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Bad Blood
InMovie Reviews, Ugly

Bad Blood (Review)

April 1, 2010By

Bad Blood

aka Mit moon

2010
Directed and written by Dennis Law Sau-Yiu

Bad Blood is a Hong Kong crime film that is about Triads and betrayal and having too many characters to give enough of them proper character development. And it isn’t very good. It is saved from being completely boring by one character going absolutely crazy and by Jiang Luxia beating up lots of dudes.

Granted, the only reason I even bothered to see this film was Jiang Luxia was in it, and from the trailer and description it made it look like she was going to be a deaf evil hit girl. And though she is deaf and dumb, she isn’t an evil hit girl and her character actual does stuff and is likeable, more than in Coweb, but no one still has bothered to use Jiang Luxia in a real capacity. Someone get of your duff and do it right, before I fly to Hong Kong and then quickly fly back home after having breathing problems in the bad air quality.

But Triad films are still the rage thanks to affairs of the infernal kind and dudes who are youthful and menacing. So for every HK Triad film you will sort of remember, there are many more that you will not. This might qualify as a film you will remember, but not because of the intriguing Triad relationships.

Audrey Lok (Bernice Liu Bik-Yi) – Audrey Lok is the female heir of a crime family who wants to go straight. Or does she? Beware, for when she cuts her hair she goes from normal to insane! No one will stand in her way. Bernice Liu’s picture was on the wall of a dim sum place I was eating at soon after I watched Bad Blood, so now she is following me and soon will try to tie me to an SUV and set me on fire as well. Too bad she has to wait in line for that chance!
Funky (Simon Yam Tat-Wah) – The default new leader of the gang who presides over most of the gang getting killed and himself killed. What a great leader! Simon Yam was on TarsTarkas.NET before with Fatal Termination and Future Cops.
Calf (Andy On Chi-Kit) –With a face deformed by a birthmark, this illegitimate son of a hooker is the heir to the crime family that is only barely tolerated by the rest of the family. Finds Dumby and takes care of her, but he is used by Audrey to get revenge on everyone. Andy On was Jet in Lethal Angels, so he’s got that going for him.
Dumby (Jiang Luxia) – Dumby is deaf and dumb, hence her name. Dumby talks via texting and sign language. She knows kung fu, having been trained by Calf who found her as an orphan on the streets. Spends her spare time doing amateur super-heroish work. Is not related to the Seven Dwarves or Gumby.
Brother Zen (Michael Chan Wai-Man) – An older gang member with grey hair and smart enough to figure out things despite being a lower-tier guy. But he gets killed regardless. That’s what you get for being named “Brother Zen”!
Kong (Xiong Xin-Xin) – Kong is a gang member who also runs a gym. That’s about it for his character, and then he’s killed. Xiong Xin-Xin has probably done action choreography in many films that you have seen. Or maybe not, because I don’t know what you’ve been watching. He also directed Coweb.
Hung (Ken Lo Wai-Kwong) – Another member of the gang who does stuff and then gets killed. You gotta love characterization like that! Ken Lo has been an HK actor for decades, and has made appearances on TarsTarkas.NET in Future Cops and Nobody’s Perfect.

High-Kick Girl
InBad, Movie Reviews

High-Kick Girl! (Review)

March 25, 2010By

High-Kick Girl!

aka Hai kikku garu!

2009
Directed by Fuyuhiko Nishi
Written by Yoshikatsu Kimura and Fuyuhiko Nishi

High-Kick Girl was one of four films that came out or were announced close together that featured new female fighting talent as the leads, the others being Coweb from Hong Kong, Fighter from Denmark (review forthcoming), and Chocolate from Thailand.

For what is undoubtedly a low-budget flick, it does mush of what it sets out to do. The main goal is to showcase the karate skills of the stars, with plenty of real karate action and moves. Forget your wire work and CGI. The amount of prep work required must have been enormous for such a low-budget affair. Rumors abound that stunt people had to go take MRIs for having so many kicks to the heads and were really upset that the fighting was all “real” and they didn’t do takes where punches and kicks were pulled.

