Evil Cat (1987)

March 19, 2023 Ken Miller 1 Comment

Starring Lau Kar-Leung, Tang Lai-Ying, Mark Cheng, Wong Jing, Hsu Shu-Yuan and Stuart Ong, written by Wong Jing and directed by Dennis Yu.

We see the cat creature in her true form during a prologue, but must wait until the last five minutes to see the cat-woman again — We see the cat creature in her true form during the prologue, but must wait until the last five minutes to see the cat-woman again

An evil cat demon-spirit reappears every 50 years and a descendant of the demon-fighting Cheung family has always been there to combat it, in a cycle of events that spans the past 400 years. Now the final cat spirit has been set free on the Earth and Master Cheung, who is suffering from cancer, enlists the help of young chauffeur Ah Long (Cheng) to destroy the evil once and for all. Armed with a bow and three charmed arrows, Long & Cheung hunt down the energy-absorbing feline entity, which first possesses Long’s boss Mr Fan and then his personal assistant, Tina.

The possessed Mr Fan likes to eat live carp

Evil Cat is standard 80s Hong Kong horror-fantasy fare, with the requisite amounts of humour and suspense, with decent action scenes overseen by master martial arts director Lau Kar-Leung, who also plays spirit-fighter Cheung.

A cop has a hand rammed right through his body

Written by Wong Jing, the film gains momentum once Tina (Shu-Yuan) gets possessed, triggering scenes in which she bites off the tongue of a pop star during sex in a car, rams her hand through a policeman’s body, and withstands multiple gunshot hits when cops blast at her during an energetic police station rampage.

Lots of swirling spectral lights as the evil cat spirit enters Tina's body — Lots of swirling spectral lights as the evil cat spirit enters Tina’s body

The plot’s supernatural lore is patchy at best, with the cat-demon easily jumping from host to host, even when it is stabbed by the supposedly lethal magic arrows, but the movie doesn’t worry itself too much about the fuzziness of its mythology, concentrating instead on supplying incident after incident, intent on reaching its climax, where the evil spirit finally reveals its true form: a pale, white-haired cat-woman.

During the police station rampage the possessed Tina really gets shot-up by the cops…

...and the policemen keep on shooting Tina... and she doesn't die! — …and the policemen keep on shooting Tina… and she doesn’t die!

Evil Cat doesn’t really stick in the memory, but it is never dull and certainly passes the time nicely enough.

We see the evil cat spirit's true form again during the finale — We see the evil cat spirit’s true form again during the finale

She could definitely audition for the Andrew Lloyd Webber show... — She could definitely audition for the Andrew Lloyd Webber show…

The Butterfly Murders (1979)

March 18, 2023 Ken Miller 1 Comment

Starring Lau Siu-Ming, Wong Shu-Tong, Michelle Yim, Chan Chi Chi and Eddy Ko, directed by Tsui Hark for Seasonal Film Corporation.

Tien Fung, leader of the Ten Flags clan, investigates the mystery of killer butterfly attacks in the deserted Shum Castle, accompanied by some of his troops and lone woman warrior Green Shadow. Entering the catacombs beneath the castle, they encounter esteemed scholar Fong (Siu-Ming), Master Shum, his wife and a mute maid named Chee. The butterflies continue to kill, hidden rooms are discovered and renowned fighters known as the Thunders enter the story.

Tien Fung and Green Shadow inspect a dragon carving in Shum Castle

Butterflies munch on a victim's hand — Butterflies munch on a victim’s hand

Tsui Hark’s first film is an assured, thoroughly engrossing Hong Kong new wave wuxia murder mystery with creature feature elements. The empty Shum Castle itself, often shown from the outside, looming above the long grasses, adds immeasurably to the atmosphere of the film, as does the effective use of Jerry Goldsmith’s PLANET OF THE APES score. Wong Shu-Tong is steely, stoic and thoughtful as Tien Fung and Michelle Yim is playful and acrobatic as Green Shadow.

Wong Shu-Tong is a cool dude in this movie

The film offers a realistic reason for characters being able to fly about, by showing them using various line-firing gizmos, but there are still fantastical components to the story, like a fire crow bird that explodes on contact with people and the notion that butterflies can actually kill a person, though these lethal Lepidoptera assaults are actually explained away as being the result of the use of ‘butterfly-controlling medicine’.

Master Shum is assaulted by a swarm of butterflies

Be careful... this bird can blow up! — Be careful… this bird can blow up!

