Category Archives: 90s-tastic!

Hail Down EVIL for a Ride! “Taxi Hunter” reviewed! (88 Films / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Taxi Hunter” Now Available on Blu-ray!

A moderately successful and mild-mannered insurance salesman is soon to be a new father.  As he and his wife baby prep with shopping around town for supplies, a few run ins with crabbily rude and scamming cab drivers make it known that the cab drivers flood the market with lawlessness.  When his wife unexpectedly goes into labor and his personal car out of service, he has no choice but to hail a cab but when the cabbie refuses the fare due excess vaginal bleed, the cabbie quickly shuts the passenger door and speeds off during the torrential rain stop, not realizing snagging the woman night gown and dragging her down the street a few yards, killing her and the unborn child, and speeding off in attempt to save his own skin.  Spiraling down into a deep depression and pushed beyond his moral limit, he justifies killing the taxi drivers for their abhorrent behavior that makes him a hero of the common people while also making him be public enemy number one with the taxi union and the police. 

History has proven, at least since the pre-2000s, that taxi drivers have had a long notorious stigma of being rude, uncouth, and greedy, especially in big metropolitan areas where traffic jams on a daily basis and the amount of fares determine your livelihood wage can eventually and insidiously get under a driver’s skin and turn the once service-needed necessity into a crabby-cabbie, a side-effect symptom of the profession one could assume.  Hong Kong’s 1993, Cat III shocker “Taxi Hunter” releases that pent up anger most of us have experienced under the clicking of the fare meter when Joe cab takes the long way around town.  Written by Wing-Kin Lau (“The Untold Story III”) and Kai-Chung Mak (“Twist”), “Taxi Hunter” marks the second collaboration effect of the same year as “The Untold Story” and “The Untold Story’s” co-director Herman Yau.  “Black Blood’s” Hung-Wah “Tony” Leung and “Tiger Cage” franchise’s Stephen Shin produce under Galaxy Films Limited and distributed theatrically by Media Film Asia.

Not only do the writers and director Herman Yau reteam to develop another controversial Category III picture but “The Untold Story’s” star Anthony Wong steps foot into another unraveled monster of a man with Kin, an amicable insurance salesman good at his job and eager to be the best father as possible quickly spins into melancholy and murder after the death of his pregnant wife at the hands of an unprofessionally hasty taxi driver.  Unlike the quietly stewing and maniacally murderous pork bun shop owner, Wong’s villainous runs takes backseat to his anti-hero performance, a punisher of taxi scum.  As Kin, Wong can be the delicately wonderful husband and the brazen barbaric with an easy slippery slope transition in between as he works to perfect Kin’s killing craft.  Unbeknownst to him, tracking him down is Kin’s own police detective brother Yu and his fun-loving goofy partner Goh, but unbeknownst to the detectives is the taxi serial killer is Kin.  “Iron Monkey” star Rongguant Yu offers up tough cop like it’s his job, mixing a humble blend martial arts and entrenched investigator into his character while also being blind to his brother’s moonlighting massacres.  Goh, on the other hand, played Man-Tat Ng (“Shaolin Soccer,” “Tiger Cage”) is supposed to provide the levity, the comic relief, the humor, but the cartoony way Goh is portrayed, in garb and in gab, reduces him to be nothing more than a Western Poser of the East with NBA and other Western branded gear from head to toe.  Goh feels very much like an attempt to jab fun at what Hong Kong might have perceived as American culture:  tasteless, worthless, and clueless.  Goh seemingly only exists to be a link between Kin and his brother when Kin hops into Goh’s undercover operation of pretending to be a taxi driver to which Kin takes his numbskull manner as cantankerous cabbie.  “Taxi Hunter” chauffeurs in the rest of the core supporting cast with Athena Chu (“Super Lady Cop”) and Hoi-Shan Lai (“Dr. Lamb”).

