"Crippled Avengers" (1978) d/ Chang Cheh

It's been a minute since we looked at any gung fu here at the Wop, so I figured we'd cover another late seventies Shaw Brothers classic from Chang Cheh starring his popular Venom Mob stable: The affable Kuo Chui (The Lizard), the personable Chiang Sheng (Hybrid Venom), the hot-headed musclebound Lo Mang (The Toad), the kick-riffic Sun Chien (The Scorpion), and the treacherous Lu Feng (The Centipede), the only fellow missing is Pai Wei (The Snake), but he'd turn up in other Cheh vehicles with his cinematic gang mates. Also on board, is the man himself, Johnny Wang Lung Wei, in another memorably villainous turn with a ball and chain (actual weapon, not a wife, don't get excited, SJW's). Maybe more surprising, is the participation of Chen Kuan Tai, usually a distinguished hero in these pictures, as a major cock of a bad guy.


Being fitted for extending iron hands that shoot darts lessens the blow of having your arms amputated by angry bandits.
While Tao Tien Tu (Chen Kuan Tai) is away on business, his homestead is set upon by members of the ruthless Tien Nan Tiger gang, who proceed to chop his pleading wife's legs off and his young son's arms off (that's a calling card, huh) before he can return in time to dole out ample Tiger Claw retribution upon these villainous bastards. After his wife succumbs from her wounds, Tao vows to construct his newly crippled boy some nifty iron arms, to assist in his gung fu proficiency as he grows up. We then meet Tao Sheng (Lu Feng) as a bitter young Tiger style proponent with iron arms, who, aided by his equally bitter old man and his loyal henchman, Lin Wing (Wang Lung Wei), enjoys playing judge, jury, and executioner to every poor son of a bitch that they deem to have shown disrespect in some regard. Their brutal martial bullying leaves the wanderer Chen Shun (Kuo Chui) blind after Sheng gives him the Iron Moe Howard to his ocular orbits, the iron smith Wei Da (Lo Mang) dumb and deaf, Hu Ah-kuei (Sun Chien) loses his legs, and Wang Yi (Chiang Sheng) gets his head squeezed in a vice until he's an idiot. These guys don't mess around...


"Which one of you bastards would like a crippling lesson?", queries Tao Tien Tu (Chen Kuan Tai).
Wang Yi's teacher takes in the crippled bunch as students, repairing their bodies and minds with gung fu, as is so often the case. The men craft some iron legs for Hu, and Chen and Wei are taught to use their handicaps to their pugilistic advantage (as is so often the case). Meanwhile, Wang Yi is able to fight as he did before the torture, he just has the attention span of a child on four bowls of Super Sugar Crisp. In between more incapacitating life lessons served up by the evil trio anytime someone bumps into one of them or mentions Sheng's handicap (which, for the record, is a lot), even more cronies are hired for protection with a party celebrating Tao's martial accomplishments on the horizon, making the already laborious task of exacting revenge near to impossible for our heroes. Will they be able to defeat the Tiger Claw master and his small army? Will there be ample doubling and blood drenched two man kata action to wow even the hardest of gung fu fanatics to please? I shouldn't have to spell it all out for you, grab a copy, and see for yourselves!


"Second word...sounds like anacusis...martial bruises? Oh, it IS anacusis..."
Not to be confused with 1979's Crippled Masters, which featured actual handicapped gents, one with no arms, and another with no real legs to speak of. That's another review...Tonight's,  also known as Return of the Five Deadly Venoms,  is one of the wilder entries in Cheh's canon with the full Venom Mob, filled with bloody limbs, torture, and the usual dazzling display of skills we've come to expect from the familiar cast of characters. The fight scenes maintain the same standard of excellence, and some impressive acrobatics from Kuo,Chiang, and Lu throughout the production. Wang Lung Wei does his thing, and Chen Kuan Tai is effective as a villain here, as well. One of my favorite Cheh productions of the period, it should become one of yours, too, if it isn't already. Three Wops, and highly recommended.


"Let me blow this sneezing powder in your face...it'll be hilarious, come on!"

