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InBad, Movie Reviews

Black Rose (Review)

August 22, 2009By

Black Rose

aka Hei mei gui aka 黑玫瑰

1965
Directed by Chor Yuen
Written by Hoh Bik-Gin
Black Rose
Welcome to a trip to some classic Cantonese cinema. Not only are we going to review Black Rose, but we’ll be hitting the sequel, The Spy With My Face, as well as one entry from the 1990’s, and an eventual rewrite of our review of Protege De La Rose Noire. Yes, that previous sentence will get edited as the other reviews appear here. Eventually. Maybe.

Black Rose was basically the beginning of the Jane Bond films. It did not start the strong female character/super hero genre, but popularized it to the point where Black Rose is known as the standard bearer of the genre. This blog entry going over some of the wonderful films featured on the SoftFilm blog features a cornucopia of films with strong female leads.

Connie Chan Po-Chu was born in 1947 and is the daughter of two Beijing opera stars (Chan Fei-nung and Kung Fan-hung) She was not only trained in classical opera style (specializing in male roles) but also trained in both Southern and Northern martial arts styles. Connie made her film debut in 1959’s The Scout Master, and became a breakout star in the 1960s. Her last film was 1972’s The Lizard (also her only film for Shaw Brothers and one of the few that still survives in color, The Spy With My Face was filmed in color even if it doesn’t seem to have survived that way.)

Black Rose
Unlike her fellow teen queen Josephine Siao, Connie Chan stepped out of the limelight after her retirement, though she does emerge from time to time in stage presentations on TV (much to the excitement of my in-laws, who spend a frightenly long time trying to capture just her performance from a TV special onto a DVDR despite barely knowing how to turn the computer on.) More information on Connie Chan can be found on Movie Fan Princess. The site is run by duriandave of SoftFilm, who also supplied me with the vcds used to review the two Black Rose films. Check her out in action in Lady Black Cat and The Furious Buddha’s Palm.
Black Rose
Nam Hung was born as Su Manmei. Her mother and sister were also stage actresses, but I don’t think they were in films. The stage name Nam Hung means “fame of the south”. She began stage performing in 1950 and moved to films in 1953. She set up the Rose Film Company in 1962 with future husband Chor Yuen (also the director of this film) She starred in many Chor Yuen and Chan Wan films, and was a coproducer of Black Rose and its sequel. She was also in the original House of 72 Tenants, which was remade and then both inspired Steve Chow’s Kung Fu Hustle. Nam Hung moved to tv in 1976.

Director Chor Yuen was born in 1934 as Cheung Bo-kin, the son of Cheung Wood-yau, a Cantonese cinema actor. After studying chemistry in college, Chor Yuen joined the cinema world, first as a screenwriter (under pen name Chun Yu) and then worked as assistant director to Chun Kim. His directorial debut was The Natural Son in 1959. He helmed all sorts of films over the years. Notable films include 1963’s Tear-laden Rose, 1968’s Winter Love, and 1968’s Young, Pregnant and Unmarried, a comedy capitalizing on the youth craze in Hong Kong (also starring Connie Chan). Chor Yuen joined Cathay in 1969 and started focusing on wuxia films. Then he moved to Shaw Brothers in 1971. Intimate Confessions of a Chinese Courtesan was one of his films there (he later remade it as Lust For Love Of A Chinese Courtesan) Besides the Rose Film Company with Nam Hung, Chor Yuen formed his own company Ligao Film in 1985
Black Rose

Patrick Tse Yin is probably best known to Western film fans as the evil guy in Shaolin Soccer, but he was a huge star in Cantonese film in the 1960s and is a pretty cool dude and leading man. But for people like me who were first exposed to him playing a jerk, we will always have that image stuck in the back of our minds when we see him play good guys. Patrick Tse Yin is the father of Nicholas Tse (seen here with his wife Cecilia Cheung in The Promise.)