The introduction of a helmeted armoured man becomes the focus of the latter stages of the movie, with the killer butterflies taking a back seat, as fights involving dart-ejecting weapons and explosive projectiles ultimately lead to a nihilistic finale.

The secret plans and rivalries eventually revealed to be the reasons behind the events may fail to be particularly compelling, but THE BUTTERFLY MURDERS remains a very moody, intriguing, enjoyable viewing experience.

Kung Fu From Beyond The Grave (1982)

March 14, 2023 Ken Miller Leave a comment

Starring Billy Chong, Lo Lieh, Sung Gam-Shing and Fang Mien, directed by Lee Chiu for The Eternal Film Company.

During the annual Ghost Festival, bare-chested hero Chun (Chong) is visited by the eyeless, green-faced spectre of his dead dad, who informs his son that he was a victim of murder. Chun decides to go to Yellow Dragon Town to get revenge for pops, but it won’t be easy as the villain controls a bunch of henchmen and is aided by a black magician priest (Gam-Shing). After Chun is pestered by hopping undead corpses in a playful scene, he’s inspired to go back to the location of a book of magic, which he uses to raise a group of mangle-faced undead to do his bidding.

These undead know how to make their own crucifix

This film is a great deal of fun!

Just to illustrate this, let’s look at what happens in a nicely-mounted confrontation between Chun and his ghosts versus the bad priest: the magician uses a magical cape and two long-tongued spirits in pointy hats to fight Chun’s ghosts, but Chun stands his ground and retaliates, using his glowing magic book to turn the black magician’s spirits into puddles… but the movie’s weird factor is suddenly turned up a notch as the priest piles on the pressure… by summoning Count Dracula! Wonderful stuff!

Billy Chong’s fight moves are a joy to watch, plus we get to see a deadly ghost with stretching arms, a long-range flamethrower breath attack, women’s underwear thrown at the wizard to weaken him and a scene where the main villain (Lieh) is chased by the burning scalps of his victims!

These surreal elements, added to fine action courtesy of martial arts directors Alan Hsu and Sung Gam-Shing, make this a very entertaining kung-fu-horror-fantasy yarn.

Chun's eyeless, green-faced dead dad — Chun’s eyeless, green-faced dead dad

Curse of Evil (1982)

March 8, 2023 Ken Miller Leave a comment

It's a toothy bloody frog! — It’s a toothy bloody frog!

Starring Tai Liang-Chun, Ai Fei, Lily Li, Wang Lai, Eric Chan and Yu Tsui-Ling, directed by Kuei Chih-Hung for Shaw Brothers.

The creature from the well assaults its first victim

The story takes place in a mansion in a quiet back alley, where the members of the dysfunctional Shi family and their servants act very superstitiously on the 1st and 15th day of each month, because this is when freaky stuff can happen, due to the fact that thirteen members of the family were killed by bandits and thrown into a dry well many years ago. When a weird, pink, toothy ‘bloody frog’ is encountered, this is seen as a bad omen for sure, as this amphibian always presages ominous events. Terrible things do begin to happen, with a slimy, horned monster crawling out of the well, intent on raping and killing.

A slime-coated victim of the tentacle-monster

Kuei Chih-Hung, director of luridly memorable Hong Kong horror opuses like THE BOXER’S OMEN, CORPSE MANIA, BEWITCHED and THE KILLER SNAKES, clearly decided not to hold back when making this demented, gooey weird-fest, choosing to merge murder mystery plotting with creature feature imagery, adding exploitative sexual abuse scenes to make the movie that bit more sleazy.

Lots of goo dribbles from the tentacled creature onto its victims

Another 'bloody frog' — Another ‘bloody frog’

The story somehow manages to combine a subplot involving certain relatives trying to kill off the Shi family’s wheelchair-bound matriarch (Lai) in order to inherit her house, with footage of a demon-headed well-monster with two tentacles instead of hind legs that sexually assaults its female victims and kills them with its flesh-ripping steel teeth, with shots of a mystery figure secretly feeding offal to a pit full of spiky bloody frogs, with scenes of abusive cousin Jinhua (Fei) hypnotising one of the maids so that he can have sex with her, resulting in an unwanted pregnancy. As you can see: Kuei Chih-Hung obviously believes that enough is never enough!

The well-critter rips chunks of flesh from people with its steel teeth

After seeing this poster you wanna see the movie, right?