"7 Man Army" (1976) d/ Chang Cheh

What would you have if you packed the top Shaw Brothers stars of the day (Ti Lung, Fu Sheng, Chen Kuan Tai, Chi Kuan Chun...even David Chiang!) into a two hour Chinese version of "Zulu", as directed by Chang Cheh? Well, we're about to find out as we tackle 7 Man Army, or "Six Chinese Soldiers With Interesting Back Stories and an Orphaned Kid Hold Off Twenty Thousand Japanese Troops During the War", as it should probably be known. If you're thinking "I'd better install some seat belts on my sectional sofa before I pop this one in...", nobody in their right mind could feasibly blame you here.


"Put your muscles away already, Chu," pleads Private He (Fu Sheng).
In the midst of an epic battle between the heroic Chinese and those stereotypically dirty Japs, six soldiers rise to the bellicose occasion in keeping their homeland strewn with the bloody dead bodies for the nationalist cause, epically heroic cats like Battle Commander Wu (Ti Lung), Private Bai (David Chiang), Private He (Fu Sheng), Private Jiang (Chen Kuan Tai), Private Pan (Li Yi-Min), and Private Chu (Chi Kuan Chun). In any other war, a handful of mere soldiers would be soon dispatched under the might of thousands of  Imperial troops with superior firepower and weaponry, but these men have all suffered under the Japanese heel long enough, and it's time to let their gung fu do the talking. The Japs send in a squadron of Mongol mercenaries( "Beardy" and Johnny Wang), as led by Colonel Hu (Liu Chia Hui), but even these ruthless murderers in Sherlock Holmes hats are no match for the plucky Chinese troops, who have only just adopted a war orphan (Ting Wa Chung), while defending a captured fortress from the advancing foot soldiers, no less. Hot damn.


"Screw what anybody thinks. We'll start a Mongolian Sherlock Holmes Hat Appreciation Society, as of right now."
In each battle, just when you'd expect the bombardment of tank shells and bullets to intensify, it stops dead, and the Chinese and Japanese square off in large scale martial contests. Luckily for the outnumbered Chinese, the advantageous Imperialists choose to use their rifles as short staffs, rather than shoot them at point blank range, which would negate the defenders' many strategic grenade tosses that send any Japanese caught in frame magically sprawling ass o'er tit through the sky in an impressive puff of smoke. Gung Fu also never shrinks from battle against Karate. Never forget that. Several dramatic flashbacks later, the Japanese finally take the gloves off and send in an insurmountable number of troops and tanks, leaving the orphaned boy in charge of Private Bai's gold rings gift to his wife, who he's treated horribly prior to the current war business. In case I fall in battle, make sure she gets them, boy! I'll give you a sec to Kleenex up any sniffles you might be experiencing. You already see the end coming from a mile away, so I won't bother elaborating upon it, here.
 

"...like fish in a barrel, eh Suzuki?"
You'll recognize some future Venoms like Kuo Chui and Lu Feng in there as extras; Philip Ko Fei, Miao Tian, and Fung Ngai, who made a career out of playing Japanese bad guys for Shaw Brothers and Golden Harvest, are in there, too. If you're sitting down to watch this one, there's a good chance you aren't going to hold the production to any degree of historical accuracy, and you shouldn't. It's a balls out pro-Chinese bayonet-slashing, Imperialist head-cracking, flag waving good time full of stage blood and explosions, starring all your favorites in top form (...even David Chiang, for real). Despite the running time, it never drags or fails to entertain. And of course I was rooting for Gordon Liu, "Beardy", and Johnny Wang all the way. Three Wops. Hunt it down.


"There'll be children with robins and flowers, as sunshine caresses each new waking hour.", croons Battle Commander Wu (Ti Lung).

B.W.'s Top Twenty Favorite Kung Fu Actors : The Top Ten

We're back, like a former 98 lb martial weakling, fully trained in secret combat techniques and prepared to avenge our father's/brother's/sister's/mother's/sifu's untimely death at the hands of a villainous bastard who's rubbing his mustache and laughing cockily, thoroughly unfazed by this latest challenge; unaware that we've mastered the ancient counter-style, thought lost for years, and he's in for some serious foot-eating, in grueling slo-mo. Movement eight'een, Peacock displays his fancy ass-feathers to Buddha! Here's my top 10.