The Black Rose series of films goes like so: The 1960’s had the first two entries, Black Rose and The Spy With My Face/Who is That Rose? in 1966. Then there was nothing until a revival in the 1990’s with homage films that are basically love stories to 1950s and 1960s Cantonese cinema. There are three films in this set, 1992’s 92 Legendary La Rose Noire (written and directed by Jeff Lau), 1993’s Rose, Rose, I Love You (directed by Jacky Pang and produced by Jeff Lau), and 1997’s Black Rose 2 (directed by Jeff Lau and Corey Yuen Kwai). The series was recently revived as a vehicle for the pop duo The Twins in 2004 for Protege de la Rose Noire. I doubt there will be any direct sequels to this due to the whole Edison Chen sex photo scandals which enveloped Twin Gillian Chung in its tentacles when she showed up naked online. Teresa Mo was the Black Rose in Protege, continuing the loose connections between the films (she was one of the apprentice Roses in 92 Legendary La Rose Noire.)

The VCDs we watched were without English subtitles, but we don’t need no stinking subtitles! And my lovely wife translated. So take that, not released on DVD film!
Black Rose

Agon the Atomic Dragon
InMovie Reviews, Ugly

Agon the Atomic Dragon (Review)

August 16, 2009By

Agon the Atomic Dragon

aka Maboroshi no Daikaiju Agon

1968
Directed by Norio Mine and Fuminori Ohashi

Agon the Atomic Dragon began as a 1964 TV miniseries Maboroshi no Daikaiju Agon (Giant Phantom Monster Agon) produced by Nippon Denpa Eiga (Japan Radio Pictures), but a four year argument with the sponsors of the show delayed it airing until 1968. The four shows were combined into a movie in the 1990s, and that is where most Western audiences became familiar with it.

The four episodes are titled:
Agon Appears – Part 1
Agon Appears – Part 2
A Dangerous Situation – Part 1
A Dangerous Situation – Part 2

The Agon monster suit was created by Fuminori Ohashi, a protégé of Eiji Tsuburaya. The suit was modified with sabretooth fangs and resurfaced on the first episode of The Space Giants as Dinosaur, and was then brought back as Aron for episodes 13-16. And that is the end of Agon. More information here.

Agon was released on dvd in Japan, so swim to Japan and pick up a copy. Or order it from the internet. Or if you are in Japan, then just go to the local DVD store and head past the many many many aisles of anime porn until you reach the giant monster rows and it should be there. Somewhere.

Agon (Etsuji Higashi) – Agon is short for “Atomic Dragon” and looks suspiciously like another fire-breathing lizard. Giant Phantom Monster Agon is sort of a jerk, and he smashes up power stations and refuses to kill a little kid that is trapped on the boat that is in his mouth for hours. Why won’t you kill that kid, Agon? Agon then acts like a dog and gets distracted.
Goro Sumoto (Shinji Hirota) – Goro is a star reporter despite being late constantly. This should tell you the quality of journalism in Japan. Goro is the Gilligan of Japanese reporters, for he bumbles around and he wears a white hat a lot.
Detective Yamato (Asao Matsumoto) – Detective Yamato hangs out with his good buddy Goro all the time despite being a hard-boiled detective and Goro being a klutzy simpleton.
Professor Ukyo (Nobuhiko Shima) – Professor Ukyo not only names Agon, but he knows a lot of professor stuff and does work with nuclear power.
Satsuki Shizukawa (Akemi Sawa) – Professor Ukyo’s assistant and love interest to Goro. She owns a dog who likes to sit in the middle of the road and tease drivers. This dog is destined to be a pancake. Is one of those girls who falls down when running from monsters and gets trapped.
Monta (Yoshihiro Kobayashi) – This annoying kid is our stupid Kenny character. Nuke all Kennys from orbit and spit on their graves.

Young Flying Hero
InMovie Reviews, Ugly

Young Flying Hero (Review)

July 22, 2009By

Young Flying Hero

aka Return of the Magic Serpent

1970HKMDB link
Directed by Tong Chim
Written by Poon Lui

Young Flying Hero is a rare Taiwan film. It is so rare I even wrote a Rare Movie Time!!!! post about the film, thinking I would never get to see it. But, rare Asian films have been falling out of the sky recently, and one of those films just happened to be Young Flying Hero! There are no subtitles except for permanent Chinese subtitles, so that’s no real help. But this is TarsTarkas.NET, we don’t need no stinking subtitles!

