11/22/09

My Week in Film (11/16 - 11/22)



Eight Diagram Pole Fighter (1984)
(Directed by Lau Kar Leung)

wow, this movie is incredible. It starts off with the brutal ambush of the Yang family where only two brothers survive. However, the Yang family is so incredible and patriotic and noble that when they die, they stay standing up. The fighting is mostly weapon-based (a pole, lol) and is incredibly fast. It's hard to keep up. Thankfully, the action is not obscured and every moment is clearly visible and it's better this way so it can astound you more. Anyway, only two of the brothers survive. One of them goes insane and the other swears revenge for the ambush. He finds himself with some monks and begins to train with them and things happen, beautiful poetic depictions of graceful badassery like I've never seen before. It's not like Hero or House of Flying Daggers or something like that (and I love those movies), it's much quicker and brutal, which I'm all for. I'm getting goosebumps thinking of that ying/yang part in the temple with the candles (spooky!) and the monks playing brutal dentists is hilarious. This movie is great! Can't wait to check out more of this stuff. Gordon Liu is awesome.

★★★★



36th Chamber of Shaolin (1978)
(Directed by Lau Kar Leung)

Hmmm, this was really good. This film may have the longest second act in the history of movies. Jesus. You see in painstaking detail this dude's mastery of each of the chambers. This is the best part of the movie. At first, he's this kid who kind of tries to take the easy way out, but it soon is revealed that he has an incredible work ethic. Each chamber has its own challenge, its own focus, its own set of problems; and seeing the change in the character and seeing his growth is pretty awesome and probably acts as the greatest sorta but not really kinda training montage of ALL TIME. The film kind of rushes the last part of the film with the creation of the titular 36th chamber, but it also leads to some totally incredible badassery. However, none of that badassery matches the badassery (this is getting complicated) that's found in 8 Diagram. ZOOM OUT

★★★1/2




My Young Auntie (1981)
(Directed by Lau Kar Leung)

What a dumb movie. But it's hilarious! This is completely different from both 8 Diagram and 36th Chamber in that it's pretty much a comedy that has a bunch of fighting. In fact, the movie's kinda bifurcated - the first half is mostly pretty silly comedy stuff, while the second half is pretty much all fighting. While the fighting is awesome and the way in which the zooms and pans are used to constantly reconfigure the fights is pretty darn swell, I kind of got bored of the fights mainly because they got rid of the Auntie :( She's so great and Kara Hui is so fun that you can't help but miss her when she pretty much goes away for the last part of the movie. However, the sight of Gordon Liu wearing a frilly wig more than makes up for it (that shit is hilarious!) That first half is so funny. It culminates with this incredible masquerade dance thing where the fighting and the dancing is pretty much one and it gave me insta-smiles and insta-points and YAY.

★★★1/2



The Magnificent Butcher (1979)
(Directed by Sammo Hung + Yuen Woo-Ping)

Oh, man, this Sammo guy is amazing. I could probably watch him do anything and it would make him laugh. And the drunken hobo guy is even better. I loved that one scene where he gets that one dude to pay for his wine by starting a fight between the two dudes. And that calligraphy duel thing was pretty fantastic, too. A lot of it was really funny, yeah, and the choreography in the fights got progressively better as it went on, but what I didn't really expect were the unexpected dramatic bits of the story, and the surprising turns and all that shit. It even got serious as fuck and I almost teared up a bit but then I wiped them away before anyone could see and make fun of me and I told everyone to fuck! off and leave me alone for a bit except I was alone and just kind of thirsty and then the movie ended all of a sudden, like those 30s WB movies pix keeps yapping about. that missing link... so, yeah, good times. Can't wait for more Sammo.

★★★1/2



Encounters of the Spooky Kind (1980)
(Directed by Sammo Hung)

Sammo's wife is cheating on him with his boss. His boss gets tired of having him around, plots his murder and gets a wizard to do it. All of this is an excuse to have Sammo duke it out against a corpse (twice? thrice?), get his hand possessed, and other shenanigans. He meets another wizard dude who starts helping him and things become better for a while but then shit goes down, including an incredible wizard showdown that has Sammo getting possessed by a monkey spirit(?) and all of this to prove that Sammo is the shit. What I didn't expect was the brutality of the ending. Seriously. What I thought would be a lark ends on a completely vengeful note and it was completely ridiculous in a way but, hey, what not? I really enjoyed the setpieces in the temple the first couple of times. They were done really well, and I particularly loved that mime one (I lol'd), but the best part of the movie might be when he's surrounded by those four guards and Sammo uses that one stool to get away. That's just genius. That said, it does get kind of draggy and there's not much momentum or whatever, and that ending is kinda ridiculously... something. Who knows.

