On New Year's Eve 1999, the GV Broadway cinema is closing down. A few last visitors come but are refused exit privileges as the ghosts decide to make a stand against the ill-treatment of their beloved cinema. A cute statement...

It's kind of criminal that deep inside Billy Chung's Last Ghost Standing manages to somehow work. Directing with a hyperactive sense and "borrowing" scenes very literally from the likes of Evil Dead II, Alien and Trainspotting, it's not so much unique Hong Kong cinema madness on display (the elephant poop monster resides in that department though) but the familiarity and surprising visuals are entertaining strengths put forth by Billy. Fans of the works heavily referenced normally should be offended but the all round, low-budget combo becomes not only strangely appealing in its b-movie ways but also inoffensive. He does ask us to take the limp romance between Simon Loui (whose novel apparently this is an adaptation of) and Sherming Yiu very seriously though but amidst the sights that takes place around these two characters, Chung should tick the "failed" box of this main plot.

Wayne Lai steals the show as the on edge and eccentric usher while Pauline Suen, Amanda Lee, Angela Tong, Pinky Cheung, Francis Ng and Chin Kar-Lok also appear. The latter doning a role that is a rather cheap send-up of Jackie Chan.

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It's at times quite amusing to watch Jet Li (who at the time had walked away from the Once Upon A Time In China series after a falling out with Tsui Hark) as the stoic Wong Fei-Hung trying to deal with his goofy environment. Mostly however, it's tireless Wong Jing-esque comedy (that expression he won't get into an official dictionary anytime soon) on display, in combination with Yuen Woo-Ping's action-directing talents.

With its fun and extensive action, including a mad climax where Wong Fei Hung in a rooster suit takes on a group of fighters in centipede armour, Yuen secures the entertainment value of Last Hero In China. No doubt, the action choices will and should turn off viewers but if director Wong Jing wanted a sense of fun to this kind of new wave martial arts movie, with the help of Yuen Woo-Ping he succeeds. Gordon Lau takes on the villainous role in popular monk mode while Leung Kar Yan, Anita Yuen, Chong Fat, Dicky Cheung, Sharla Cheung and Nat Chan (as Mass Tar Wong, proprietor of the nearby brothel Wong Fei Hung's clinic Po Chi Lam happen to end up living beside) also appear.

Also known as Claws Of Steel and released in various versions of varying length (edit entitled Deadly China Hero is cut), of note is the UK dvd with an anamorphic transfer. Sadly the newly done subtitles are straight copies of the error riddled English cinema subs prepared for the Hong Kong print.

Yonfan's Rose was also known as Lost Romance, which would be more applicable to his 1988 drama in actuality. A tumultuous, splendid looking Jingle Ma photographed story of friendship, love, status and much in between, compared to the largely empty Rose, Last Romance scores competence points at least. Although told way too fragmented (by choice) at points, the all throughout beautifully photographed leads Cherie Chung and Maggie Cheung gives Yonfan's otherwise emotionally empty direction (his attempt at subtlety nails that verdict) some more resonance. Starting out with the quick meeting and quickly established friendship between So So (Chung) and Nancy (Cheung), their giddy crush on Japanese-Chinese Sung (Tsurumi Shingo) becomes a centerpoint brought up often in the epic narrative. Neither girl gets romantically engaged at their tender age but fairly immersing passages follow, concerning each character path. So So seems to be spiraling out of control as she's at one point a prostitute but gains marriage status before her best friend does. Nancy goes into fashion design and seems left out of any bliss so it's a classic thing of how you define your status. It's interesting therefore that both characters suffer, So So from being addicted to wealth and Nancy from being addicted to a friendship that needs to be there, regardless of how old the characters become. When focusing on the two, Yonfan gets the most of his story- and visual combo, although his ways rarely affects us truly. The asides, our subplots registers little however, including that of Sung's obsession with his girlFRIENDS So So and Nancy. Drawing comparisons to the spiral life development represents, issues of declining finance for Nancy's parents (father played by Lau Siu-Ming) merely takes up time rather than involves. Last Romance is definitely close to being pretentious drivel, driven only by an image thinker but the images are wonderful and compared to Rose, Yonfan manages to reach out a little anyway. Also with Stuart Ong, Michael Lai, and Kenneth Tsang.

KENNETH'S REVIEW: Unashamedly designed around half a dozen or so songs by Leslie Cheung and Anita Mui combined, the former plays successful singer Louie that cares little for consequence or responsibility. Although giving one of his dancers Anita (Mui) a chance at stardom, Louie's world does begin to break when his flirt Julia (Joey Wong) turns out to be his father's (Paul Chu) girlfriend. Louise takes refuge to Paris and at his most definite low, Vietnamese refugee Yu-Shieh (Cecilia Yip) picks him up...

