Black Magic is a gruesome Ho Meng-Hua horror fest that spawned a whole genre. Still I think it is the story and its two chief villains (Chian Mi and Mrs. Luo) that really carry it. Later, she is poisoned by Master Shi’s wife. Like many on this list, he wants revenge. Dugu Wu Di from the two Bastard Swordsman films is one such phenomenon. Lo Lieh has a knack for playing great villains. When she becomes a ghost, it is both heartbreaking and horrifying. Yet, most of those films were consistently strange and/or outrageous. The whole time you are waiting for her to be revealed as a ghost. But I think the character he plays in Human Lanterns, Chao Chun Fang, is remarkably suited to October. He’d be the downtrodden hero. It slips slowly into the supernatural, and most of the film is devoted to building the relationships between the characters. Lau Wing plays him brilliantly though and despite his shortcomings, we are willing, even eager, to follow him as he battles wits with the equally distasteful Master Tan (Chen Kuan-Tai) and is pitted against Lo Lieh’s menacing and invincible, Chao Chun Fang. Review by Jay H ★★★½ Very amusing buddy team up with Ti Lung, Lau Wing and Lo Lieh as they unravel a mystery and seek revenge for the death of a famous hero in the martial world. This is not a movie for everyone. For one, there has not been a traditional Shaw film, opening fanfare and all, in decades and a hefty portion of … These appear in chronological order of release. Far East Films is an Asian movie fansite dedicated to bringing you all the latest news, views, and reviews on all of your favourite movies. There’s been zombified assassins, coffin-dwelling killers with deadly gasses at their disposal (Pursuit of Vengeance), English-spouting mummies (Holy Flame of the Martial World) and scores of cackling monstrosities who bring the fantastical world of Gu Long, Louis Cha and Jin Young to life. The 80s saw the Shaw Brothers studio produce some crazy flicks. It can be uncomfortable to watch at times, but isn’t overly intense. Ouyang Feng is nearly unequalled in the martial world in terms of sheer power and ambition, but as you might expect it is the latter that begins his downfall. In style, it falls somewhere between Holy Flame of the Marital World and the Bride From Hell. One of the things I love about The Enchanting Ghost is how you never quite know when the horror begins. Kuei Chih-Hung films can be graphic and intense, and I decided to pick a movie from his catalog that seemed like an accurate representation of that. But Chao Chun Fang manages to be quite frightening without the aid of demons or spirits. It is the kind of movie one half-expect to reveal mundane explanations for seemingly supernatural developments. Zhi Hong is creepy and unsettling in Killer Snakes. And it all comes down to the unwavering focus on the deeply disturbed Zhi Hong. While literature was the first home of Wuxia, cinema has added another layer of intensity to the genre and the Shaw Brothers’ studio of the late 60s to early 80s was the undisputed home of the tales of luminaries like Louis Cha and Gu Long. It is the villain. We get a lot of hints and false starts, where we think maybe Ruyu is a ghost who has enchanted the scholar. As she wanders home, with poison shredding her hair and flesh, we once again think she might be a ghost. He gets full wuxia marks for the ability to literally bounce of the walls and fire laser bolts from his hands and the way he decimates his opponents is quite a spectacle. On Diabolique: My three-part article, “Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio,” examines A Chinese Ghost Story, one of the iconic films of the Hong Kong New Wave; including a look at the original story by Ming Dynasty-era writer Pu Songling and the Shaw Brothers’ Enchanting Shadow, an early adaptation of the same ghostly tale.. Needless to say that, despite a relatively innocuous name, The Plum Blossom Bandit is nearly without equal and as scores of protagonists try to unmask him in the film, he fashions ingenious ways of getting rid of anyone who gets too close. Its gorgeous fog-filled sets give the movie a fitting mood. This is a well-drawn and believable villain, whose excesses will turn off some viewers. With a potent love spell, she wrenches him from the arms of his bride, Chu Ying (Lily Li). Most were friends since childhood and attended the Peking Opera School in Taiwan before meeting director Chang Cheh and moving on to the Shaw Brothers studio in Hong Kong. Weekend Spotlight Why the Shaw Bros. Movies Are Awesome. None of the three main leads could be described as heroic. It brought us some of the greatest kungfu/wuxia films to date. Nevertheless, few images are as powerful in Shaw Brothers’ wuxia cinema as Yoh Xi-Hung, arms outstretched, gauntlets on, bearing down on the camera. As villains go, he can be quite reasonable to work with. Armed with a skull-mask and bear-like claws, he employs an animalistic of Kung Fu to work around his foe’s sword skill and make lanterns from human skin. But in the end, it turns out the ghost is quite real, and extremely powerful. Despite the orgies of violence and sex in his movies, Kuei Chih-Hung brings atmosphere and an expert-hand. Draped in his purple robes, Zhou might seem a fiendish schemer rather than an arch-enemy, but in the finale he shows that he very much has the fighting chops to compete with the best; the way he disarms Fu Sheng’s Gao and his allies is mightily impressive. A mere mortal with no ghostly powers, she has no means of defending herself and falls victim to his violent advances. While many of its cinematic descendants, like Yang Chuan’s Seeding of a Ghost, are more extreme, Black Magic still packs a lot of stomach churning parasites and gore. For sheer eye-watering wickedness and general demeanour, Yoh Xi-Hung, played in the classic ‘Avenging Eagle’ by Ku Feng, is impossible to ignore. Please go to the Instagram Feed settings page to connect an account. It starts out with a scholar named Lang Yu Zhu (Yang Li-Hua) forced to live in haunted house after he loses his home. Villain: Exit, Stage Left: After her plans are foiled and the Shaw brothers kill all her men and capture her plane, Cipher escapes from it by jumping with a parachute, remaining at large as the movie ends. Thankfully the first on our list is such a figure, a man who brings single-minded obsession with ruling the martial world to incredible new heights. Chu Ying and Xu Nuo’s friends find a priest of their own to battle Chien Mi’s charms, and a spiritual battle ensues between them. still packs a lot of stomach churning parasites and gore. And it all comes down to the unwavering focus on the deeply disturbed Zhi Hong. With their ornate costumes, eclectic masks and sinister weaponry – not to mention some of the most blood-drenching flicks ever put on celluloid – we consider The Venoms (aka Philip Kwok, Lu Feng, Chiang Sheng, Lo Meng, Sun Chien and Wei Pai) to be the ultimate link between kung fu and Halloween. What often draws a viewer into the world of a Wuxia film is not so much the plot – as long as it is suitably insane, we’re happy – or the hero or heroine. This character is a human monster and the only supernatural elements in the story are conventional wuxia features like lightness kung fu. 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