However still managing to provoke potency in parental guidance, to me, “Taxi Hunter” is perhaps the least intense Category III film I’ve experienced to date, but don’t let that keep you from taking a ride in Herman Yau’s rancorous retribution vehicle that has scores of variable car action scenes and a sordid glaze of street-level grime amongst the taxi industry.  “Taxi Hunter” engages us to think about the minor point As to point Bs in our lives that can easily subvert the well-oiled machine that is our existence.  Kin has a promising career, money (a motif we’ll revisit later), and a baby on the way and aside from the money, bizarrely enough, it all comes crashing down in the moment of a car door slamming shut. Those micro-fissions separating our good moments with nastiness slog us into another mindset, a killer’s mindset, when we’re wading at the very bottom of the losing everything depression. Lau and Mak don’t immediately set Kin’s path shortly after the turning point event, which also had a good chunk of setup. Posthumous need to kill cabbies didn’t occur directly after the tragedy as the script allowed time for Kin to try and stomach digesting tremendous loss, even giving away much of his money, as aforementioned, for services gone unrendered such as with the prostitute he didn’t end up sleeping with or being overcharged a child’s trading card just to make a crying child, a future version of his own child now deceased, happy when his parents would not purchase it. “Taxi Hunter” has more than just a singular character-driven story with plenty of suspense from Kin’s evolving practice of killing taxi drivers to the plethora of practical car action. “Taxi Hunter” is metered madness that shies away disgusting you with overt violence or seducing you with graphic sex of other Cat III film in its purer requital black comedy only Herman Yau and Anthony Wong could chauffeur in.

Presented in full high-definition 1080p from the original 35mm stock, “Taxi Hunter” has been flagged down for a new Blu-ray release from 88 Films, shown in anamorphic widescreen 1.85:1 aspect ratio. The transferred print keeps the natural grain of the 35mm film but swells the pixelations to ramp up details and textures tenfold without appearing touched up or improperly enhanced. 88 Films’ coloring grading leans slighting into the metallic blue steel, offering a gritty detective thriller with the overcast effect. The print also shows hardly any age or damage that results in a clean redress of a pristine print. Only one audio option is available for selection, a Cantonese LPCM 2.0 mono. Curious to why there isn’t a Mandarin option leads to speculation that Cantonese sole use was due to the dialect being more widespread in Hong Kong to keep a product of Hong Kong, typically with CAT III products where mainland China censorship would have picked “Taxi Hunter” to pieces. Though in original language, ADR is still used in post and while dialogue is cleaning in the forefront of the rest of the audio tracks, there’s not a ton of depth being too at the forefront, especially with Goh’s goofball gab. However, the action-laden and quarrelsome dynamics provide a plentiful range of sounds from screeching of tires, to the car crashes through windowfronts, to the multiple gunshots that make this sound design rich and energetic. English subtitles are offered and though glibly bland and concise, a lot of repetitive words and phrases, such as a wide use of bro, the subtitles are error-free and paced well. This special edition release includes a new audio commentary with Hong Kong film expert Frank Djeng, a new interview with producer Tony Leung Hunting for Words, a new interview with actor Anthony Wong Falling Down in Hong Kong, a new interview with action director James Ha How to Murder Your Taxi Driver?, still gallery, and trailer. Physical features available, if you’re quick enough, include a limited-edition cardboard slipcover with Sean Longmore’s compositional illustrated art and a folded poster insert of the same art. Also available inside the green Blu-ray case is reversible cover art with the initial same design as the slipcover or, my personal favorite, the original Hong Kong poster art that I proudly display on the shelf. Disc art is pressed with a slight variant of Longmore’s art and the not rated disc’s format comes region A and B playback with the film clocking in at evenly paced 90 minutes. Classic 1990’s fare without charging us an arm and a leg in wasted time, “Taxi Hunter” is solid CAT III with more vindictive and veridical visceral moments that change gears often and punches the gas into accelerating this terminal taxi tormentor.

“Taxi Hunter” Now Available on Blu-ray!

When Trying to be Good, EVIL Will Always Pull You Back In! “Streets of Darkness” reviewed! (SRS Cinema / DVD)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Just Look at this “Streets of Darkness” Cover!  It’s a Must Own!  

After avenging the death of his friend and sister, Danny completed his prison stint and was released back into his Miami neighborhood to restart his life.  Looking to stay clean of violence, Danny doesn’t want to connect himself to any crime organization but when a cruel Cuban drug lord assaults his mother due to his father’s past transgressions, Danny’s seek for solitude drives him into the embracing arms of the Italian mafia who also has a grudge against their rival drug trader.  One hit leads to another and Danny finds himself back in the criminal world rising quickly to become one of the mafia’s profitable enforcers.  Danny has everything he’s ever wanted – money, respect, and the woman of his dreams – but when a pre-affiliation sexual tussle with one of the crime boss’s young vixens come to light, a division between the family turns the tide on Danny’s uncertain future when a target is placed on his back.