  10) Liu Chia Hui  The youngest of the Liu's behind Chia-Yung and eldest Chia-Liang, Gordon "Master Killer" Liu's instantly recognizable even to those beyond the HK fight club, appearing in Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill series, after having a long and rich career in the Shaw Brothers productions of his older brothers and others; some of his best appearances coming in movies like Martial Club (1981), Heroes of the East (1978), Legendary Weapons of China (1982) and, of course,  The 36th Chamber of Shaolin (1978).


  9) Ti Lung  One of Shaw Brothers' early stars, the ever noble Ti Lung lends his unmistakable air of class to productions like The Deadly Duo (1971), Five Shaolin Masters (1974), and The Kung Fu Instructor (1979), as well as modern works such as John Woo's A Better Tomorrow (1986) and Liu Chia Liang's Drunken Master II (1994) opposite Jacky Chan.

 
   8) Kuo Chui   Number Four, the Lizard. My favorite Venom, Kuo usually plays a drunk or a wanderer or a beggar...or a drunken wandering beggar... in iconic Shaw Brothers productions for Chang Cheh like Daredevils of Kung Fu (1979), The Flag of Iron (1980), Five Element Ninjas (1982), as well as the aforementioned Five Venoms.


 7) Liang Chia Jen  We've come to "Beardy" himself! Though he's always been technically excellent, dating back to early Shaw flicks like Five Shaolin Masters (1974) and Marco Polo (1975), I prefer repeat viewings of his work in later films like Warriors Two (1978), Sleeping Fist (1979), The Victim (1980), Thundering Mantis (1980),  and Knockabout (1979) these days. All of his stuff is worth checking out, really.



  6) Billy Chong The Indonesian Willy Dozan was often billed as "Bruce Lee of the 80's" and was number one on my list for a long time, too,  often sparking arguments among us before and after many a kung fu class back then, but I stood firm on my choice, using movies like Super Power (1980), Kung Fu Executioner (1981), and Crystal Fist (1979) as visual evidence. Still a favorite.


  5) Liu Chia Liang The mere screen presence of this fight choreographer-turned-director, the elder statesman of the genre bar none,  uplifts any production to a must-see status. Though those appearances numbered ninety-three at the time of his death in 2013, with many glorious fights that instantly spring to mind, one only need bear witness to the spectacle that is the final fight in his own Legendary Weapons of China (1982) vs. his brother, Liu Chia Yung, to see a perfect jaw-dropping illustration.


  4) Fu Sheng  My favorite Chang Cheh regular has to be "Alexander" Fu Sheng, hands down. His comedic abilities, mischievous spirit, and general likability are top notch, and only matched by his prowess as a pugilist, having long trained under the tutelage of none other than Liu Chia Liang. Were it not for a tragic car accident in 1983, his international star would have surely rose to more dizzying heights, transcending the martial arts genre into mainstream comedy, as evidenced by the success of Hong Kong Playboys (1983).


  3) Bruce Lee Undoubtedly the King of the Kung Fu movie, and the Gold Standard by which all cinematic martial artists will forever be compared to. The four movies completed at the time of the iconic little tough guy's death in 1973, are all required viewing, for sure: Big Boss (1971), Fists of Fury (1972), Way of the Dragon (1972), and Enter the Dragon (1973).


  2) Jacky Chan In one instant, this former Peking Opera performer-turned-stunt man rose to the top by single-handedly revolutionizing the kung fu film with his own unique brand of physical kung fu comedy, performing all legendarily inhuman stunts himself along the way. Snake in the Eagle's Shadow (1978), Drunken Master (1978), Project A (1983), Police Story (1985), Armor of God (1986)...his list of excellent action movies is lengthy. If you've never seen his early classics, you're really selling yourself short as a film fan.


