Chen Sing gets framed for drug smuggling by his best friend, breaks out of prison and goes on a revenge rampage. As simple as they come and wisely enough not letting this basher slip over 80 minutes, you have pure rampage and effectiveness present here. Killing in cold blood just to get his revenge (on Lung Fei and his boss played by Yasuaki Kurata), Chen Sing brings the intensity but Nancy Yen also gets a fine fighting showcase and especially within arguably the best and highly suspenseful fight set at a roof.

Clarence Fok's action-comedy has gained somewhat of a cult reputation over the years. Hard not to see why and it all surely has to do with the absolute manic Hong Kong comedy on display. Broad to the max but combined with its over the top nature and the same esthetics to the high flying action choreography, Fok scores points.

Not being able to sustain that silly momentum, Fok almost completely diverts and goes the straight heist thriller route for the rest of the show. A decision leading to The Black Panther Warriors losing much of its colour. Still, whenever the action rears its head again, many wild and creative ideas fly by in rapid speed. Fok's film is simply a matter of taste and a test to see how receptive you are of this relentless assault of wackiness and action. With Alan Tang, Brigitte Lin, Simon Yam, Tony Leung Ka-Fai, Carrie Ng, Melvin Wong and Yuen Wah.

The dvd subtitles are extraordinarily bad with grammar errors in most sentences but it's not high art and strangely adds to the nature of the film. Main credits also claim that 6 (!) cinematographers worked on the film including Arthur Wong and Jingle Ma.

Buy the DVD at:
HK Flix.com
Yesasia.com

Bruce Le stars, directs and action directs with only minute touches of his Bruceploitation past injected (the glasses basically). He's Wong Lung who needs to dip his toes again into the world of being a hired thug for gangsters in order to avoid jailtime. This involves cage matches, assassinations but ultimately a trip to Thailand and the Golden Triangle sees Le take on the opium druglords...

A fair bit global with its story, there's a lot of dead stretches in Black Spot and 90 minutes is a tester but enough kooky and technically sound elements make it notable for let's say one reel. The highlight is the mentioned cage match where Le goes up against a giant making constant (post dubbed) monster sounds, chews on his opponents and drinks the inside of a dead sheep in the ring. Yipes. It's cruel but a cruel intensity that also pops up on occasion later from director Le. Getting quite a bit of support from local army for his ending, it looks quite mighty when tanks and choppers roll in and the gunplay, while very basic, makes the finale go by a lot quicker than other parts of the film. That an attempt at message and profound statements about the problem with opium in the region is injected is an ill and comical decision though. Lo Lieh and Kong Do also appear.

Reportedly this was to be a directorial comeback vehicle for Lo Wei (The Big Boss, Fist Of Fury) but most likely Sammo Hung (also action) took over full directing reigns in this new wave effort about political power struggles during a planned reformation of China. Therefore we're thankfully left with a highly serious effort in the vein of Once Upon A Time In China 2. The crew also splendidly echoes the feeling of an old Shaw Brother's movie with some beautiful, extravagant design work. There's a big but here because all intentions are correct, the execution in all departments isn't.

Despite an engaging plot, and a focus to deliver something akin to plot driven, the proceedings left me emotionally cold. Characters are established as they should yet this movie doesn't possess the heart that Tsui Hark for instance brought to his classic works of this era. Ti Lung however exudes terrific dignity as Tan Szu Tung and newcomer Yeung Fan probably could've taken over the Wong Fei-Hung role with ease as he embodies those ideals in a competent manner for the character of Wong Wu.

If only the action could've taken the emotions up a notch and it's the same correct instinct by Sammo here as he blends standard over the top wire work with welcome grounded displays of martial arts. However, he seriously undercranks just about everything so the effect of power instead turns Blade Of Fury into a cartoon. Which is sad because Sammo obviously had actual martial arts talent at his disposal that didn't need artificial power enhancement through undercranking. Sad, sad, sad...

Only dvd edition currently available with English subtitles is a Mandarin dubbed one released by Scholar in Taiwan.

Buy the DVD at:
HK Flix.com

Also known as Lady Reporter and even marketed as a sequel to Corey Yuen's classic Righting Wrongs, Mang Hoi takes over directing duties for this unusual action venture since the lead is a Westerner, Cynthia Rothrock (dubbed in Cantonese though). She's proven to be a pretty kick ass presence under Hong Kong direction and it continues here since Corey Yuen is still around to perform action directing duties. It takes a while but around the hour mark the team delivers solid skirmishes with the finale being filled with more creativity (a fight in between cargo containers would later be a scenario used by Corey in The Transporter). It lacks the impact of Righting Wrongs though because this ain't no morality tale or as bleak and violent. Outside of the action, director Mang Hoi instead does his best to bore us to death with slow pace and straining comedy. Rothrock's leading lady abilities certainly ain't nothing to write home about so best advice is to look at The Blonde Fury only during the moments when Mang Hoi is working with Corey Yuen. Less blonde, more fury would have been nice basically.

