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Dolls (2002)
It seems that every time I mentioned that I’d seen Kitano Takeshi’s latest effort and liked it, someone said “You must be the only one!” I’d then have to point out that no, I wasn’t the only one, and if they’d seen it themselves they’d be able to offer an informed opinion. ‘Twas an education for me in how rumours get started.
So let’s deal with my impression of Dolls. Tearing into the bad stuff first, it did drag … (read more)
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Curse of the Golden Flower (2006)
The new Chinese drama Curse of the Golden Flower is a welcome return to form by director Zhang Yimou, and further proof that major Chinese stars Gong Li and Chow Yun-Fat do their best work on home ground.
In the past fifteen years Zhang has gone from being the bad boy of Chinese cinema (Ju Dou, Raise the Red Lantern) to the acceptable face of a cultured China with international hits like Hero and House of Flying … (read more)
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Shaolin Prince (1982)
Most fans of Shaw Brothers’ martial-arts and swordplay films know the names of director Chang Cheh and action director Lau Kar-leung, also a fine director in his own right. The Shaws studio had several other top action directors, though, chief among them Tong Gaai, who worked in partnership with Lau sifu on many of Chang Cheh’s films. While Lau is most associated with empty-handed martial arts, Tong Gaai was a weapons specialist, responsible for many of the Shaws films featuring … (read more)
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Burning Paradise (1994)
Burning Paradise is a collaboration between two of the greats of contemporary Cantonese cinema: director Ringo Lam (Prison on Fire, Full Contact) and producer Tsui Hark (Once Upon a Time in China series).
The opening action sequences of this martial arts feature quickly establishes the cinema landscape via a series of human and animal decapitations. The prologue describing the persecution of Shaolin monks by the Manchu government during the Qing dynasty, has been used in Shaw … (read more)
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Darna Zaroori Hai (2006)
I begin this review with a small confession — I’ve recently turned into a Bollywood fan girl. Yes, I genuinely like Bollywood movies. I don’t watch them to laugh at them (well, only when they deserve it) and, no, I have absolutely no problem when the actors break out in song and dance. I had seen Bollywood films before (Lagaan, Kaante, Talaash, Dil Chata Hai) but the bug really bit with Kuch Kuch Hota Hai… (read more)
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20:30:40 (2004)
Thankfully, 20:30:40 is not – as some marketing material has suggested to the contrary – a Sex in the City replicate with a Taipei backdrop. Unless you are the type of person that gets really upset when films about women are not also films that deconstruct feminism, try to ignore this kneejerk promotional tactic. I certainly wouldn’t climb over mountains to chase down a movie so advertised, but I might be inclined to set up a base camp, fire up … (read more)
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Karas (2005)
There’s a fine line between the real world and the spirit world, or at least there is in Japan, apparently. Karas, by classics production studio Tatsunoko, seems to have borrowed from the same source as Takashi Miike’s recent kid’s flick, The Great Youkai War, populating its realms somewhere on the edge of general consensus reality with figures and creatures more familiar in mythology than anime’s mecha Halls of Fame. And as in Youkai War, someone with a … (read more)
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An Amorous Woman of Tang Dynasty (1984)
An Amorous Woman of Tang Dynasty is another in the Shaw Brothers’ studio’s proud tradition of period-setting erotic dramas with dodgy English titles, following on from 1972’s Intimate Confessions of a Chinese Courtesan. Like the latter, though, it really is just a bit more complicated than you’d think: this movie has a number of attributes that set it apart from the rest of the pack.
Now, don’t get me wrong. It is what it says it is on the … (read more)
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