If you’re looking for that Miami Vice feel of a movie with hot locations, hot bods, and hot criminal action, look no further with “Streets of Darkness” having been rightly resurrected from video obscurity, lost to Father Time since the mid-1990s.  The 1995 crime thriller comes from director James Ingrassia who hasn’t cinematically published a movie since his double billed features of 1988 – a surfing themed sex comedy entitled “Hot Splash” and an island survival slasher in “Kiss of the Serpent.”  “Streets of Darkness,” paying titular tribute to and cashing in on perhaps the popular stage fighting game “Streets of Rage,” is also a direct sequel to “Just a Chance” of 1992, a semi-biographical story of Danny’s descent into the depths of criminal syndicates told anecdotally while in his incarceration  Both stories are the pen presentation of Creative Productions’ Vincent LaRusso, the creative wordsmith, producer, and star of both films trying to capitalize on the market’s desire for toned bodies and gang dramas with treachery and murder. 

Vincent LaRusso isn’t just the leading man of his own film, he’s also a workout enthusiast that helped his own cause in creating a chiseled mafioso who’s smooth with women and even smoother laying down criminal keystones to the way he runs operations.  Yet, LaRusso’s character Danny can often talk-the-talk but can’t seemingly walk-the-walk with his own principles as he quickly turns against his own rules of operations by joining the mafia with dollar signs in his eyes after repeating himself, at least three times, noting how he doesn’t want to be attached to anyone or anything.  Repeating himself also becomes a running motif, or maybe a running joke, as much of LaRusso’s script recycles a ton of aforementioned material.  You can even make “Streets of Darkness” a drinking game on how many times Danny, or any character in general, says, “you understand me?”  If you do make it a drinking game, the possibility of being drunk half-hour in is very possible.  You’ve been forewarned.  Commingle the script spiraling with LaRusso’s one note performance and what churns out only scratches the surface of potential in what could have been a lucrative gem of indie filmmaking.   Instead, what’s achieved is a lifeless centric character in the midst of decent supporting players, such as Armand Cassis as the ruthless Cuban Hector, Jerry Babij as a cuckold crime boss, and Christine Jackobi as the cuckolding and scorned Diabolique.  Speaking in regard to the latter’s veneer that LaRusso aims for, “Streets of Darkness” offers that sexy, supermodel, Andy Sidaris-type of female principals, including a Hawaiian Tropic contestant.  Monique Lis and Jennifer Cole (a Miss Hawaiian Tropic), along with Christine Jackobi, fit that busty and beautiful bill that solidifies that beach body and vice viscera.  “Streets of Darkness” fill out with Joseph Cappello, Peter Gaines, Stanley Miller, Frank Palanza, Gennaro Russilo, Louisette Geiss, Lou Rebino, Angelo Maldonado, and Patrick Berry.

LaRusso’s “Just a Chance” was a made for CTN, the Christian Television Network, to deliver a religious message of strength of endurance and overcoming the cause-and-effect in turning toward a life of violence and crime.  For the sequel, LaRusso wanted to embark on a more entertaining product for the public with edgier content, hence the naked women and graphic violence which most of the Christian community won’t understand, shy away, and definitely wouldn’t fund a financial base.  With a budget doubling “Just a Chance,” LaRusso is able to obtain through private funding a higher production value with areal cigarette boat footage in and around Miami and its waters, decent lighting in a broad and focal sense, camera movement work, variety of locations though many look like hotel rooms, and achieving the overall Miami mise-en-scene cinematography.  For a 90’s indie production, “Streets of Darkness” reaches that particular look of tropical turmoil and drug scene, the perfect beachy bodies, and the complex story of one man’s reluctant return to the savage, dark streets but the picture doesn’t take the elements to the next level beyond other Miami-based gang/cartel movies like “Scarface” or “Cocaine Cowboys” where there’s a continuous blanket of thick aired intensity and explosivity of big shootouts.  “Streets of Darkness” is more expositional and story driven, likely due to budget reasons, to integrate gangster Danny’s plight into our own understanding of this character’s vow to do the right thing but ultimately destines him in the opposite direction.  The editing starts off funky with a clunky fast forward scene that comes around later to then slowly but eventually, level out to a chin high in too deep path of no return from life of crime.