One constant stylization that High-Kick Girl uses is the different angle slow-mo instant replay. Many of the more brutal hits are instantly replayed from an alternate angle slow enough for you to enjoy them. This happens often enough that it probably added 20 minutes to the length of the film

Many of the characters are given introductions with their names when they first appear on screen. One problem is the fact the intros are in Japanese with no subtitles. I can read some of the characters, so there will be a few actual names below, but some of them I didn’t catch.

Kei Tsuchiya (Rina Takeda) – A real-life blackbelt in karate who will kick you in the head just because she can. This girl kicks high, thus the title, Kick High Girl. Wait, that’s not the title!
Yoshiaki Matsumura (Tatsuya Naka) – Tatsuya Naka is a real life Karate champion, as in a former All Japan Karate champion who is now the Japan Karate Association lead instructor.
Kei’s buddy (???) – Kei’s buddy who documents her attempts to beat up everyone in the universe.
Ryuzoku (Sudo Masahiro) – Matsumura’s former associate with a grudge. Ryuzoku is part of a larger mob of goons who all hate Matsumura, and he gets to him by going through Kei and using her to track down his foe.
Genga (Amano Koji) – Leader of the gang (the Destroyers) with a grudge against Matsumura. What this grudge is, I don’t know thanks to the no subtitles, but my guess is Matsumura

Honey Bunny Wildcats in Strip Royale
InMovie Reviews, Ugly

Secret Undercover Agent: Wild Cats in Strip Royale (Review)

November 20, 2009By

Secret Undercover Agent: Wild Cats in Strip Royale

aka Himitsu Sennyu Sosakan – Wild Cats in Strip Royale

2008
Directed by Keiichi Kobayashi

Secret Undercover Agent Wildcats in Strip Royale continues the tradition of having weird microchips in fashion accessories that do amazing things started in the previous film. Wildcats in Strip Royale also continues the tradition of the film looking freaking gorgeous. The cinematographer should be doing mainstream work in Hollywood, not Japanese DTV exploitation trash. But Hollywood’s loss is our gain! In fact, a lot of directors in Japan get their start doing trashy exploitation work. That’s partially why a lot of the 1970s Sukeban films look so good, along with the hundreds of detective films and pinku films.

The biggest news of the sequel is that Haruna Yabuki left, and was replaced by Reon Kadena. As Reon Kadena has a much higher profile, this announcement caused a large amount of internet buzz that the first film just didn’t have. Although the internet buzz was pretty much “Hey, Reon Kadena is in a movie!” it was enough to raise the profile of the film far above the nothing the predecessor had.

Wildcats in Strip Royale does have a few other things going for it. It is obvious the actresses are having more fun in this one, Yuuri Morishita especially. Some of the costumes are pretty ridiculous and funner than in the original (the cats suits are actual cat suits!) and the plot is easier to follow without subtitles. Yes, that’s right, TarsTarkas.NET doesn’t need no stinking subtitles! I still don’t know the name of their agency or of some of the minor players, but such is life.

Quick lesson for everyone: In Japan, there are these supermodel girls called Idols. Some of them are just models, some do more than that such as singing and/or acting. The big Idols pull in a ton of cash, then marry some rich guy and retire. The lesser Idols do car shows and mall openings and marry midlevel accountants. Most of the bigger Idols have followings all over the web, and there are guys who just scan photobooks of models all day, or host websites that just catalog Idol pictures and news. Idols can specialize in certain genres, like the gravure Idols that star in the film, there are also AV Idols which is a nicer way of saying porn stars. This film will talk of Pure Idols, which is another term used but I don’t know exactly what it means. And let’s not forget the Idols who are thrown so whips can be received.