  1) Wang Lung Wei  Johnny Wang, who is without a doubt, the epitome of villainy in Asian action movies, naturally tops my list of favorites. "Who else... coooooooooould be", to quote Hwang Jang Lee. To Kill a Mastermind (1979), Martial Club (1981), Shaolin Temple (1976), and This Man is Dangerous (1985) contain some of my favorite vintage Wang assholery.

"Two On The Road AKA/ Fearless Dragons" (1980) d/ Li Chao

It's been a minute since we've covered any gung fu, so tonight, to set the Yin and Yang into balance again, we'll be taking a look at the Goldig Films production of a 1980 kung fu comedy directed by Li Chao, the man who gave you 1982's Billy Chong/Willy Dozan vehicle,  Kung Fu From Beyond the Grave, and starring no less than "Beardy" aka/ Liang Chia-Jen and Phillip Ko Fei. If that wasn't enough, Johnny Wang himself dons the grey wig and mustache combo as a mayor who may or may not be on the up and up. I think you can figure out how this is all gonna end up already...


"If boulders were currency, I still wouldn't share with ya.", notes Lively Dragon (Liang Chia-Jen).
At the same time that Lively Dragon (Liang Chia-Jen) reluctantly gives Crazy Horse (Philip Ko Fei) a cart ride, the Mayor (Wang Lung Wei) has dispatched a shipment of coins as relief to local refugees with a large weapon-bearing entourage in tow, to protect it. Is it any wonder that both carts cross paths, just as the donations are set upon by bandits on the road? I wasn't surprised. In the melee, Dragon heists the cart, but finds the money already stolen and the chest filled with rocks upon closer inspection. With wanted posters springing up all over town with depictions of Horse emblazoned on them, and the Mayor's fedora-clad associate (Chiang Tao) leading the investigation, Dragon sets a trap for him, both to warn him of the impending fuzz on his tail, and to collect his cash reward himself, of course. At the same time, Golden Jaws (Siu Gam), the Chinese mutant giant cousin of Jaws (who's off working with James Bond, apparently) has been biting random people to death with his spiffy auriferous teefers.


Beardy and Ko Fei are prisoners of Chiang Tao, who's a slave to that ridiculous hat.
The two men set out to find the true gold thief, robbing each other back and forth and ultimately getting themselves thrown in a cell by Fedora after he threatens to torture them in a red white and blue "games room" that has a seat with obligatory spike that goes where the sun doesn't shine. Our boys name drop 1978's Midnight Express as they bust out the cell wall (what era is this set in, anyway?), only to empty out into the cell of a horse-faced nymphomaniac. There's also a behemoth babe (Tsui Oi Sam) who accidentally crushes her husbands on their wedding night, one turning his toes up while our heroes are hilariously hidden under their honeymoon bed. They pose as travelling scholars to investigate the lame legged Mayor as a potential suspect, and combine to wear out Golden Jaws in a silly fight that ends with the giant pissing himself as he falls unconscious. In the end, it's Dragon and Horse vs. the Mayor (surprise, it was Johnny Wang all along.) in a marathon match of martial skill as they interrupt his sneaky getaway with the stolen loot.


"Movement number three...Chinese strongman carries your mother's ass to bed."
After 65 appearances as an actor in these films, in titles ranging from Bruce Lee and I (1976), Eighteen Jade Arhats (1978), and Challenge of the Masters (1976),  Cantonen Iron Kung Fu (1979) was Li Chao's first film in the director's chair, having earned over thirty credits there in the years since, on films like 1994's Shaolin Avengers, Struggle For Leader (1983), and 1981's Ninja Supremo. Beardy, on the other hand, has appeared in over one hundred and thirty films, and directed only ten. He's still one of my favorites, even though he's nowhere near as prolific as Ko Fei, who acted in over two hundred movies and directed over twenty, himself. The payoff in this one, is obviously the final showdown between these two and Wang Lung Wei, which is lengthy and as amazing as one could expect out of these guys. Three Wops, and required viewing for any Asian action enthusiasts out there. Hunt it down.


Hold on to your sash, it's about to get fightastic out here.