Due to some shady dealings with a corrupt distributor, the Beta SP master was lost but Ron Bonk and SRS Cinema was able to obtain the VHS master tapes for an Apple Hi-Def ProRes digital remastering of “Streets of Darkness” onto DVD.  What results is a beautifully slick and clean appearance of Vincent LaRusso’s vision, especially for a standard definition 480p, sourced almost impeccably from one of the best possible VHS format options, the Beta SP.  Though virtually wear free with no signs of VHS degradation issues, details are generally and expectedly soft presented in the letterbox 1.33:1 full frame but not overwhelming glossy smooth to the point of splotchy or granularly patchy.  Remastered coloring, along with the innate lighting, sell “Streets of Darkness’s” semigloss South Beach brushstroke and achieving LaRusso’s production value desire tenfold.  Audio options only include an English Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo mix has been augmented with additional score and soundtrack by Tim Ritter (“Truth or Dare?,” “Killing Spree”) and Toshiyuki Hiraoka (“Clownado,” “Cannibal Claus”).  From the commentary track, a few of original soundtracks had expired copyrights and so additional music was needed to rescore the film but, honestly, the additional pieces delved too much into Tim Ritter’s gore-and-shock territory with heavy low-frequency tones that rattle the eardrums and don’t necessarily scream Miami’s synth-beat rock or Latin flair.  I would have been interested to hear the original music and compare to the newly supplemented release.  However, dialogue protrudes into the forefront with lesser force than normal but still clean, clear, and prominent other than the heavy duty, reverberating bass notes.  There’s slight static feedback throughout but doesn’t hinder the audio senses.  The Brutal special features include a second film, the Vincent LaRusso’s “Just A Chance” along with video commentaries and interviews with both films featuring video discourse between LaRusso, Tim Ritter, and filmmaker Larry Joe Treadway and Ritter and LaRusso only on the audio commentaries.  The bonus content ends with theatrical trailers of both films.  While not chockablock with physical fixings, the SRS release has one of the more amazing cover arts sourced from the original poster elements of a shirtless and ripped Vincent LaRusso in between two model women for the front cover.  Immediately eye-fetching and intriguing, the image is accentuated by SRS’s mock retro designed DVD casing with a round ACTION and BE KIND REWIND stickers and an image bordering encompassment to make the appearance of a VHS cover.  Disc pressed art is the same image but cropped to focus on the three individuals on the front cover.  The not rated film has a runtime of 102 minutes and is region free.  “Streets of Darkness” is a win-win for SRS Cinema and Vincent LaRusso in its newly remastered form that revives the Miami mania even if it’s only for one more heat and beach encore.

Just Look at this “Streets of Darkness” Cover!  It’s a Must Own!  

A Corrupted Nation, Operated by EVIL Drug Lords, Are No Match for “McBain” reviewed! (Synapse Films / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“McBain” Explodes onto Blu-ray from Synapse!

Vietnam War has officially ended, and U.S. troops evacuate the worn torn country almost immediately until Robert Santos and his squadron happen upon a Vietcong-controlled POW camp still operating under the merciless thumb of North Vietnamese soldiers either unaware of the news that war is over or are blatantly disregarding defeat to deface the enemy. During the trouncing of opposition in a fury of firearms and explosions, Santos saves POW Robert McBain seconds before being stabbed in the back by the enemy. McBain pledges a debt to Santos for saving his life. Eighteen years later, the now Colombian revolutionary Santos, in fighting for his countrymen’s freedom and end of suffering, is killed by an iniquitous President controlled by a narcotic cartel. Santos’s wife travels to America to find McBain where the former soldier regroups Santos’s old platoon to avenge their brother in arms as well as to free the struggling people of Colombia from dictatorship and tyranny.

Director James Glickenhaus, known for his handful of thrifty, R-rated, action thrillers with some of the biggest names of the 1980s, including Jackie Chan, Sam Elliott, and Peter Weller, had previously not helmed a picture with a budget more than $5-10 million. That is until he met “McBain,” a fictional, titular character Glickenhaus created and wrote the screenplay for in his first feature at the turn of the decade. The 1991 film tripled in budget compared to the filmmaker’s previous films, aimed high for a larger scale that took the retribution guts of the story to multiple locations from around the New York metropolitan area to the surrounding waters of the Philippine islands that doubled for politically despotic Colombia in South America and multiple, sizeable explosions around every scene corner. “McBain” also hired an esteemed actor to bear the weight of the title that would contest the very robust budget against “The King of New York’s” star power, paid for by Glickenhaus’s own production banner, Shapiro-Glickenhaus Productions with executive producers Leonard Shaprio (“Black Roses”) and Alan M. Solomon (“Moontrap”) and producer J. Boyce Harman Jr.