Honey (Reon Kadena) – Honey has changed! Is it no longer Haruna Yabuki and is now Reon Kadena. Also gone is a lot of the tough loner girl stuff Haruna Yabuki did, Reon’s take of Honey is snobbish at first, then she becomes totally into the Idol world. Honey is still down to business and will beat up guys all the time, so hooray for that! Check out the Reon Kadena Gallery
Bunny (Yuuri Morishita) – The simple and sweet agent with the big rack. Bunny now spends a lot of the film bending over while wearing a short skirt or dress. See Yuuri Morishita in Monster X Strikes Back and on her gallery page.
Capp (????) – We call this guy Capp because we aren’t sure of his character’s name. He is the agent in charge of this little spy ring.
Saki (Minami Otomo) – Reception girl for the spy agency, also specializes as a bartender when doing undercover work in big stings. Although she has more lines in this film, she still doesn’t seem to do much.
Nervous Guy (???) – The other male agent in the spy agency, Nervous Guy is sort of shy but doesn’t really do much except provide someone for Capp to talk to when the girls are undercover. Joins in on big stings like Saki does. I am not sure of his character’s name, either.
Shitagi (Fumie Nakajima) – The evil boss from the previous film shows up again. We also find out she is working for someone even more evil.
Kaori (???) – The new girl and Pure Idol who wants the Wildcats to investigate a series of Nude Pure Idol incidences. I will investigate that for free.

Honey Bunny Secret Undercover Agents
InMovie Reviews, Ugly

Secret Undercover Agent: Honey & Bunny (Review)

November 16, 2009By

Secret Undercover Agent: Honey & Bunny

aka Himitsu Sennyuu Sousakan: Honey & Bunny

2007
Directed by Keiichi Kobayashi
Written by Yoshiyuki Morita

From the land of Japan comes the first of the Secret Undercover Agent films, what is basically a showcase for two gravure idols. For those of you who don’t speak Japanophile, gravure idols are models that pose almost naked, but not quite naked. Thus we have no nudity and have to make due with implied nudity. Don’t blame me for the lack of naked chicks, this is purely a Japanese phenomenon. The two gravure idols are Haruna Yabuki and Yuuri Morishita.

The plot of this and the sequel is there is a secret organization whose name I haven’t ever figured out that does James Bond-type work in the fashion industry. So I am guessing Zoolander was also an inspiration. This allows for the girls to wear lots of skimpy outfits, while at the same time there being action and other things happening. What makes the Secret Undercover Agent movies stand out is they are beautifully shot. They seriously have some of the best cinematography I have ever seen in what is essentially an exploitation film. The film was written by Yoshiyuki Morita and directed by Keiichi Kobayashi, so they get the majority of the credit and blame.

The DVDs come lacking English subtitles, so there will be certain things we are guessing at. At TarsTarkas.NET, we don’t need no stinking subtitles! Another guess is at some of the character names, our rudimentary translation skills were put to the test and found lacking (partially because I didn’t want to devote three times the amount of time trying to find out a character’s name than I was spending writing the whole review!)

Now, we must try not to let exploitation films speak for a culture as a whole, though it does speak for a subculture of the main culture. Do you want Japan judging us based solely on The Hills Have Eyes 2? As far as exploitation flicks go this is pretty tame and would barely even qualify, if it wasn’t so blatant on showing off the gravure girls it could even pass itself off as a comedy.

Honey (Haruna Yabuki) – Shoe-throwing tough girl who spends most of the film not trying to care about anyone. I embarrassed by the smallness of her mammaries. Haruna Yabuki is a gravure model so there are a lot of pictures of her in skimpy clothes around the internet. She does not return for the sequel and the role of Honey is recast. But check out this gallery of images!
Bunny (Yuuri Morishita) – The newest agent, simple and sweet, also has a big rack. Said sweetness and big rackness makes Honey treat her with disdain at first. Yuuri Morishita can also be seen in Monster X Strikes Back.
Capp (???) – We call this guy Capp because we aren’t sure of his character’s name, though it might be Kamakita or Hanzai. He is the agent in charge of this little spy ring, and spends most of the film lusting after Honey.
Saki (Minami Otomo) – Reception girl for the spy agency, also specializes as a bartender when doing undercover work in big stings.
Nervous Guy (????) – The other male agent in the spy agency, Nervous Guy is sort of shy but doesn’t really do much except provide someone for Capp to talk to when the girls are undercover. Joins in on big stings like Saki does. I am not sure of his character’s name, but it might be Hacebe.
Shitagi (Fumie Nakajima) – The boss where Bunny interviewing for a job as a bondage gravure model and involved in some sort of illegal shenanigans. Is a fashion dictator, but manages to escape in the end. I am not sure what her name is, but she was involved in launching the Shitagi Collection so we are calling her Shitagi.