We get close-ups of the tentacle-monster’s extendable appendage as it sucks out the eyeballs of elderly manservant Quan and see the critter cover its female victims with pink, gelatine-like slime… and yet… it’s eventually revealed that this beast is actually fake, just a guy in a suit! This is all an elaborate set-up, of course, involving fake identities, obscure secondary characters and the matriarch herself, who is not really disabled and can become an unstoppable maniac… until she is beheaded! The unimaginably preposterous denouement would have us believe that all of the strange happenings were fabricated and nothing supernatural actually occurred, yet the film never provides a real-world explanation for the existence of the flesh-eating bloody frogs, which chow down on several people, including a bound-up maid. Did these amphibians mutate purely because they were fed lots of offal? Does it matter, really? This is a loopy film where logic takes a backseat, so that the director can focus on batshit crazy stuff like a mad granny secretly sewing costumes for a kid’s skeleton in the attic, perverted amateur hypnotism, and outrageously far-fetched murder schemes.

Bloody frogs chew on Quan's face! — Bloody frogs chew on Quan’s face!

A tied-up maid is unable to escape an attack by a bunch of bloody frogs!

The Killer Snakes (1974)

March 7, 2023 Ken Miller Leave a comment

The main character is quite Norman Bates-like sometimes, only he's more disturbed than Norman! — The main character is quite Norman Bates-like sometimes, only he’s more disturbed than Norman!

Starring Kam Kwok-Leung, Li Lin-Lin, Chen Chun, Lin Feng and Ko Ti-Hua, directed by Kuei Chih-Hung for Shaw Brothers.

Zhihong is a poor, gawky, bullied youth living in a shack next to a snake bladder store in a rundown Hong Kong neighbourhood. When an injured cobra slithers through a crack in the store wall, entering Zhihong’s ramshackle home, he decides to stitch up the serpent’s wound and look after it, triggering a set of circumstances that will lead to Zhihong using his killer cobra, plus more reptiles liberated from the store, to avenge himself against those who have treated him badly.

Unlike Willard (1971), however, which this film is obviously inspired by, Zhihong is a far more disturbed protagonist compared to the rat-obsessed main character in the American original. In a scene where Zhihong carries a prostitute who’d tried to mug him back to his shack, The Killer Snakes queasily merges Zhihong’s desire to get back at his tormentors with his disturbed sexual urges, showing him take advantage of the woman by tying her up and licking her. Though Zhihong himself has been a victim of bullying, he does far worse, allowing his snake friends to violate his captive in a sweaty, seedy scene that uses black and white flashbacks to suggest Zhihong’s dark urges stem from childhood memories of abuse and voyeurism.

Zhihong allows his bondage fantasies to get out of hand

Starting with mondo-style footage of live snakes having their gall bladders cut out, this film is sordid and repellent in many ways, but it is well shot and lit, juggling its exploitative components expertly. Bondage fantasies, scenes of Zhihong letting monitor lizards scratch his latest tied-up female victim, a set piece involving an abusive character chopping up snakes for real with a sword before he’s constricted to death by a huge python, plus other grindhouse elements, show how this movie set its sights on offending and disturbing its viewers, a goal it obviously succeeded in achieving with sleazy ease.

Zhihong lets monitor lizards attack one of his captives

The Web of Death (1976)

March 4, 2023 Ken Miller Leave a comment

Lo Lieh opens-up the Spider weapon... — Lo Lieh opens-up the Spider device…

Starring Yueh Hua, Lo Lieh and Ching Li, directed by Chor Yuen, for Shaw Brothers.

Members of various clans hunt for the hiding place of a legendary weapon. One of these warriors is swordsman Fei (Hua), intent on finding this deadly device before it gets into the hands of someone who will use it for evil purposes.

THE WEB OF DEATH, directed by Chor Yuen, is a tangled tale of rival sects, including the 5 Venom Clan, Qingyi Clan and Holy Fire Clan, who are all immersed in a plot featuring such fantastical elements as acid pit traps and characters with the power to unleash energy beams from their hands.

Some of these martial arts masters can fire power beams from their hands

The highlight of the film is undoubtedly the secret weapon at the centre of the tale, known as the Spider. This is a hand-held smoking lantern containing a glowing tarantula that makes roaring sounds, emits deadly poisonous gas and creates massive webs that can trap its victims. The use of this curious device, which causes some casualties to develop blackened faces as they expire, adds a layer of surrealism to the film and helps make the finale very strange, absurd and spectacular.