Young Flying Hero achieved semi-legendary status as hard to find among collectors, due to a painted poster that appeared regularly on ebay and some lobby cards with giant monsters. But hardly anyone could get a hold of the actual film. Thus, people began to wonder just what kind of monster action happens on screen. Having now seen the film, I can tell you it is actually a children’s film, with a young boy as the main character. The giant monsters appear briefly in the film despite their prominent place on the poster art, with less than five minutes of screen time at the very end. There are too few Chinese giant monster films (other notable films are the equally as rare (or even lost) Devil Fighter and rare War God.)

Taiwan fantasy is rapidly becoming one of my favorite subgenres because it can be both insanely bizarre but amazingly entertaining at the same time. There are about a dozen more Taiwan fantasy films in the pipeline, many of which are responses to the Shaw Brother’s epic movies. But I’ll save a history of those films for one of the other Taiwanese fantasy films, because I haven’t finished writing it yet. One interesting thing is the alternate title for the film is Return of Magic Serpent, which may be a reference to the Japanese film Magic Serpent!

Enough background, let’s get on with the show!

Brother (Pa Gwoh) – Our Young Flying Hero! The son of a family captured by the Evil Warlord, and trained by a mystical sifu who gives him flying powers. Then he frees the kingdom and becomes a bored kid general. His name might be Tee-Sho.
Sister (Hong Ling) – Sister of the Young Flying Hero and the maker of some food that wakes up the Sleeping Beauty. Doesn’t do much except get captured repeatedly.
Goofy Hair (???) – Goofy Hair is the son of the guy who turns in the family of our hero to the Evil Warlord. Unlike his father, Goofy Hair isn’t a greedy idiot, even if he doesn’t have the best hair stylist. He is the Piggy of Young Flying Hero.
Evil Warlord (Chiu Keung) – Evil Goofy Mustache Black Wolf symbol on outfit. He is so evil he takes over the kingdom, but doesn’t kill the rulers right away because of politics. Eventually, the Young Flying Hero kicks his Evil Warlord butt. He reminded me of Phantom of Krankor from Prince of Space.
Scorpion Guy (???) – Scorpion hat and dual claw blades that look like weapons straight out of Battle Beasts.
Centipede Guy (Yeung Fui Yuk) – Have you ever seen a dude with a centipede hat and a centipede weapon? Because you have now.
Spider Woman (Tin Mung) – Special power includes creating giant spider webs and the power to pull people into said spider webs.
Frog Guy (Lu Wei) – Has tiger stripe clothing but his hat is a goofy frog hat and the dude is fat like a frog.
Lizard Guy (???) – Has a snake-themed crown, lizardy weapons and a costume that looks sort of like scales.
Giant Frog (Himself) – He’s a big naughty frog who shows up and smashes some castles but he doesn’t have immunity to little kids flying down his throat and chopping stuff up. Is probably Frog Guy in Giant Frog form.
Giant Dragon (Himself) – A Giant Dragon shows up because we need giant dragons doing…stuff… and then he dies. Yeah. Way to be a dead giant dragon, Giant Dragon. Is probably the Lizard Guy in Giant Dragon form.

James Band 007
InMovie Reviews, Ugly

James Band 007 (Review)

June 16, 2009By

James Band 007


1980
Directed by ???

James Bond ripoffs seem to exists in every culture’s movie repartee. Some countries churn out dozens of them, especially during the boom years of the 1960s and 1970s. So it is only fitting the comedians get in on the act. Spy spoof films also seem to show up in every country. Spy films are a genre ripe for spoofing, because they are usually freaking ridiculous on their lonesome. James Bond even approached self-parody with cheesy ridiculous entries like Moonraker. So it comes to no surprise that we have a Thai James Bond spoof. The surprise is the film has survived to the point of hitting VCD, which pretty much means we will have at least a low-res version of it forever. Hooray for low-grade film archiving.


