morrison-dylan-fan
Gathering up titles online over Christmas 2017, I spotted what sounding like a great Hong Kong crime flick. Watching it for the Hong Kong challenge on ICM (better late than never!)I was sad to find no Eng Subs. Rolling the dice and E-Mailing the uploader,I was thrilled to get the Subs sent,which led to me finding out how fatal this termination is.View on the film:Swarming round the (sadly un-credited) dark synch score, director Yeung-Wah Kam attacks with a deeply cynical,nihilistic atmosphere, tinted in blue for the burning of the thin blue line. Cracking open the double dealing between the cops and the criminals, Yam holds firm in a blistering take no prisoners approach,reeling in thugs and children caught between shoot-outs in lightning-fast whip-pans, whipped up by burning rubber car chases and stylish shots revealing the contents of brown envelopes.Rubbed against the grime on the street shown by Kam, the screenplay by Chi-Ming Pang superbly takes aim at all sides, stripping the cops and thugs of heroics to show them at their most bare, rogue form. Netting in Jimmy's family, Pang powers the explosive action on the down and dirty desire for revenge of Jimmy and Moon. Screeching with fury,Moon Lee gives a simmering performance as Moon,whilst Simon Yam gives Jimmy the hard-nose of ambiguity and the fantastic Phillip Ko hisses as Ko Mok-Fu unveils his fatal termination.
HaemovoreRex
A pre Mortal Kombat Robin Shou appears in this as a particularly slimy swine who is abusing his position as a customs official to help smuggle a consignment of guns.The plot becomes far more complex when the police become suspicious thus prompting Shou's character to put one of his employees in the frame. Matters take a further turn for the worse when the said employee is subsequently murdered and his brother and sister in law become unwittingly embroiled in the sinister affair.A number of excellent action set pieces (mostly towards the end of the film), some edge of your seat suspense, some awesome martial arts action (from the always superb Moon Lee), great performances all around and even a shocking scene in which a character that would never, ever be sacrificed in a Western film is brutally murdered all make this absolutely electrifying stuff!Fellow fans of IFD output will instantly delight to behold regular bad guys Philip Ko and Cornish born actor Mike Abbott in this to. The former playing the particularly nasty lead bad guy whilst the latter plays a complete psychopath who holds a sadistic predilection for holding little girls out of car windows whilst the car is being driven at break neck speeds!This is simply riveting stuff and the sort of film Hollywood wouldn't and indeed, couldn't make in a million years!
fertilecelluloid
Andrew Kam, who helmed the superb (and more well known) THE BIG HEAT in 1988, also helmed this equally nasty exercise in cinematic nihilism the same year.It does not have the high production values of HEAT, but it has stunts that some viewers may argue go too far.The stand-out is a sequence in which Moon Lee's daughter is kidnapped by bad guys. They grab her by the hair and hold her aloft above the road as they flee. To make matters more difficult, the feisty Lee tries smashing her way through the front window of the vehicle at the same time.This sequence is simply jaw-dropping. I've seen virtually every Hong Kong action film made between the late 70's and early 90's, so I'm not exaggerating when I say that you have never seen anything like this stunt (with a small child) before. The trauma on the child actor's face during this sequence is palpable.The film also boasts a back-breaking fall from a shipping container to the ground, a handsomely staged ticking bomb sequence in which our hero's husband is blown to pieces and various shoot-outs with family-sized squibs.The plot is pretty nonsensical and Simon Yam makes little impression, but do seek this out for its mind-blowing stunt scenes.There is a cavalier disrespect for human life in this little-seen actioner and a mean-spirited tone to wash it down with.Phillip Ko makes an ugly, nasty villain who is not adverse to shooting a child dead and the terrific Moon Lee gives her 100% best as usual.
AD