Chor Yuen displays little fire that was evident in his glorious days at Shaw Brothers and this overwrought melodrama/commercial exercise is a pretty banal affair. Basically a musing on appreciating life, Chor Yuen rushes (and I mean sprints like a motherf*cker) through so many stages of it that he probably could've done an afterlife and reincarnation segment too if 5 minutes more was added. This means affection is nowhere near the flick, just basic filmmaking that turns the most embarrassing during a lengthy montage of loooovvvveee set to one of the songs. The late great Leslie and Anita have catchy tunes to share but are not coming off as genuine cinema icons just yet at this point. A little flick called Rouge took care of that. Charlie Cho and Hui Siu-Hung also appear.

Notable for being the first Cinema City production and founders Dean Shek, Karl Maka and Raymond Wong didn't waste any time acknowledging one profile that many Hong Kong cinema profiles have been inspired by; the one and only Charlie Chaplin. Unfortunately here essayed by the one and only Dean Shek.

Directed by John Woo, it features the better gimmick of his comedies and for some stretches of film isn't the biggest insult disguised as an homage. Woo goes for the under cranked motion, classic silent comedy routines and even obnoxious Dean Shek keeps somewhat in character. Whether or not the entire film has routines "stolen" from Charlie Chaplin I don't know but there's really only novelty value for a few minutes in this Woo film. Barely amusing, not much of a laughing time and more than a little overlong becomes the verdict ultimately. Somewhat fun to spot typical Woo inclusions though, this time involving religious imagery and an early Hong Kong screen image of one of Woo's idols, Alain Delon. Wu Ma, Wong Wai and Karl Maka co-stars.

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There's differences in the way Danny Lee approaches the portrayal of justice. You'll get something like Twist that advocates all kinds of torture and you get The Law Enforcer from this period that is way more tuned and balanced. Although not particularly memorable, Lee's take on the vigilante tale is handled straight at least. Lung Ming-Yan (A Better Tomorrow II) plays Kent, a former cop diagnosed with epilepsy but is looking to make it back into the only profession he knows. He can't stop his urges to stop justice in front of him though and the police has to face pressure from superiors and public about the person out there "interfering". In the eyes of Anna (Betty Mak) he is a saviour though...

The concerns are largely Public Service Announcement-like in nature, designed to favour the Royal Hong Kong Police Force and while this is valid, director Lee has a problem creating well-paced cinema from it. Possessing good opportunities to be elite material, the story of Kent is handled well and only after half an hour Lee's character knows who he is but stands by him as a loyal brother, hoping he'll get his reinstatement. Structurally he's got to prove himself though and the robbery plot headed by Ricky Yi and Shing Fui-On's brutal characters does play into the uncertain hands of the film. Compared to the vague subplot of Kent and Anna, to have the character go these expected ways is more favourable. While possessing edge, tension and bloodshed during it's fairly long climax, The Law Enforcer is effective as an idea but won't ever enlighten truly. See Law With Two Phases or No Compromise instead for the elite material. Parkman Wong, Ken Lo and Ben Lam also appears.

There's a moral and ethic dilemma hidden in the title of this Taylor Wong helmed Shaw Brother's production. See if you can spot it. A stab at the courtroom drama, centering around rapist Tien (Wilson Lam), someone the law has difficulty nailing down despite violating a model (Joey Wong) and her sister (Lau Mei-Gwan). As defense counsel he gets Wing-Man (Carol Cheng), the girlfriend of a cop (Alex Man) who offers up a opinion not matching her professional ethics...

Effective when it is exploitative (the rape of the sister has Tien throwing buckets of paint at her, taking place amongst strobe lights to boot), Taylor Wong stages a fairly competent but standard drama. Questions brought up are valid concerns but you do start to get pissed off when victims, while under distress, can't seem to say the right thing in court. But then the movie wouldn't be feature length anyway so characters acting foolish is something Wong embraces seemingly. Performances are spotty, with Joey Wong largely disappearing by the half way point but Carol Cheng proves to have a commanding presence when her character is in her element. The romantic pairing between her and Alex Man seems a little far-fetched but their relationship does come to an effective closure when Taylor Wong stages his final moments in the courtroom. Moments that unfortunately includes an over the top melodramatic speech but also a quick outburst of rather shocking bloodshed. Law Or Justice? seems to leave a mark on you therefore but one imprint doesn't save it. Paul Chun and Ti Lung also appears.