"This Man is Dangerous" (1985) d/Wang Lung Wei

Who's that heavily armed thug in a ski mask, mugging for the release poster for tonight's review, a 1985 HK crime drama of grim and bloody proportions, you ask? As if the mustache of ultimate villainy wasn't a dead giveaway. This Man is Dangerous aka/ Shandong Madman is the second Shaw Brothers feature directed by Wang Lung Wei, starring Chin Siu Ho and Fu Sheng's pipsqueak sibling, Chang Chan Peng, as well as a beardless Beardy (Liang Chia Jen), and a cameo from a very eighties-looking Lo Mang, of Venom Mob fame. There's plenty of execution-style murders, maggot-ridden corpses, Herpes jokes, dated eighties wear, and there's even an obligatory Western extra with zero screen presence, thrown in, for realism's sake, of course. Buckle up, me hearties, it's gonna be another wild one...
 

"Fingerprint this?? Bullshit, Mr Han(dless) man!", exclaims Wei (Chang Chan Peng).
Hao and Wei (Chin Siu Ho, Chang Chan Peng) are roommates who aspire to be undercover policemen in Hong Kong, when Hao isn't undermining Wei's every secret desire, stealing his meticulously maintained roses and giving them to Zhi (Lai Yin Shan), a local girl that Wei fancies, but is either too shy or too short to make a move for. Hao even kicks him out of the apartment while convincing her to sleep with him. With friends like that, you almost don't even need Ku Lung (Wang Lung Wei), a ruthless bastard from the mainland who robs armored vehicles in broad daylight and stomps call girls in the labonza just for kicks. On the job, Wei and Hao are forced to pull fingerprints from a rotting, maggot-infested cadaver in a coffin at a morgue whose floor is nearly untraversable, thanks to a floor littered with sheet-covered bodies. They also roll, ridiculously garbed,  into a gay disco, while hunting for a marijuana dealer named Pink Lady (Elvis Tsui), a randy leatherman who digs Hao's Double Dragon-inspired disguise. Cue: obligatory fight scene.


"Go take a shower, bitch...here's your l-OOFAHH!"
While Hao further strains his friendship with Wei by ducking out on a pregnant Zhi, Ku Lung is busy beating on drunken cops, stealing their service revolvers, and using them in a bullet-ridden bloodbath against a rival gang of Vietnamese, as a favor to Chin Lao Pa (Chang Chuang), a brothel owner and fellow evildoer. When he rubs out Sgt Chen (Phillip Ko Fei) and his favorite prostitute one afternoon, and demands that Chin support him in some upcoming major bank robberies, Chin then sells him out to Beast, the young men's immediate superior, earning himself a brass knuckle beatdown at Ku's ruthless hands,  in one of his own sauna rooms. With the cops, led by Officer Leung (Liang Chia Jen) and Police Chief Luo (Lo Mang), closing in, Ku's brother Biao gets picked off by Hao while trying to dog paddle to freedom in a pond near the gang hideout, and that's something that Ku takes very, very personally, judging by the Uzi he's got stashed away, for just such an occasion. All Hell then breaks the fuck loose, right up to the signature Shaw Brothers final freeze frame.


Looks like The Toad isn't impervious to half-off sales at Chess King, either.
"The Mayor" himself, Johnny Wang, who wrote, directed, starred in, and choreographed fights for tonight's feature, would go on to direct The Innocent Interloper for Shaw Brothers the following year. You've probably caught Chin Siu Ho in things like Ten Tigers of Kwantung (1979), Masked Avengers (1981), and House of Traps (1982), though he's appeared in over a hundred films by now. Less prolific, by far, is Chang Chan Peng, who made his final film appearance here, after roles in Eight Diagram Pole Fighter (1984), Treasure Hunters (1981), and Wits of the Brats (1984), before retiring from acting altogether. Wang may have caught some slack for his downbeat endings and brutal portrayals of violence as a director over the years, but Dangerous did Top Ten business at the HK box office in 1985, and I was well entertained throughout, as always, by Asian cinema's greatest bad guy of all-time. Perhaps he could have changed out some of the weird comedy for longer, more elaborate fight scenes (the choreography tends to favor Wei's love of kickboxing over a traditional style here), but overall, I'd have to lay three Wops on it, regardless. Seek it out, at once.