Now, I originally got this film off the eThaicd website as a whim, looking for something to fill the order up enough. I didn’t expect this to be anything special, I didn’t even expect it to be a comedy. I was surprised when I opened the package and looked through my vcds, just to notice that the cover to this one included a tiny C-3PO and R2-D2 at the bottom of the film poster. I expected that I would scan in the VCD cover, make a joke about how I liked those droids and couldn’t wait to see them, then get all mad when they never showed up. But the movie punked me. Because…C-3PO and R2-D2 are in this movie! Seriously! Sure, generic Thai knockoffs, but it is them and that is who they are supposed to be! It is one of the most awesome movie discovery I have made. Of course, I included clips of the droids in action. Just stay put. I did some research on the cast, since the only thing written in English about James Band 007 is the order page on the eThaicd website.


James Band (Thep Tienchai) – A bike cabbie who takes over the mantle of James Bond when he is killed in his taxi. Thep Tienchai gained fame in the 1970s using his bad looks and missing teeth in his comedy act, but he has since passed on. He can also be seen in the films Pher Jorm Pern, Tah Tien, and Yod Manood Computer (where snot flows from his nose.)
The Villain (Lor Tok) – The Villain of the piece (I never caught his name) is evil and wants to destroy the world. He has robot goons, and lots of henchmen. Lor Tok was born Sawong Supsamruay, and eventually became one of the greatest comedic actors in Thai cinema. His film debut was in 1933 in Wan Chakayan. Among his over 1000 films roles he starred in the comedy horror Dracula Tok, which had a cartoon series based on it after his 2002 death. He established his own production company in 1969 called Tok Boom Parpayon.
Contact (???) – The contact James Bond was supposed to meet and James Band now meets instead. She may be named Pani Ka. Incredibly thin. Not afraid to tromp around in a bikini.
Thai Moneypenny (???) – James Bond means lots of hot chicks, so of course one of them will work for the secret agency that James Bond works for. Thus we dub her Thai Moneypenny because we didn’t catch her real name. The actress seems very prolific, I have spotted her on several posters.
Thai M (???) – The Thai M heads the secret agency that the James Bond of Thailand works for. His agency is so powerful that some random rickshaw guy saves the day.
James Bond (???) – Thailand has their own James Bond, except he isn’t very good at dodging assassin’s bullets and ends up becoming 00Dead. Luckily, James Band takes over!
A2B (???) – The C-3Po droid of our evil Villain. Gold skin, evil laugh, short temper, he is every bit the C-3PO we all know and love.
A2A (???) – The R2-D2 droid of our evil Villain. I believe his name is A2A, but I am not sure so don’t yell at me for my less than fluent Thai. A2A likes to peep, and argues with A2B about everything. Their battles can get violent. A2A is made out of a bunch of vents, filters, and gauges.

InBad, Movie Reviews

How the Ape Girl Stole the Lotus Lamp (Review)

February 13, 2009By

How the Ape Girl Stole the Lotus Lamp

aka 白猿女三盜寶蓮燈

1962HKMDB Link DianYing Link
Directed and written by Wong Fung

There is a lot of old Chinese cinema. Many films were made in the post-war period based on plays, operas, folk tales, and old novels. There was also a bunch of original content created. These old films have handpainted backgrounds, origins in operas and classical tales, and were produced quickly and cheaply. That doesn’t stop many of them from being interesting. I am fond of old-style effects, goofy plots, and stylized action as long as the film remains interesting. And in between all the older love/opera/drama type stories, there is a large pocket of wuxia/swordplay movies just waiting to be discovered. Although the audience for these films was large long ago, nowadays few people are even aware of them. Older Chinese people know of the films, but most of them don’t watch them regularly anymore, and even fewer have websites on the internet. So any specific film backgrounds I can find is few and far between (or in the case of this film, almost non-existent!) Heck, there is no IMDB entry for this film (no surprise there), and even the often reliable Hong Kong Movie Database has the wrong English name for the film.