Also with some returning cast members from Righting Wrongs that includes Roy Chiao (in a turn echoing his future award winning performance in Summer Snow), Wu Ma and Melvin Wong. Elizabeth Lee, Mang Hoi, Chin Siu Ho, Billy Chow, Jeff Falcon, Chung Fat and Ronny Yu (as the villain!) appears as well.

A rather unusual aka for our director but under the Chinese name of Tung Liu he also co-directed Without A Promised Land. A hardhitting film in its own right, cementing Blood Call in slasher-territory is not the worst of ideas either. But under the opening credits we find an oil painting by our director and via this abstract behaviour we launch into an utterly dreadful and incomprehensible stalker story. Fear of pagers and fear of a mental patient with a loaded gun, while atmosphere is foreboding and loaded with dread sometimes, it all is indeed dreadful and seemingly someone's consciousness under deep sleep that is manifested on screen. Not so much their nightmare but the illogical, unconnected stream of consciousness. Is that art to some? Max Mok, Eddy Ko, Michael Chow and Charlie Cho appears.

1974 saw Shaw Brothers teaming up with Hammer Studios which resulted in Shatter and The Legend Of The 7 Golden Vampires. A bit more obscure is this co-production with Italy that tapped into the notion of combining martial arts with the popular spaghetti Western and paired up Lo Lieh (King Boxer) and Lee Van Cleef (The Good, The Bad And The Ugly). Lo Lieh is Wang, dispatched from China to find the the missing fortune of his late uncle. Setting free Dakota (Van Cleef), the man accused of the murder of Wang, the two begin uncovering clues tattooed on the bottoms of women that leads them closer to the hidden wealth. A psychotic, bible quoting gunman is also following their every step...

While not particularly memorable, the novelty of pairing up East and West in this case survives the entire feature. It feels distinctly less Shaw and more Italian though which results in subpar martial arts choreography (a 70s score put on such scenes doesn't help either) but the pair of Lo Lieh/Lee Van Cleef are a fairly fun double act to follow as cultures are shown merging. Especially our Asian star nicely portrays the cunning nature of Wang and is a typical fish out of water character by choice. The many excuses to be very naughty and feature shots of women with their pants down is some kind of genius exploitation thinking as well. Also released as The Stranger And The Gunfighter. Also with Wang Hsieh and Chan Shen.

The Japanese invaded China set against a cold and dramatic backdrop is surprisingly well handled in combination with some breathtaking martial arts action. Essentially the invaders have hired one of the Chinese (the main character of Lui) to handle the matter of The Doll Bride Mask who's leading a destructive rebellion against the Japanese. Lui is of course disliked by his own people and family but tries to stand firm under the circumstances. A basic melodrama but one that works fairly well against the gritty nature of the narrative, to boot there's some excellent kicking from the man behind the mask. Acrobatic showcase amidst a basher and a surprising end reveal is proof that Blood Of Dragon Peril demands attention all throughout its lean running time.

Designed to scare the living pants off the superstitious Chinese (the opening caption does well in that regard), Ding Sin-Saai (The Beheaded 1000) directs all three stories contained within The Blood Reincarnation, starting with "The Treasure". Featuring Dean Shek, this quite short scenario strips the narrative down to a minimum and goes for the highest gear possible in the audio- and visual field. The relentlessness of it all is eye catching and atmospheric.

Soon we're into "The Wanton", settling again as per the first story on revenge but with some goofy and darkly comedic twists that manage to work by the time the ending has done its thing.

The center piece "Lau Tin Sok" is the story corresponding to the title of the film and takes a different route. Not only is it the longest of our short stories but also designed to dig into our emotions, hard. A doctor played well by Peter Yang is framed but returns thanks to the titular blood reincarnation to settle what he didn't have time for before his natural life ended. A neat twist by Ding Sin-Saai is inserted and it's a story therefore that takes a potentially predictable main plot to secondary status as well as unexpected places. It helps that the atmosphere is suitably spooky as well as touching, even though the typical broad melodrama is quite ear piercing in the final reel. The Blood Reincarnation ends up overall on a positive note, being a show reel for what director Ding can do and no aspect truly fails. The drama easily beats the terror though.