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Overly long but passable bio-pic about Lee Rock (Andy Lau), one of the most famous corrupted cops in Hong Kong. This first installment out of two follows him beginning in the 1940s up till the 60s in a system where honesty is not the way to progress. With the help of his elder superior and mentor Chan (Kwan Hoi-San), Lee rises swiftly through the ranks, much to the dismay of sergeant Ngan Tung (Paul Chun)

In the wake of the success story that was To Be Number One, the trend became the true life bio-pic and while Lee Rock ranks way above the lackluster trendsetter, interest is merely sporadic. Judging by the box-office, it was either an effort that will connected to Hong Kong or in fact Andy Lau's name drew people in despite this Lawrence Lau helmed effort feeling overall empty to the Hong Kong people even? It helps that Andy Lau puts in a commanding performance and the veteran cast in mostly sync sound dialogue brings colour to the piece. The ending does spark interest for the sequel that was unleashed the same year. Chingmy Yau, Cheung Man, Ng Man-Tat, Lung Fong and James Tien co-stars.

A multiple nominee at the Hong Kong Film Awards including Best Picture but it was Kwan Hoi-San that bagged the only award as Best Supporting Actor that year.

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Legal Innocence represents one of several occasions where Hong Kong filmmakers have utilized the same true life crime for multiple productions. More recently Human Pork Chop and There Is A Secret In My Soup marked such an event and during the Category III boom of the 90s, more specifically in 1993, Legal Innocence and Remains Of A Woman tackled the same horrific crime. In Cha Chuen Yee's (The Rapist, Once Upon A Time In Triad Society) version, we see Cecilia Yip as Shirley, a Christian who finds sympathy and possibility of redemption in sentenced murderer Patrick (Francis Ng). His stories convinces her that he's even innocent of the murder of girlfriend Brenda and it's instead the jealous party in the form of Kitty (Ivy Leung) that orchestrated what led to the finding of a corpse corroding in acid. A courtroom drama plays out and tests the newly found love between Shirley and Patrick. But characters behind the scenes, most notably a cop (Anthony Wong), are convinced of other truths...

Cha Chuen Yee has the Cat III rating to play around with and just like the Clarence Fok directed Remains of A Woman, he spikes the gruesome-meter at times and directs with an aggressive style. While he has a fine pairing in Cecilia Yip and Francis Ng, Cha opts for hysterical melodramatics and a strange, almost bizarre character arc for Yip's Shirley who longs for love and seemingly desperately throws herself at the mercy of a potential killer she's known only for a short time. Yip and Ng bring some fine subtleties during their initial scenes but Legal Innocence soon start to resemble many other similar efforts of the time. In its favour compared to Remains Of A Woman, it deals largely with the aftermath in combination with the flashback segments of the events leading up to the murder but Fok has one up on Cha due to Carrie Ng's undeniably powerful and over the top performance (that got her a Taiwan Golden Horse Award). Legal Innocence is just over the top without the truly lasting effect. Yet, it deserves a wee bit of acclaim for what it does, mostly straight faced, and few Cat III movies of the time could be associated with positive remarks from any critic. Paul Chun and Hui Siu-Hung appear as lawyers.

Less of the visual splendor that was Erotic Ghost Story II, frequent cinematographer and even actor Peter Ngor creates via Legendary Couple an emulation. And that's being nice about it because obviously Natural Born Killers had something to do with this Hong Kong creation. At the same time, Ngor's particular mad mix of social commentary, romance and violence is as unashamedly improper. It's an assault on the senses that is mild compared to Oliver Stone's movie but Legendary Couple is probably a lot more fun in its horrid ways. More importantly though, less pretentious. Simon Yam stars as disgruntled and bullied worker Tin Laap who is being innocently accused of robbing a large amount of cash from the company he works for. Joining the legions of people protesting against the corporate elite and injustice HIS WAY, it leads to the kidnapping of the spoiled daughter (Chingmy Yau) of his boss and to the creation of our Hong Kong Mickey and Mallory...

With Yam soiling himself, being tortured by police while we cut to his wife in labour who eventually passes away, there's a form of cartoonish excess here that may have decided to take itself deadly seriously. However with a completely incompetent police force on the hunt for Tin Laap and forgotten subplots about that very police force, Ngor simply comes off as someone not knowing, not bothering and not caring. The transformation in characters carelessly happens, so does romance and bringing in cheerful, light tangents concerning the raising of Tin Laap's infant son, other robbers donating basically a weapons cache to the rookie robber couple, Legendary Couple really does go for transforming into something in an actual way. In other words, a rulebreaking, gory actioner with no connection to logic, reality or attempts to satisfy those looking for actual merits. It's just a concoction by a filmmaker wishing to have a little fun. But even if he didn't intend to, Legendary Couple can still breath as a strangely watchable crap film with little to none signs of a cinematographer in the directing chair.