Tribute is paid to these classic movies in the film Kung Fu vs. Acrobatic, which even co-stars Walter Tso Tat-Wah, one of the stars here and dozens of other classic films. How the Ape Girl Stole the Lotus Lamp is a lucky pick grabbed from a Chinatown movie store based solely on the pictures on the back of the VCD, which included some kids dressed up like monkeys. I am happy to report there are crazy monkey children in the film, but there are also lots of other cool retro effects. Even if I didn’t have my wife there to translate the film for me I would have been entertained (although slightly more confused.) The VCDs for these old films have no subtitles (why would they? I am one of the few non-native Cantonese speakers who would watch these) so the best to hope for is lots of fun stuff happening on the screen.

The VCD case makes the presence of Josephine Siao Fong-Fong well known, though at the time this movie was released (1962) she hadn’t taken off into super-stardom (where her major competitor would be the other, bigger 1960’s Cantonese sweetheart Connie Chan – seen here in Lady Black Cat) so Josephine has a supporting role in this film. Josephine Siao would later become a major leading lady, and participate in many of the Jane Bond films of the late 1960s and even do many films with her “rival” Connie Chan. She first appeared in 1954 and two years later won the Best Child Actor award for Orphan Girl. Like Connie Chan, she also had an impressive output in the 1960s, but in 1969 she slowed down her acting to focus on education and marriage (to actor Charlie Chin, which lasted three months – she later remarried and had children) She later appeared on TV as the bumbling plain Jane character Lam Ah Shun in 1977, followed by three films (one of them was Plain Jane to the Rescue, directed by a young John Woo). She is probably best known to fans from the 1990s for her parts as Fong Sai Yuk’s mother in the Fong Sai Yuk films. See the Jane Bond article for more of her films.

Sek Kin is another major Hong Kong actor making a supporting role here. Usually Sek Kin played villains and evil men in his movie roles. He was the ultimate Hong Kong villain character actor for decades. Oddly enough, although his character is a jerk in several scenes in How the Ape Girl Stole the Lotus Lamp, he isn’t the villain, and ends up doing some pretty noble things near the end. It was sort of weird seeing Sek Kin as a non-bad guy, I have only seen him in a few films but he was always over the top evil. Bruce Lee chose him as the villain in Enter the Dragon. At the time of this writing Sek Kin was still alive and kicking at age 95! He is also in Lady Black Cat where he plays a more common evil villain role.

Fitting with Chinese films, the cast is enormous, so here are the major players listed out (that way we can get shoutouts to all the more obscure Chinese actors and actresses that probably have next to nothing written about them in English.)