InBad, Movie Reviews

Spy With My Face (Review)

August 27, 2009By

Spy With My Face

aka Black Rose vs. Black Rose aka Hei mei gui yu hei mei gui aka 黑玫瑰與黑玫瑰

1966
Directed by Chor Yuen
Written by Poon Faan
Spy With My Face
The sequel to 1965’s Black Rose has a greatly expanded scope, as the Chan sisters go from being champions of the poor to outright superheroes who take down a sinister secret gang intent on robbing jewelry from all over the city. The James Bond influence is very heavy, as there are a lot of gadgets, microbombs, disguises, and hidden identities. The film also has what sounds like an original score that is rather well done as well (and also Bond influenced).
Spy With My Face
The review of Black Rose has miniprofiles of Nam Hung, Connie Chan, Patrick Tse, and Chor Yuen, so we don’t have to do it here! Hooray for laziness! We also have the overviews of the Jane Bond genre and other interesting links there so we don’t have to link it again here. Spy With My Face is notable because this film was where Connie Chan eclipsed Nam Hung and became a bona fide Hong Kong superstar.

Spy With My Face
A color print does survive in the HKFA vault, but the VCD release is a black and white dub probably made for TV. This sucks, because it would be great to see all the funky colors. At this point in time Cantonese cinema was on the decline as the Shaw Brothers were becoming the standard with their high production values and massive use of color. Shaw was also putting out their own spy films at this time, some with female leads as well.

Once again we have no subtitles, but TarsTarkas.NET doesn’t need no stinking subtitles! And the wife translated about half of the film before deciding it was time for bed, so the rest I just followed along the story as best I could. It all works out fine.

Spy With My Face

Chan Mei-Yi (Nam Hung) – The older Chan sister, who is freed from the constant attention of rich bachelors because she spends the whole film helping her friend Cheung. Is Black Rose along with her younger sister.
Chan Mei-Ling (Connie Chan Po-Chu) – The younger Chan sister who is sassy and tough. She doesn’t put up with bad guys’ crap and would just as soon beat the tar out of them as look at them.
Black Rose (Nam Hung and Connie Chan Po-Chu) – Black Rose moves up from Robin Hood thief to gangbuster as the Black Roses save an entire city from an evil criminal element while saving their friend at the same time. Remember, it is only good to steal if you steal from those who deserve to lose it.
Cheung Man Fu (Patrick Tse Yin) – Insurance investigator and subject of Chan Mei-Yi’s attraction. Gets himself caught up in a nasty situation and replaced with an evil duplicate.
Gold Boss (Cheung Wood-Yau) – All my wife could translate of his name was Gold _____ – so we will call him Gold Boss. If he doesn’t like it, he can get bent. Gold Boss runs the secret society that kidnaps Cheung to rob all sorts of rich people. He’s also a refugee from a Mexican Wrestling film. Cheung Wood-Yau was in film for almost thirty years at this point, and only made a few more films before retiring in 1969 (with one later appearance in 1980’s Duel of Death.)
Fake Cheung Man Fu / #1 (Patrick Tse Yin) – Fake Cheung is the most worthless gang member on the team. Had he not undergone surgery to look like Cheung he would be #0 as he would have been fired. Was saving your job really worth the pain? Despite looking like Cheung, he totally doesn’t act like Cheung at all and dresses in dark shirts and sunglasses in order to look like a gangster, thus keeping his innocent insurance investigator cover. Fake Cheung is not the sharpest of tacks.
#2 (Fung Ngai) – The mute gang member. Only a mute guy would put up with being named #2, because that means you can’t hear him complain! Fung Ngai also played #1 in fellow 1966 spy film The Golden Buddha. Among his many other film appearances is Come Drink With Me.
#3 (Wong Hon) – The nerdy gang member who is fourth in charge and has confidence problems. Wong Hon was a Chor Yuen regular, appearing as a policeman in Black Rose, a doctor in Intimate Confessions of a Chinese Courtesan, and many other Chor Yuen films.

Spy With My Face

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

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