 Ku Lung (Johnny Wang) never met someone he couldn't call a "dirty scumbag".

"The Boxer's Omen" (1983) d/ Kueh Chih Hung

If you thought last night's review sounded slightly weird, just wait 'til you wrap your minds around tonight's movie, a 1983 Shaw Brothers tale of kickboxing and mysticism as directed by Asian horror king Kueh Chih Hung, of puppets and wind up toys passed off as special effects, a soundtrack that borrows directly from Flash Gordon (1980) and Phantasm (1979) among others,  and then there's Johnny Wang Lung Wei as a paraplegic with extraordinary range of motion in his limbs...look,  I'd never be able to document all the lunacy within Sze To On's bizarre screenplay in a mere intro paragraph, nor would I ever attempt such a blatant impossibility,  without first undertaking my own introspective spiritual journey, involving lots of early 70's era Amboy Dukes, a gas mask full of Dutch Treat nuggies, and a special lady I know who does this thing I'm especially fond of,  without ever using her hands. Sidetracked again...


In this episode of Black Magician vs Food, we'll hear Somjai Boomsong query, "Are you gonna eat that?"
After brutal Thai boxer Bu Bo ("Bolo" Yang Sze) leaves his brother Chan Wing (Wang Lung Wei) permanently crippled in a kickboxing match, Chan Hung (Phillip Ko Fei) is visited by the spirit of his twin brother (Elvis Tsui), who just so happens to be a dead Taoist Abbot striving to attain immortality despite the witchcraftian interference of a pesky Black Wizard (that looks like an Asian mash up of magician Doug Henning and eighties wrestler Ultimate Warrior), who's highly salty and vengeful over the murder of one of his disciples/ pet bat, who's been reduced to a hopping wind up bat skeleton by the monk's gung fu magic. When Hung  (who pukes a live eel into the bathroom sink one evening, mind you) decides to assist the Abbot, who's been poisoned by eye needles, manages to dispatch the responsible Wiz in a dizzying, often nauseating hail of WTF,  three of his students take up the cause.


"This egg could use a Glade Air Wick. For real, it smells in there."
From here on out, it's colored lights, detached floating heads strangling folks with dangling veins and muscle sinews, pillowy Asian bobblers squashed up against glass, cyclopean lo-fi laser-shooting poodle demons, hydrocephalic monster puppets hatching out of goopy Alien rip-off eggs, wind up spiders that might have left even Fulci himself snickering, gaudy-yet-mystical locales in Thailand and Nepal, troops of attacking crocodile skulls, Saran wrapped suicide by kukri knife, and nude sorceresses reanimated by the sewing of corpses into dead crocodile carcasses and group eating/regurgitating/re-eating of rotten fruit, 'nanner peels,  maggot-ridden chickens, entrails and assholes, with the gross blend all stuffed into the woman's mouth. The final magical showdown sees Hung's ears and nose infiltrated by fuzzy demon caterpillars while he's held down by a pair of skeletal arms, but he somehow manages to strip the sorceress of her flesh, causing her to melt into a blue puddle full of maggots. I could elaborate further, but you get the idea. Hung defeats Bu Bo somewhere in there, too, but with everything else going on, you probably won't notice.


"I'm alive!!! That last chewed up chicken shitter you put in my mouth must've done the trick..."
You'll recognize Ko Fei from things like Seven Man Army (1976),  The Killer Meteors (1976), Bandits, Prostitutes and Silver (1977), and The Dragon, The Hero (1979), though he dates back to the studio's early days with roles in The Deadly Duo (1971) and The Water Margin (1972) as well. The muscle-bound Bolo/Yang Sze has had a long career in action films, squaring up against everyone from Bruce Lee to Jean Claude Van Damme over the years. Be forewarned, if you've got a working gag reflex, this movie will test it often. And if you're getting zooted while viewing (couldn't blame ya), you're probably gonna wanna skip the munchies phase afterwards. In a sub-genre known for its propensity to turn gross in a moment's notice... Seriously, this movie is like the Star Wars of gross Asian shit. Not for everybody, Boxer's Omen scores a WTF deuce on the rating scale.