“The King of New York,” if you haven’t clued in on the hint by now, is Christopher Walken playing a former Vietnam veteran turned NYC steel worker fulfilling his promise to repay a life debt to fellow former soldier Roberto Santos (Chick Vennera, “Last Rites”). Walken, in at least my eyes, has always been a one note kind of character and as McBain, that note remains true here as well.  Don’t get me wrong about Walken’s feature-after-feature character continuity as the acclaimed actor has his cool-cat idiosyncratic inflections and pompadour hairdo.  There’s also a relaxed swagger about the now 80-year-old actor that remains recognizable from his earlier work to all the way to today.  Usually, we do not see Walken paired up with a love interest and “McBain” is no different in a side-by-side with “Running Man” and “Predator 2” actress Maria Conchita Alonso as Christina, sister of Robert Santos.  The two are more servants of doing what’s right, connected by singular retribution, to provide justice for a mass of people drowning in injustice because of a small group of corrupt and dangerous empowerment.  McBain and Christina rarely share the screen together in a strategic mix of accomplishing their own parts of the mission:  McBain rallies sympathetic mercenaries to obtain money and gear while Christina rallies her people to rise up and raze the crooked administration.  Walken makes the ordeal look like a stroll in the park with lofty assurance to take down an entire country’s military power juxtaposed against Alonso soulful, teary-eyed pursuance in the eyes of Christina that’s more compassionate and real, especially with Alonso’s investment as a Cuban born actress who may know a thing or two about dictatorships.  McBain mercenaries are not a ragtag bunch but the former military unit that saved him from POW Hell along with Santos, but they are more of a ragtag, mixed lot cast of actors amassed to be characters ready to leave their professions and livelihoods for a South American throwdown.  Michael Ironside (“Scanners,” “Starship Troopers”), Steve James (“The Warriors”), Thomas Waites (“The Thing”), and Jay Patterson (“Hard Rain”) see to it that those mercenary warriors are committed beyond a shadow of a doubt and, no, Michael Ironside does not lose a limb in this film.  A rather bland McBain is backed by a rather highly skill set of commandos, such as post-Vietnam billionaires with long-reaching tech and a war pilot who is also now a surgeon, and this creates some depth complexity between a former POW turned steel worker McBain and those who saved him and came out better in life than the titular character.  “McBain’s” explosive action rounds out with roles from Forrest Compton, Hector Ubarry (“Crocodile Dundee II”), Nigel Redding, Victor Argo (“True Romance”), Michael Joseph Desare, and Luis Guzman (“Innocent Blood”). 

Explosive would be one of the words I would use to describe “McBain” to someone who hasn’t seen the film.  Another word I would use would be rudimental.  “McBain” struggles to provide opposition for our band of solicitous to the cause heroes who steamroll over the entire Colombia army and air force with little-to-no resistance or demise unless it was their own decision.  What basically unfolds is a much more expensive version of the A-Team with high powered gear and a will to flatten just about anything that lays in their path, making “McBain” shallow like an extended television episode rather than a saga of epic explosive proportions.  The one good aspect about Glickenhaus’s production is the pyrotechnics are ridiculously off the charts with a nonstop stop bombardment of military armament, combat vehicles, and personal convoys strapped with a weaponry assortment of M50’s, incendiaries, and stingers to light up every scene with miniature mushroom clouds glow with the heat of orange, yellow, and black.  “McBain” might as well have titled “McSplosion” with all the hellfire that lit up the budget.  Unfortunately, “McBain” doesn’t yield any other megaton fringe benefits from the acting to the story that seemed to have been caught in hoopla of the collateral damaging combustion, like an Andy Sidaris actioner but without the equalizing T&A to extinguish the bad by igniting another kind of pants fire.