★★★



Wheels on Meals (1984)
(Directed by Sammo Hung)

Oh, man, this is like the great buddie action movies I never knew could be good. Jackie Chan and Yuen Biao are just buddies operating their own amazingly pimped out food van or whatever. They dominate most of the film, really. They meet this pretty lady and hijinks ensue there because they both want her but they're bros so they decide that neither of them will go for her. In the background is Sammo Hung, who plays a detective trying to track the girl down. There's not that much fighting at first, more of a comedy/action kind of thing (there's even a really badass car chase in there somewhere), but when both threads of the film converge and there's a rumble in this really great castle, there's lots and lots of fighting, including one of the greatest of all time. Jackie fights against this one white thug dude in this thing that gets progressively more epic and that climaxes with all kinds of badass shit going down, and although Sammo doesn't get to shine as much, he still delivers a bunch of laughs and thrills and goddamn if that one fight isn't fantastic, and I laughed and you laughed and we laughed, except there's no "we," just an imagined "we" or whatever, but I'll take what I can get, because movies like Wheels on Meals should be known by everyone. So fucking fun. And, man, Jackie Chan is a really good skateboarder...

★★★★



The Prodigal Son (1982)
(Directed by Sammo Hung)

The movie's probably better before Sammo appears but he does get a few moments himself to shine. That calligraphy-fu and toilet-fu stuff is hilarious. But, this is really Yuen Biao's show and all his cockiness at the beginning really pays off at the final fight when both Wing Chun approaches coalesce into a single expression of badass. While I've been trying to pay attention to the direction in these films, I always get lost in the fights themselves and the balletics and the movement inherent in them and not how the editing/direction/etc are working in tandem with them, so, yeah, I'm useless. I just know that Chinese Opera seems really awesome and I should probably watch Peking Opera Blues pretty soon, otherwise I'll die a terrible death while making mashed potatoes. Or not.

★★★1/2




Hallelujah I'm A Bum (1933)
(Directed by Lewis Milestone)

When I watched some of The Jazz Singer, I remember saying to myself that Al Jolson was a pretty good performer and that the blackface just distracted/took away from his charmingness. Well, this proves it. Jolson plays the mayor of central park, a bum who relishes his freedom to just do whatever he wants and hang out with his hobo buddies at the park. He's also friends with the real mayor and talks with him all friendly and stuff, but then he falls in love. Those ethereal moments when Jolson pulls the girl out of the water are fantastic, as are the workingman moments as he goes up the fire escape. The rhyming dialogue thing didn't work for me for some reason, maybe cuz the score and the songs weren't that memorable for me (except that "you're too beautiful" one or whatever) but the performances and the direction were pretty good and the quiet resignation at the end hit a grace note which more things should hit, in this life or another.

★★★



Project A (1983)
(Directed by Jackie Chan + Sammo Hung)

Jackie Chan plays a coast guard dude who doesn't like cops. Anyway, there's a big fight against the cops, one of whom is Yuen Biao, and there's some stuff about the coast guard going away to fight the pirates cuz they're owning everyone and everything. That's all fine and dandy. There are so many great sequences in here: the inspection of the club that turns into a giant fucking brawl, the ridiculous chase with the bicycles that turns into like 5 different set pieces and lasts like 30 minutes and everything else. It's totally formulaic and awesome nonsense but the thing is that I just can't find anything wrong with the execution. Seriously. These guys perfected whatever formula they had going on there and all the little touches and nonsense work so beautifully together and that final bout with Sammo included is like a dream come true. I've found them. Yes, I have.

★★★1/2



The Victim (1980)
(Directed by Sammo Hung)

It starts off so nice and comedy-like with Sammo asking random people to fight him so he can get a master. He even fights that one cat dude from Magnificent Butcher in the beginning. Anyway, things turn very serious later on, and there's all these tragic flashbacks to his eventual master's past with his brother, and Sammo's eventual master gets most of the badass action which is fine because he's really fucking good and beardy and sweaty. Anyway, Sammo basically ingratiates his way into this dude's life, learns all his shit, gets beat up a lot and then fights alongside him. But then the film piles on like 5 fucking different twists and you're left reeling and going WTF. So, yeah, good stuff. Oh, oh, did I run out?

★★★1/2



Carry On Pickpocket (1982)
(Directed by Sammo Hung)

Lots of fun. Those early silly moments watching Sammo and the gang pick pockets may be my favorite moments of the film along with that stakeout with that dumb cop trying all those toys. It gets pretty intense later on with some double crosses and some fake violence and I thought the film had turned this incredibly hardass turn at one point, but then it just showed me that you can't trust anything. By the way, the scene at the disco is frame-for-frame perfect. That lonely as hell Chaplin homage is so beautiful and the incredible dance sequence that follows is even better. Anyway, Sammo is the man of my dreams.

★★★1/2

This was a fantastic week.

Jhon's Movie of the Week is... Wheels on Meals


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