"At least my good fashion sense remains intact!", notes Wing (Johnny Wang).

"The Fake Ghost Catchers" (1982) d/ Liu Chia Yung

Tonight's review, a supernatural kung fu comedy from director Liu Chia Yung starring the likes of Hsiao Ho, Chang Chan Peng, and Fu Sheng, has only been on my "to see" list for the past thirty years, having been unable to score a copy anywhere until the glorious advent of all region dvd players finally made it and many other Shaw Brothers films accessible to long time Western enthusiasts like myself. As one would expect, this is a weird and wild ride, packed with cereal-faced zombies, hopping ghosts, spiritual posession, lazy eyes, foot moles, broad physical slapstick comedy, lo-fi special effects, and Chinese mysticism that pre-dates Ivan Reitman's own Ghostbusters by nearly two years, or, in other words, a must-see for any self-respecting fan of martial horror-comedy. Still not convinced? What if we threw in Wang Lung Wei in a friggin' eye patch? Yeah, thought that'd do the trick...


Fu Sheng, at his dramatic finest, as you can clearly see here.
After a man (Lung Tien Chiang) commits suicide with poison over his unrequited love for a beautiful young newlywed (Lily Li), his spirit returns from the afterlife during a bungled grave robbing by a group of starving bumpkins, who are interrupted by a wounded whistleblower (Chang Chan Peng) fleeing the armed henchmen of a corrupt Qing official (Wang Lung Wei) known as "the one-eyed general", who's trying to kill him before he can transport evidence of his treachery to a nearby judge. The vengeful ghost kills the young woman, whose ghost enlists the services of a phony Taoist magician's young assistant (Hsiao Ho), who happens to be the whistleblower's cousin, leading him to also unwittingly involve himself in the deceased woman/ghost's plan to foil her ethereal murderer before he can give her twin sister (also Lily Li, of course) a similar fate. The titular fake ghost catchers bring in an extravagantly garbed and perpetually unlucky opera performer  with nine lucky moles on his foot(Fu Sheng) and carry along the female ghost in a paper spell inside an umbrella for the ride. Nope, not a typo.


"Let's see Linda Blair pull some shit like this off!"
The actor only agrees to help the young men if the female ghost will help him to be more successful at gambling, leading to expectedly ludicrous results at the local gambling house with a lazy-eyed casino owner (Tu Shao Ming), who even has a lazy-eyed mistress. Meanwhile, the plotting, murderous general only has one eye. You with me, so far? One eye captures the whistleblower and tortures him for the whereabouts of the secret list, but the woman's ghost possesses him, making him impervious to blows, weapons, and even flaming sticks of incense, which he chews menacingly (!) before escaping the general's clutches. At the climax, a trap is set at an abandoned house by the judge and the ghost catchers who defeat and arrest the general and his men when Li's ghost again possesses Peng, who subdues One eye while fighting like a Shaolin wooden marionette. Fu Sheng poses in ornate traditional marriage drag as Li's twin sister afterwards, as part of the set up for Lung's ghost, who naturally isn't about to give up hauntings and murders without a knock down, drag out fight to the finish, complete with wire work, lighting fx, cheap horror masks and makeup, and a goodly dose of gung fu magic, luckily for all of us watching from our seats. See for yourselves.


...and Johnny Wang as the evil One-Eyed General. Joke pretty much wrote itself.
1982 was a busy year for Fu Sheng, who showed up in My Rebellious Son, Cat vs. Rat, and The Brave Archer and his Mate all in the same year as this effort, and his appearance here is mostly in a supporting comedic role, with few fights to mention, but he's freaking hilarious throughout the damned thing, so we'll let that slide this time. On the other hand, the acrobatic Hsiao Ho, who never really received the spotlight he truly deserved, is excellent here, and Sheng's younger brother, Chang Chan Peng, who retired from acting altogether after completing Wang Lung Wei's This Man is Dangerous in 1985, has some equally impressive fight scenes, and it can be argued that his possessed wooden man routine vs. Wang here, rivals or even bests his brother's similar sequence (on a physical level if not a comedic one) in Liu Chia Liang's Legendary Weapons of China,  which was also released in 1982, coincidentally. A good time to be had, for sure, and three Wops on the scale. See it now!