Synapse Films delivers another high-quality product with the new 2K transfer of “McBain” on an AVC encoded, 1080p, Blu-ray.  Presented from its OAR of 1.85:1 to a high-definition 1.78:1 widescreen aspect ratio, Synapse’s Blu-ray release clearly has a pristine transfer to work from, likely the reason why there’s no mention of restoration printed on the back cover.  No significant signs of damage, age wear, or unnecessary augments on the 35mm print.  No notifiable compression issues on the information decoding that averages around the high 30s on a sizeable BD50.  A varied color palette has a renewed, clean, and stable appeal, pleasing to absorb and delineate objects within the primaries as well as patterns and sundry hues that separate into a range of objects and locations.  Specified new is the English DTS-HD MA 5.1 surround soundtrack created this release.  Accompanying also is the original theatrical LPCM 2.0 stereo mix.  The DTS-HD mix has superior strength to maximize the explosions across the cross-media channels. There’s also an unobstructed dialogue track that prominent but maintains the varying degree of depth during bullet buzzing skirmishes and the flaming tailed rockets.  Transmissions and comms hold the range to the appropriate subdued amount and, even more so, when the enemies engage each other in aerial combat. Exclusive to the release are newly translated, optional English subtitles. Bonus content underperforms on this particular Synapse title with only an audio commentary with director James Glickenhaus and film historian Chris Poggioli as well as the original theatrical trailer. Physical content comes home in a green, standard-sized Blu-ray snapper case with one of the more illustratively warm “McBain” poster arts on the single-sided cover art. Inside, a multi-page advert catalogue is included for your browsing pleasure and the disc art is rendered with the front cover art. “McBain” is rated-R, has a 104-minute runtime, and the release has a region free playback. “McBain” promises a retreat back into action for those missing action after the war is long over, but though there is a lot of bang, there isn’t a lot of buck with a seldomly challenging fight that practically makes McBain an invincibly dull crusader.

“McBain” Explodes onto Blu-ray from Synapse!

Just Because Your EVIL Dad Says Its Okay, It’s Probably Not. “Netherworld” reviewed! (Blu-ray / Full Moon Features)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Enter the Netherworld on Blu-ray!

A wealthy owner of the Thorton plantation bequeaths to his willfully neglected son, Corey, his large Louisiana estate. He’s welcomed by the estate’s unusual lawyer, a house caretaker with an affinity for birds, and her beautiful daughter Diane who, despite her teenage muliebrity, immediately takes an interest and liking to the handsome young man. Corey is also met with his shirker father’s penned testament, to be resurrected from the dead by a sexually alluring brothel woman and necromancer named Delores who works at the local bordello and bar named Tonks. Fascinated by the idea, Corey hangs around the bar and becomes just as engrossed with Delores as his father as he seeks to abide by his father’s supernatural wishes but there’s a warbler cult connected to Delores and Corey’s father with an underhanded scheme that doesn’t favor the new, young estate owner trying to save and possibly get to know the father he never knew, the same one who abandoned him as a small child.

One of the more stranger Charles Band productions to every come out of Full Moon Entertainment, and that’s saying something for a media empire that made killing on hawking killer dolls amongst other oddity-saturated, carnivalesque sci-fi and horror for many decades, “Netherworld” is the early 90’s, Cajun-encrusted, occulter of the Full Moon legacy director of “Tourist Trap” and “Puppet Master,” David Schmoeller, who also cowrote the film alongside Charles Band. “Netherworld” harkens to a time before Band became visionally crazed by dolls, or miniaturized maniacs in general, with a plot that promises Cajun black magic beyond the traditional spells and curses of Louisiana Voodoo, a son desperate to reconnect with his long-lost father who abandoned him, and a flying stone hand with finger extremities that turn into vicious snake-like creatures when attacking the quarried head, but is “Netherworld” too extrusive of the regular and in vogue poured cement of solidified psycho-dolls? ‘Netherworld” is executively produced by Charles Band, produced by Ty Bradford (“Trancers II”) and is a part of the vast Full Moon Entertainment catalogue of productions.