The tarantula within the lantern is normal-sized

The faces of some victims of the otherworldly arachnid go black as they die — The faces of some victims of this otherworldly arachnid go black as they die

Everyone gets trapped within an electrified web

Although the plot can be overly convoluted at times, the film is entertaining, with colourful costumes and wonderful eye candy sets, the most impressive of which is a voluminous chamber containing stone balconies and a large, red spider sculpture.

Robo Vampire 3: Counter Destroy (1989)

February 24, 2023 Ken Miller Leave a comment

One of the ghouls haunting the rented villa

Starring Sorapong Chatree, Sun Chien, Michelle Yim, Fan Chin-Hung and To Siu-Ming, directed by Edgar Jere, from Filmark International Ltd.

A scriptwriter called Joyce goes to an isolated rented villa to write her magnum opus about the last Emperor of China, but other film companies want to prevent this biopic from being made and will resort to murder to get their way. To make matters worse (and weird) the plot also involves hopping vampires, a crosseyed Taoist priest, a possessed phone, ninjas with automatic weaponry, poisoned lipstick, a razor-fingered spirit, a fortune-telling sacred bird, a muscular zombie-vampire that leaves sparkling footprints, an explosive bouquet of flowers, the ghost of a Ching Dynasty eunuch… and the silvery cyborg hero from ROBO VAMPIRE (1988)!

This poster rocks, even if the film doesn't! — This poster rocks, even if the film doesn’t!

The dubbing, dialogue and acting in this cut-and-paste brain-warper, which is also known as COUNTER DESTROYER, THE VAMPIRE IS STILL ALIVE and COUNTER DESTROY, achieves levels of cheesiness that other Tomas Tang productions even fail to reach. The voice work for the actress playing Joyce’s friend is especially jarring!

The various bits of unrelated footage, some from a Thai film called KILLER EYELASHES, are tenuously linked, as usual, with new dubbed dialogue ‘seamlessly’ melding it together, but all logical narrative is swept away during a finale involving the robo-warrior, hopping vampires, the Taoist priest and a ghostly vampire kid who bursts from Joyce’s rapidly-swelling belly! This brat tells a couple of vampires that they are going to pay for killing his ‘mother’, even though it was the kiddy-vamp who actually killed Joyce by erupting from her stomach! The vamp-child then proceeds to urinate on the vampires, but don’t worry, folks, the film ends with Joyce somehow still being alive?! My brain hurts…

Ninja: the Violent Sorcerer (1982)

February 24, 2023 Ken Miller Leave a comment

Does any of this happen in the movie? Ah, I don't think so — Does any of this happen in the movie? Ah, I don’t think so

Starring Simon Reed, Harry Carter, Henry Steele, Joe Nelson, Chiang Tao, Lu Feng, Chen Hung-Lieh, Angela Mao and Danny Lee, directed by ‘Bruce Lambert’.

Two dice, taken from hopping vampires, will help Mr Baker, known as the Gambling King, take over the whole gambling world! But Roger, the brother of a gambler forced to kill himself, promises to get revenge, which he does dressed as a white-clad ninja!

You’ve got to grudgingly admire the don’t-give-a-f*ck plotting in producer Tomas Tang’s spliced-together specials from Filmark International. This particular film sticks new vampire & ninja content (probably shot by action director Chiang Tao and not Godfrey Ho, who is always credited as director for these kind of movies) into footage from another film called THE STUNNING GAMBLING, which stars Danny Lee and Angela Mao, featuring gamblers betting their lives on the outcome of games, including a super-fast card-dealing challenge.

THE STUNNING GAMBLING, a Taiwanese gambler opus, provides much of the footage used in this cut-and-paste movie

Greek VHS sleeve with misleading cover art — Greek VHS sleeve for NINJA: THE VIOLENT SORCERER with misleading cover art

'The mystic knowledge of all ages is unleashed...' — ‘The mystic knowledge of all ages is unleashed…’

With ninjas being taught anti-sorcery magic by a priest, seemingly unconnected scenes located on a war movie set and in a rowdy barroom, green & white ninjas with the ability to vanish and reappear, and a briefly-seen female ghost called Rose, NINJA: THE VIOLENT SORCERER ends with the two ninja heroes and a good priest combating multiple hopping vampires and an evil priest in a normal-looking suburban living room.

Finger of Doom (1972)

February 22, 2023 Ken Miller Leave a comment

Starring Ivy Ling Po, Chin Han, Chen Feng-Chen, Hung Sing-Chung and Tung Li, directed by Pao Hsueh-Li, with action direction by Simon Chui Yee-Ngau and Chui Chung-Hok.