Mo Kwun-tin (Walter Tso Tat-wah) – Strong fighter and student of the White-haired Nun, Mo Kwun-tin defends people being harassed and wants to marry Wong Kam-fung. His heroic nature gets him into trouble. Walter Tso Tat-wah began as extra and then a director in the beginnings of the Hong Kong film industry. He soon starred in front of the camera, and by 1941 he had appeared in over 80 films, but then Japan invaded and the industry ground to a halt. After making a fortune on the black market, he returned to films in 1946 and was part of the Wong Fei Hong series of films. He had his own production company, but he was also a heavy gambler and lost a lot. He starred in wuxia ad detective films in the 1960s and eventually wound up on television after returning from retirement.
Wong Kam-fung (Yu So-chau) – Daughter of Wong Yut-pao and training with the White-haired Nun. Wants to marry Mo Kwun-tin, though her cousin Lam Kim-sing is conspiring to marry her instead. Is a knife expert. Yu So-chau (or Yu So-chow) is the daughter of Master Yu Jim Yuen who ran the China Drama Academy. She started her stage career at age 8 in 1938 and began her film career in 1948, eventually making over 240 films. She was the Queen of the wuxia films and no actress has come close to appearing in as many as her (over 170). After her marriage in 1966 she retired a few years later, her last appearance was a cameo in 1970. Since she supposedly lives in San Francisco now I may have run into her on the street without having any idea who she was! I’ll just pretend I did because it sounds more impressive. More information on some of Yu So-chau’s films can be found at our blog entry and this SoftFilm blog tag, and don’t forget this Electric Shadows piece.
Leung Yin-yuk (Chan Wai-yu) – Sister who is training away, saves her brother who runs the restaurant. Is attracted to Mo Kwun-tin, but he doesn’t share her affection. Teams with Lam Kim-sing to steal the Lotus Lamp, but is betrayed.
Leung Yin Bing (Josephine Siao Fong-Fong) – The second Leung sister, instead of training under the White-haired Nun she guards the magic plant for Taoist Priest White Ape. Is called White Ape Girl, but is primarily called Yin Bing by her family. Steals the Lotus Lamp after overhearing her sister’s plans, disobeys her sifu, and generally causes a lot of trouble while not being evil or anything. I gave Josephine Siao a biography earlier, you better have read it!
Cousin Lam Kim-sing (Lam Kau Hei-ho) –He is trying to marry Wong Kam-fung, so he is against Mo Kwun-tin. Steals the Lotus Lamp, a lamp so lotus-y all other lamps are jealous. Eventually dies and is White skull driven reincarnated. You read that right! Lam Kau has acted for 50 years, from 1950 until his last film appearance in 2000. He was in many of the Wong Fei-Hung films. Lam Kau started his own drama school in the 1960’s and later became Sir Lam Kau Hei-ho.
Wong Yut-pao (Sek Kin) – Protector of the lantern and a jerk, but turns into less of a jerk after the lamp is stolen and when his future son-in-law Mo Kwun-tin is sick. Sek Kin got a mini-biography up top so I ain’t repeating it here. Yes, laziness. Deal with it!
Leung brother (Sai Gwa-Pau) – He runs the hundreds of restaurants the Leung family is supposed to own, has buck teeth and a stutter. He is called Ah Goh because that means brother. Sai Gwa-Pau (Sai Kwa-Pau) made films from 1947 until 1995! Sai Gwa Pau was famous for the role of Ah So in the Wong Fei Hung films. Sai was born on October 7, 1918 in Guangdong, China, and died in Hong Kong on March 21, 2001. His nickname was “watermelon scoop!”
Mo Kwun-tin’s father (Cheung Sing-fei) – Father of Mo Kwun-tin, hence his name! I don’t know his character’s name, they didn’t bother to mention it in the film. One of the two guardians of the Lotus Lamp along with Wong Yut-pao.
Beast King (???) – A great ape. Actually, a captive of White-haired Nun and pitted in gladiatorial combat against her students! Where is the ASPCA? This poor gorilla. I don’t know who is in the suit. Maybe it was a real gorilla in the gorilla suit. Because that would be cool.
White-haired Nun (???) – The female sifu! She trains the original four in the ways of swordfighting, knife-throwing, and gorilla destroying. Because they will run into plenty of gorillas in ancient China. I am not sure who played her.
Taoist Priest White Ape (Cheung Sing-Fei ?) – Trains Leung Yin Bing, master of the ape kids, and collector of cool artifacts. He can fly, teleport, hire apes, command apes, command ninjas, and make invading parties go through a bunch of challenges. Being a sifu must be boring if he has to mess with so many people like that. I think he was played by Cheung Sing-Fei (Cheung Seng-Fei) but I am not certain.

InBad, Movie Reviews

Lady Black Cat (Review)

February 9, 2009By

Lady Black Cat

aka Haak Ye Maau aka 女賊黑野貓

1966HKMDB Link
Directed by Cheung Wai-Gwong
Lady Black Cat
One genre from older Chinese films which is barely known today despite how awesome some of the films are is the Jane Bond genre, which are films with tough female leads who are either spies or thieves or super-heroines who beat the tar out of evil dudes. Women as central figures has a long history in Chinese opera/film, and some of the earliest surviving Chinese films have female fighters as leads. The popularity of James Bond translated to female leads wearing slinky outfits, disguises, and beating up lots of dudes. There was a whole ton of these films produced in the 1960’s, many starring Connie Chan Po-Chu and/or Josephine Siao Fong-Fong. Sadly, many are lost today.
The Jane Bond films were proceeded by films based on the Oriole, the Heroine (Wong Ang) stories, a series of books which were first shown on film in the 1950s. Even those came from the Nuxia (swordswoman) genre, which dates back to at least 1928’s The Burning of Red Lotus Temple, the first martial arts blockbuster and which spawned 18 films total in the series. Here is some more information.
Lady Black Cat
There is also an article I wrote on Jane Bond films here, which references several other good articles written on the subject. The most famous of the Jane Bond films is probably the Black Rose films (also starring Connie Chan Po-Chu), which produced a complicated string of pseudo sequels after the one official sequel, which eventually lead to the Protege de la Rose Noire film. Michele Yeoh’s Silver Hawk is also a modern update of the old source stories. The two classic Black Rose films are only available on old VHS tapes, thus we don’t have them.