Unsuspectingly walking into between the veil of the living and the dead is predominately television actor Michael Bendetti (“21 Jump Street”) embarking on his first ever horror feature as Corey Thorton, the city boy, or so we assume as he leisurely journeys down a windingly steamy Louisiana tributary in a button-down shirt and tie, who learns his deadbeat, rich father has left him a large amount of property. For having been left fatherless for all of his life, the pill that read as Corey’s deep-rooted longing to familiarize with a flake of a father is a hard one to swallow. The angle that Schmoeller should have attacked more resurrection motivation is the one that involves Corey searching for answers in his father’s disfavor, choosing to live without the flesh and blood legacy of a son, and why now, posthumously, does his father want to reconnect? Audiences will find the answer overly obvious, but Corey Thorton’s thickness proves more difficult to penetrate, especially when he’s beguiled by an enchantress who can summon a flying, snake-fingered hand that emerges an affixing binding wire out from its stony skin and can turn whorehouse johns into caged birdies, literally, if they misbehave or become indelicately frisky. The house keeper’s horseback riding daughter Diane is marred by Holly Floria (“Bikini Island”) with an excessive Southern Belle accent when her character’s status doesn’t stem from sophistication and affluency but rather from the blue collared starry eyes of Anjanette Comer’s (“The Baby”) motherly and hospitality position. When the climax arrives in grand temps and we’re face-to-face with Corey’s ghostly pops, living in the titular Netherworld, the story takes a sudden branch drop that executes any voyage into the void between worlds and there’s quite a bit of neglect for Robert Sampson (“Re-Animator”) as Corey’s father who barely has any scenes to live up to being the film’s primo antagonist pulling the strings of the marionette of his flesh and blood. “Netherworld” fills out the cast with Robert Burr (“Ghost Story”), Alex Datcher (“Passenger 57”), Holly Butler (“Vendetta”), George Kelly (“Jugular Wine: A Vampire Odyssey”) and Denise Gentile (“Ordinary Madness”) as the super-sexy, premium prostitute Delores with parapsychological powers that connect her to the land of the dead.

Off the tip of a gator’s nose, “Netherworld” offers a taste of Full Moon’s 90’s production, promising radically outlandish F/X with a monstrous airborne hand, saucy sexual content, and gore. Corey’s inner thoughts exposition and waterway introduction tends to be more private eye monologuing in the explanation setup of his unplanned inheritance and it also feels like the brittle beginnings of a trashy romance novel: young man travels down the river to his inherited late father’s estate, torn between a pubertal young daughter of the long-standing estate housekeeper and the haram brothel seductress with an eldritch, supernatural inveiglement. Corey’s past lacks backstory, leaving an even playing field across the board of all characters and participating audiences in what to expect from the wild card that is Corey. Immediately drawn to the wanton Tonks not for carnal desires but rather the one woman who her father says can restore his past expiration, Corey’s not a wild card of ambiguity as his role lacks the pull of tough decisions, often between character versus character conflict, with basically a mind already made up to visit the bar-and-bordello despite the ominous warning signs between George Kelly’s sloppy bayou cajuner wanting to dance with Corey at Tonks, Diane’s strong opposition for Tonks in general, and amongst others dubious gratifying points. “Netherworld” very much lives in a world of opposition, like Superman’s bizarro world that defies logic. Logic such as the transition of people into birds, or being inducted into a clan of avian cultists, or ciphering who’s a good guy and who’s a bad guy, or, and this is the most important or, the suddenly cleaved ending that not only doesn’t allow a satisfying ending but also doesn’t explain much, in dialogue or in action, what came into existence once Corey was stuck in the Netherworld other than the obvious trade his father wanted to force.

Full Moon Features brings Hell to Blu-ray with an uncut and remastered from the original camera negative transfer of “Netherworld” in the continuous effort by the empire to upgrade all their classics for a new wave of format availability. Scanned into 2K from the 35mm negative, the AVC encoded, 1080p, high-definition Blu-ray looks pretty darn good. Well kempt over the years, the negative appears to have sustained little age or wear that progresses the hi-def upgrade with relative ease. Color grading is warm and stoked with detail that encrusts every object – the lushy bayou forest, the stony power of a flying hand, Michael Bendetti’s layered curly-perm mullet – all of it is greatly textured and delineated for depth, presented in the 1:78:1, widescreen aspect ratio. Compression doesn’t appear to be an issue despite a lower storage BD25 but that might be due to the utter lack of bonus accompaniments. The release offers two audio options: an English Dolby Digital 5.1 surround sound and an English Dolby Digital 2.0 mix. Both options are equally suitable as the there’s not much more environmental oomph through the extra channels despite the full-bodied cacophonous cicada singing, which unfortunately doesn’t open up depth in the back channels despite the prevalence of the singing in the story’s background sonance. However, dialogue doesn’t feel cheated with a dominating layer and decent range to go with it. Along with essentially what is a bare bones disc, there are also no subtitles available with this release. What is available to view outside the feature is other Full Moon trailers and the original VideoZone segment that covers this particular 1992 gem. Physical features don’t stray too far from VHS, to DVD, to Blu-ray with the same flinty hand rocketing outward in a 3D-like position on the front cover. There are no inserts included with this release. “Netherworld” Blu-ray comes region free, with a runtime of 82 minutes, and, for the first time ever, uncut! An opposition to the usual spun of Louisiana voodoo-hoodoo, there’s another dark magic brewing in the bayou in “Netherworld,” but the promising story can’t coherently piece together down river in an uneven quagmire of quandaries.