(Not very)Special make up tip # 7783: Apparently, ghosts like their Cream of Wheat with strawberry preserves mixed in. 

"To Kill A Mastermind" (1979) d/ Sun Chung

1979 was a productive year for Shaw Brothers director, Sun Chung, who'd planted his martial flag the previous year with the epic Avenging Eagle, starring Ti Lung, Fu Sheng, and Ku Feng. Tonight's review is the third of his efforts from the decade's end, with The Deadly Breaking Sword and The Kung Fu Instructor preceding. Mastermind has always been the most difficult of the three to score a decent print of, having been unavailable in anything clearer than a ghostly VHS print with cut-off subtitles and a bootlegged rip from Chinese YouTube for what seems like forever. Don't let the mostly unknown cast scare you off,  this one's got a little bit of everything, from one of Ku Feng's "Avenging Eagle" metal claw-gloves to dart-shooting backpacks to  modified Venom Mob masks. Besides, where else are you gonna catch Johnny Wang Lung Wei, strawberry variant?


"Poison Clan? No, no, no, we're the Seven Evil Spirits Clan. This isn't the Snake, Number Two's mask, either."
Some eight years earlier, a failed attempt by the Imperial Court to bring down the murderous Qisha gang sent it's surviving chief into anonymous seclusion, where he plotted to raise his syndicate from the ashes back to criminal prominence. Now, with the Qisha receiving orders from their mastermind through an elaborate Electric Company-esque gold ball maze in their secret headquarters, they have again become the target of the court and Lord Yang, who has enlisted a spy among the ranks of their eight chiefs, setting up an ambush for their ranks after intercepting gang orders, raising the levels of mistrust and dissent among the bandits and to ultimately flush out the titular mastermind, whose identification is unknown even to his own chiefs.


"Of course, I haven't the balls to call Wang Lung Wei 'Strawberry Shortcake', are you kidding?"
Despite their array of flashy, hidden weapons, the Qisha chieftains fall one by one to Yang's carefully concealed counterintelligence, and he fells a large stone effigy of each bandit with a rope noose with every successful mission. With trust disintegrating as rapidly as their numbers, it isn't long before the Clan Leader reveals himself to be...Wang Lung Wei! Big surprise there, right? He of the strawberry hair streaks in turn, reveals his insidious plot to flush out the spy, while blowing up Clan HQ with most of Yang's army inside, and when he flexes his shoulder muscle to send a sword blade flying out of his torso into a nearby clay pot, destroying it instantly, you just know this cat isn't effing around anymore. What follows is a wild wushu finale, that you're gonna have to see for yourselves.


At that moment, Zan and Jayna both realized they'd left Gleek out in the hot car with all the windows up. 
 Though widely considered a box office flop, Mastermind is an excellent showcase of everything one could love about Sun Chung movies: excellent swordplay and fights (choreographed by Shaw reg Tang Chia), with his trademark picturesque wide shots and dramatic slo mo sequences at the height of the martial mayhem up on the screen. Perhaps competing with the genre hits of the day like Jackie Chan's Fearless Hyena, Samo Hung's Magnificent Butcher, and Fu Sheng's Proud Twins, combined with the audience's unfamiliarity with most of the cast proved too great a task, but to Chung's credit, he gets memorable performances from everyone involved. Interestingly, among those formidable Qisha chiefs are Lo Chun and Lo Sheng, brothers in real life of Venom Mob strongman, Lo (The Toad) Meng. Needless to say, this one should not be missed, at any cost. On the scale, Mastermind schemes and plots its way to three Wops, and comes highly recommended. Catch it!


"I'll give you some strawberry shortcake, you bastard!"