We do have this old film that made it to DVD, thanks to Chinatown DVD shops and the cheap prices there-in. Lady Black Cat is a heist film starring a thief who is a girl dressed as a cat who steals from the evil rich guy and beats up his goons single-handedly. It has an unrelated sequel, Lady Black Cat Strikes Back, starring essentially the same cast with the same plot (except instead of a diamond being stolen it is a role of microtape.) Director Cheung Wai-Gwong is also credited as Jiang Weiguang depending on your translation methods, he directed the sequel and many many other films from the mid-1940’s until the 1970s. He was also a prolific writer for films during that period.
Lady Black Cat
The internet is helping shed light on this forgotten classic films. Good links in addition to the ones above include Connie Chan – Movie Fan Princess, The Lucha Diaries, Teleport City, Electric Shadows, SoftFilm Blog, Illuminated Lantern, and probably many more unsung sites that I don’t have links to at the moment. There is not much written about this genre, it has much to discover and reviews are much needed. Do your duty and locate films today, write up reviews tomorrow, and sign up for the Mobile Infantry. Service guarantees citizenship!
Lady Black Cat
There are no subtitles on the DVD, wife translated some of the names and some of the plot, so I have some of the character’s names (but not the main two) My Cantonese is sub-elementary school, but I am slowly but surely catching on to a bit. At TarsTarkas.NET, we don’t need no stinking subtitles, but will accept help from out lovely wife!

Lady Black Cat (Connie Chan Po-Chu) – Lady Black Cat robs from the rich and helps the poor, she’s like Robin Hood except a girl, dressed as a cat lady, and doesn’t lead a band of outlaws in fighting a corrupt government. Besides helping a nice family in this film I am not even sure she gives to the poor that much. But she does stand up to Tong Long, who is somehow considered a respectable businessman despite being a corrupt lecherous theif and killer.
Girl Friday (Connie Chan Po-Chu) – Connie Chan Po-Chu’s name is sometimes written as Chen Baozhu. She starred in a bajillion films and was one of the reigning Hong Kong cinema queens in the 1960s (the other was Josephine Siao Fong-Fong.)
Detective (Bowie Wu Fung) – Bumbling detective who is as sharp as a Jello basketball. Bowie Wu Fung was a constant onscreen partner of Connie Chan Po-Chu, they were in too many movies together for me to count, because I am lazy.
Tong Long (Sek Kin) – The movie’s bad guy. He is a rich evil guy, I don’t know how he got so much money, why everyone in the city seems unemployed except by him, and why no one seems to punish him for being evil except Lady Black Cat. Sek Kin’s name is sometime written as Shi Jian or Shih Kien. He also costarred with Connie Chan in dozens and dozens of films. He usually played the villain character, or people with evil intents. We will give a better biography of him in another review where there is more room in the introduction. As of this writing he was still alive at the age of 95.
Lisa (Yu Mei-Wa) – Mistress of Tong Long who does some of his evil doings, and seems oblivious to his hound dog ways. Or she doesn’t care. Or it excites her. Who knows? Manages to get kidnapped at some point.
Lam Suk-Ying and husband (Fong Sam and Do Ping) – Lam Suk-Ying is in trouble, she and her husband are awash with money troubles. Lam has a sick mom and her father, Ah Cheung, is framed for theft and later killed by Tong Long. And you think you had a bad day!

Lady Black Cat

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