrology columns.

Sek Dusit

Sek Dusit says you got Capricorn in your Leo!

Here is a collection of covers of Insee Daeng and other hero books and comics.

As the Thai film industry was getting big in the late 1950s, it made sense that some of these hugely popular stories would end up on the silver screen. And while I can’t say for certain every pulp hero that made it to the cinema, I can give many examples of both direct book-to-movie heroes, and heroes that possibly started in pulp or were inspired by the pulp heroes.

In addition to the Insee Daeng series (a more complete summary of that film series will be covered in the Jao Insee review), Thai pulp bandit heroes movies include:

1958’s Hao Dong, starring Amara At-Savanon (2nd Runner-up Miss Thailand 1953 who starred in scores of films before retiring) as the bandit heroin with a cobra logo on her shirt. I do not know if this film still exists. More info in Thai.

Amara At-Savanon as Hao Dong


Hao Dong poster


Hao Dong poster

1958’s Mong Daeng (Red Bandit), which I can only find old ads for, featuring another female hero. There is a modern tv drama series by the same title complete with a masked female heroine with a whip. I am almost positive it is the same franchise, but not 100% positive.

Mong Daeng poster

Mong Daeng poster


Mong Daeng

Modern Mong Daeng artwork

1959’s See Kings based on Sek Dusit’s story, also costarring Amara At-Savanon. It was remade in 1982. More info in Thai.

Four Kings

Four Kings promo shot (autographed!)


Four Kings poster


1963’s Kewpit aka Poison Fang, starring Mitr Chaibancha and Amara At-Savanon. Kewpit is a black masked hero similar to Red Eagle, judging solely from the lone movie poster I could find. Thaifilmdb info.
Kewpit

Kewpit poster


1981’s Yord Ying Poo Ying Yai starring Sombat Metanee. This one I can tell you does still exist on an out of print vcd.
Yord Ying Poo Ying Yai

Yord Ying Poo Ying Yai mocks the internet for not locating a copy


And there is this movie that I haven’t IDed yet, but the picture was labeled Yiew Ratree:
Yiew Ratree

Who you callin' a Rat Tree?

And don’t worry, if you missed reading any of this, it will probably be ganked verbatim without attribution by a certain site profiling superheroes who live.


Awasan Insee Daeng is a typical Thai film of the time, filled with that Thai comic relief stuff in much of their films that I don’t understand. There are comic relief effeminate characters filled throughout, even one of the police detectives. These comic relief characters both allow for humor in the film and also serve a function in making the male hero even more hyper-masculine than you ever thought possible. But that doesn’t mean the effeminate guys are wimps, a whiny detective goes toe to toe with Insee Daeng and although he loses, he manages to bruise Insee’s face enough he has to lay low until he heals.

Infernal Brains Podcast – Episode 05 – Turkish Pop Cinema Part 2

The Infernal Brains are still around, and thanks to this new episode I have an excuse to throw up the graphics I threw together on Inkscape (click for huge):

In this episode, Tars and Todd finish discussing a mishmash of Turkish Cinema, including a spot where we see double – Four Krustys! Also Two Turkish Phantoms, two other Turkish heroes with Iron in their name, and a devil who does not possess the trait of death.

Download the mp3 (right click, save as)

Watch in slideshow form:

Subscribe to the Infernal Brains on YouTube!

Click the graphic for Podcast Feed:

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Movies discussed include:
Kizil Maske
Kizil Maske
Iron Fist The Giants are Coming
Iron Claw the Pirate
Deathless Devil

Prior Infernal Brains:
Taiwanese Giant Monster Films Part 1
Taiwanese Giant Monster Films Part 2
Polly Shang Kuan
Turkish Pop Cinema Part 1

Inkscape graphics via OpenClipArt

Defendor (Review)

Defendor


2009
Written and directed by Peter Stebbings

Oh, there will be spoilers. So don’t read if you don’t like them.

Defendor – “Fight Back!”

When I first heard of Defendor, it was word of mouth describing Woody Harrelson running around as a super-hero with a duck taped “D” on his shirt. But the film is much more than just some guy as a low-rent superhero. It is a twist on the superhero mythos as well as a semi-realistic take on what a real life “superhero” would be. A guy who isn’t all there upstairs but has his heart in the right place. Most comic inspired films don’t have the same sweet sadness feel of Defendor.

Oh, let’s get this out of the way…

Arthur Poppington / Defendor (Woody Harrelson) – Woody Harrelson is one of the great underrated actors of our times and delivers another great performance as Arthur Poppington and as Defendor. That’s Defendor! He’s got duck tape, marbles, and wasps. Eat your heart out, Batman!
Kat Debrofkowitz (Kat Dennings) – Hooker who ends up crashing at Arthur’s place after they continually cross paths under his guise as Defendor. At first, she is using him, but learns to love the big dope.
Chuck Dooney (Elias Koteas) – Crooked cop whose nasty deeds means he and Defendor run into each other often, especially when Defendor becomes convinced his crook boss is the evil Captain Industry. It’s enough to make a guy want to become a masked vigilante and pal around with some mutated turtles.
Paul Carter (Michael Kelly) – A friend of Arthur’s and his boss at work. Spends most of the film trying to get Arthur out of jams.
Dr. Ellen Park (Sandra Oh) – Psychiatrist appointed by the courts to determine if Arthur is fit to stand trial. Helps set the narrative structure.
Captain Fairbanks (Clark Johnson) – Local police Captain who becomes the Commissioner Gordon for Defendor.