Burning Paradise

Burning Paradise starring Willie Chi Tin-Sang (1994).

Whether it’s historical landmarks like Once Upon a Time in China 1-3 or schlock like We’re Going to Eat You, producer/director/actor Tsui Hark is a force to be reckoned with. If Hark is connected its a guaranteed banger. We also get acclaimed auteur Ringo Lam who just directed the insanely fun action packed film Full Contact (1992). Ringo's films influenced Tarantino's career early on.

 BP begins in the middle of a sand torn war landscape. The gore immediately gets to soaked level! Swords clang and a horse gets decapitated by a flying guillotine.  

Fatal Flying Guillotine you wound up in my movie?

This Hong Kong flick so far is bad asssss! Two Shaolin monks are the main characters and a cute girl in a floppy hat. The younger monk is Fong Sai Yuk (played by Willie Chi Tin-Sang and his Master Chi Nun (Wu Xiqian). The female’s name is Dou Dou (Carman Lee Yeuk-Tung). 

The atmosphere shifts from blazing desert to frost bitten darkness. Fong Sai Yuk gets entrenched in an epic battle with soldiers on horseback. He wields a ginormous weapon that could be in a Capcom Arcade game. The sword slices through flesh and even stays in rock if you wanted to propel out a few cartwheels during the fight. 

It’s so heartbreaking when the main soldier callously stabs Yuk’s Uncle as he’s buried in rocks. The gore effects and cinematography are superlative! 

At the Red Lotus temple evil is a foot and some severed hands. I mean the place reminds me of a Ripped To Shreds tune or a MK set piece. 

essential listening

The monks are now property of the Quing Dynasty and they have all these rules including no martial arts! Shen Kung played by Wam Kam-Kong, is their ruler. These masterfully choreographed fights include flames, chains, the kind of shit out of a heavy metal music vid! 

Welcome to Rochester Ny

There’s a epic battle of strength every couple of mins yet it’s never boring and propels the character driven plot. Sai Yuk is thrown into a cave filled with corpses. An old Master Chi Sin helps him through act two. This fool says he’s been living off rats like Vermin in Time Bandits (1981! 

There's no worser farts than Rat meat ones

Shen Kung at first seems like a villain on par with General Zod but he does masterfully decapitate a female lickety-split! Kung does look stoned most of the time and paints with blood like that one H.G.Lewis film. 

Maybe you're the one that's really stoned!

There’s a female guard named Tsui ho (Maggie Lam Chuen) with a black face plate that reminds me of a minstrel act or one of those creepy Betty Boop cartoon characters. 

Boop Boop Ba-Dead

Our two main heroes wind up in the corpse pit again. This captivating movie has many elements from Indiana Jones but it never gets blatant about what it's copying. This film never slows down and there’s constant action. Vinegar Syndrome offers the new restored version of a film that before you could only find online in unsavory places or on a bootleg. Lately this company has been releasing very rare HK flicks that we reviewed in 2012. I know they’ll continue on in this trend and I’m stoked they are releasing top quality HK sleaze/ action. Thank You VS! HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!

Devil's Express (aka Gang Wars)

Devil's Express (aka Gang Wars) Starring War Hawk Tanzania (1976).

Who is War Hawk Tanzania, dunno but that name is FEROCIOUS! Let's find out together shall we?

 The music shifts from no wave to Barry White"s Love Unlimited style strings. 

Warhawk is also my porn nom deplume!

War hawk’s fro and droopy stache reminds me of a less attractive Lionel Ritchie. Warhawk or Luke Curtis trains to fight with his squirrely bro Chris played by Larry Fleischman. That aforementioned actor was in The Warriors PS2 video game as a back round police officer. Good for Larry I say! 

ICE decided to detain all of us based on nothing!

There’s all kinds of Chinese cave hijinx and flute music. Don’t look now but there’s a creature lurking in the forrest! I was waiting for a Gilman type monster to burst out already! It doesn’t quite happen though. We see an Asian man wonder around by traffic with giant white eyes painted over his! For a second I thought Larry Buchanan ghost directed this!

Larry paid me in day old circus peanuts

Warhawk's partner Chris kind of resembles Raoul from the Wild Kingdom segment of that UHF (1989) Weird Al movie. A bunch of Noo Yawk cops show up complete with phones and typewriter sounds. The main pig thinks Black and Chinese gangs are beefin’, duh ya think? 

Looks like we got another one of those long hard ones (and that's how we like it)!

An Ed Macmahon looking honky wanders into a subway after hearing a creepy AI sounding voice. Wouldn’t you know, Brother Theodore star of The Burbs (1989) and Letterman appearances is among the police. Brother T is shockingly quiet, I mean it’s unsettling! I'm so used to him screaming his brains out!

 

How come no one wants my autograph?

I originally heard about this movie when it was trashed in Bad Azz Mofo zine by David Walker. I once saw him talk about blaxploitation films and show clips at a Humanist church in Oakland Ca. Badazz Mofo was an influence on my writing for sure! The cops in Devil's Express all look like a hybrid of Tackleberry and Mauser if they mated. A bag lady with no brain filter faints after seeing a headless body on the subway. One thing I find irritating is how they only show the havok the monster inflicts but we never see the beast itself. OK Maybe we do see a grey dude in a shitty mask but that's not enough closure for some of us pickier film goers, sorry! My guess is that they had no money in the effects budget.  This movie is at least half as entertaining and unintentionally funny as Bare Knuckles (1977) or a 5 pack of Chuck Norris flix! 

AVAILABLE TO STREAM ON TUBI (for a limited time).

Erotic Ghost Story 2

Erotic Ghost Story 2. Directed By Peter Ngor Chi-Kwan (1991).

When I saw this was part of Shout Factory’s dive into Cat III shit I figured after 11 yrs?!! It was time to review the sequel. I found this on Plex instead of having to buy the boxset, which has many TOG HK classicks that I highly recommend. The set is called Golden Harvest vol 1: Supernatural Shockers. Films include Sex and Zen,Dr. Vampire, Erotic Ghost Story 1-3, Robotrix. These titles besides Sex and Zen have all been reviewed here before when they were on inferior sources and VHS tapes procured after dumpster dives but NOW the genius people behind Shout Factory have them in superior HD quality Blu-rays packed with fun shit!

The director is an amazing cinematographer named Peter Ngor, this dudes resume is a blaze with hits like Armour of God (1986), Full Contact (1992) and the aforementioned Sex and Zen (1991)just to name a smattering. 

Skunkape revealed to me that he didn’t think much of this and complained about Anthony Wong’s annoying hissing! Wong plays Chiu-sheng, he bangs so many Asian babes but doesn’t do any butchery Untold Story (1993) style. He wears white makeup, a white mane and has a tail. He'll hop in a spiky cocoon with his Goth girlfriend that's where they have the best talks.

HISSSSSSSSS You like that ya smelly ape?

There’s an obscene amount of fornicating, ass play, I mean a raw egg rolls down some butt cheeks, just weird Cat III type tomfoolery. I’d say 70% of EGS2 is full of nut bustin’ content. Unless you're 12 years old, this kind of constant Skin-a-Max type bonin' is hardly sexy but I was never bored at least. There’s one sex orgy scene (of many) where they pass a joint and smoke what they call the “happy leaf”. The end throws a lot of sappiness our way, it didn’t impress me but it was a fun time nonetheless.

MARIO KART MEETS SUPERNATURAL CAT III STYLINZ. I can't wait to see how part 3 is! 

PART 1 &2 are available to watch on PLEX.
 

Just widdlin'

this movie sure blows NOT!

I'm here for the Evil-Lynn audition.