The masked swordsman turns out to be the other dude's brother just messing around — The masked swordsman turns out to be the other dude’s brother just messing around

A spike-fingered woman with black hair and white robes stabs men in the back of their necks with her poisoned metal talons, turning them into zombie-like minions, who dutifully carry her around in a coffin. Other men are also attacked, becoming members of the undead after their female assailant shoots metal pins into their necks. Three brothers decide to take on the local villains, including a hunchback and Chang Kung Chin, but two of the bros are transformed into undead vassals, leaving just Lu Tien Bao to avenge them.

One of the living dead minions — One of the zombified minions

...but she's actually the heroine, who teams up with Lu Tien Bao — …but she’s actually the heroine, who teams up with Lu Tien Bao

Interestingly, the spike-fingered woman is revealed to be the heroine, sleeping in her coffin merely to seem spooky and the minions she has zombified are actually bad men. Her sister, however, is really nasty and will turn anyone into the living dead with her metal pins. Lu and good sis join forces to rid the land of this evil, which is headquartered in the temple of Chang Kung Chin.

This is the bad sister: she's evil! — This is the bad sister: she’s evil!

Atmospheric, evocatively-lit sets and the story’s horror trappings definitely help this early 70s Shaw Brothers wuxia stand out. I love the cheeky ending too, where the heroine finally tells Lu what her name is… but the shot freezes, meaning we never learn what she’s called!

Child of Peach (1987)

February 19, 2023 Ken Miller Leave a comment

What the hell is this thing?! Read on to find out... — What the hell is this thing?! Read on to find out…

Starring Lin Hsiao-Lau, Tu Chin and San Peng, directed by Chao Chung-Hsing and Chen Chun-Liang. A Chin Ke Film Company production.

Four large snowballs land in Peach Garden... — Four large snowballs land in Peach Garden…

...and turn into these green-haired warriors! — …and turn into these green-haired warriors!

High up in the Himalayas is the Peach Garden, an area of eternal springs, flowers and birds, where it never snows, thanks to the natural power absorbed by the Sword of the Sun. But a blue-faced, red-haired, fanged villain called King Devil attacks this tranquil place, steals the sword and kills the master of the garden and his wife, but they manage to save their baby by placing him inside a giant, flying Holy Peach! The huge peach whizzes down from the mountains, causes some trouble at an old couple’s home, then splits open to reveal the baby, which the couple adopt and name Peach-Kid.

It's King Devil! Boo! — It’s King Devil! Boo!

That's a big peach! — That’s a big peach!

When King Devil’s evil forces begin to attack the land, a fairy helps Peach-Kid grow up super-fast, so that he becomes a strong teenager (actually played by actress Lin Hsiao-Lao), who is ultimately able to defeat King Devil’s horrible army, which includes white-clad minions in fright wigs, a strongman with a spiked mace called Hercules, horned, green-haired warriors, a dude called Aeolus, who uses a big bag of compressed wind to defeat people, and a villainess with a flamethrower staff named Grandma from Devil Island.

Grandma from Devil Island and Aeolus... who uses a deadly bag of wind to attack folks! — Grandma from Devil Island and Aeolus… who uses a deadly bag of wind to attack folks!

This Taiwanese flick, loosely based on Japanese folklore hero Momotarō, boasts POWER RANGERS-style villains with colourful wigs, a lot of fun fantasy fighting, and a bunch of pretty novel moments, like the fight with a group of trident-wielding shark men, who have lumpy craniums and dorsal fins on their backs. As the story progresses, Peach-Kid is aided by hefty dude Melon and the former ‘guardian angels’ of Peach Garden, which are three super-powered kids that can become a bird, a gibbon and a dog… and are called Tiny Cock, Tiny Monkey and Tiny Dog.

Yes, that one kid does, indeed, have long gibbon arms!

Things to look out for include King Devil’s showdown with a puppet creature that’s made up of lots of large peaches, some gags involving drinking gibbon urine or getting pissed on by a giant peach, and a brief scene where Peach-Kid blows air down a tube into Aeolus’ mouth, which causes his head to explode! Erm, this is a children’s film, right?

Wacky, weird and fun.

This critter is made from a bunch of big peaches!

King Devil faces-off against the peach-creature!

The peach-creature squirts urine from its 'belly'... — The peach-creature squirts urine from its ‘belly’…

...which gushes into King Devil's face! — …which gushes into King Devil’s face!

Devoted to every kind of movie and TV monster, from King Kong to Godzilla, from the Blob to Alien. Plus monsters from other media too, including books and comics.