Enter the Netherworld on Blu-ray!

EVIL Has the Right to Remain Dead! “Magic Cop” reviewed! (88 Films / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

No Two-Bit Magician In ‘Magic Cop” on Blu-ray!  

Hong Kong cops are confounded by a chaotic drug bust when learning that their female suspect, who had managed to overpower an entire unit of male officers and even take a bullet ambling deadpan into the streets, had died 7 days prior.  An outlying officer, and practicing Taoist, Uncle Feng is called to Hong Kong to not only quickly solve the narcotic crime but also investigate the unnatural properties of the case.  Feng is accompanied by his city eager niece Lin and two Hong Kong cops, a Taoist devotee and skeptic of Ancient Chinese spiritual mythologies.  Together, they track the drug trail to The Sorceress, a Japanese witch with powers that rival Feng and that can resurrect the dead into zombies and vampires to do her bidding, such as trafficking narcotics.  When the investigation closes in her business, The Sorceress and her right arm, skilled fighter plan to remove the only man worthy of stopping her.

Fans of Ricky Lau’s “Mr. Vampire” will once again be amazed and entertained by the fantastical and mystical action of Stephen Tung Wai’s “Magic Cop.”  Tung, a fellow martial artist and stunt man who had roles in “The Fatal Flying Guillotine” and John Woo’s “Hard Boiled,” helms his debut directorial penned by Chi-Leung Shum (“Vampire vs Vampire”) and the longtime Stephen Chow script writer Kan-Cheung Tsang (“Shaolin Soccer,” “Kung-Fu Hustle”).  The screenwriting duo brought lighting quick comedy to the mostly fictionally invented yet sprinkled with slivers of hard-pressed veracity and definitive entertaining occultism and what resulted resurrected “Mr. Vampire” semblance out of the being a period piece and into the modern day, backdropped in the year of 1990 when the film was released.  Long rumored to be the fifth sequel of the “Mr. Vampire” franchise, “Magic Cop” is a coproduction between Movie Impact Limited, Millifame Productions Limited, and Media Asia Film with star Ching-Ying Lam producing.

“Magic Cop,” and even “Mr. Vampire,” wouldn’t have such a cult following if it wasn’t for the Vulcan eyebrows and thin mustache of Ching-Ying Lam in costume.  The short-statured, Shanghai-born Lam delivers the same vigorous choreography and tranquil demeanor to this particularly stoic character of Uncle Feng, a Taoist practitioner to essentially wrangle unruly entities and please the spirits in the in-between our world.  Feng is old world and finds himself in surrounded by modernism when in Hong Kong, goaded by the young lead sergeant attached the case.  Practical as well as disrespectful, Sgt. Lam (Wilson Lam, “Ghost for Sale”) epitomizes today’s, or rather back then the 1990’s, modern man who has forgotten tradition and deference to those who came before.  Though padded with a fair amount of comedy coursing throughout, balanced against the impeccably edited tango fight sequences, Sgt’ Lam’s partner, known only as Sgt. 2237 played by “Centipede Horror’s” Kiu-Wai Miu, risibly wants to understudy Uncle Feng’s powers while Feng’s niece Lin, played by Mei-Wah Wong of “The Chinese Ghostbusters,” provides the subtle and quirky opposite sex that catches of the philandering eyes of Sgt. Lam.  The ragtag quartet of influx mindsets and personalities become challenged by their single common goal, to stop whoever is behind breathing life into the formidable dead and stop the unorthodox method of drug smuggling.  Former Japanese bodybuilder Michiko Nishwaki (“City Cops”) embodied that very dark magic antagonist.  Nishiwaki handles The Sorceress character with ease despite not having a surfeit army under her thumb; instead, this forces Nishiwaki to become the entire villain body with the slight, full-contact support for her right-hand bodyguard (Billy Chow, “Future Cops”) and a couple of undead lackeys, including Frankie Chi-Leung Chan of “Riki-Oh.”  “Magic Cop’s” cast rounds out completely with well-versed and seasoned, late actor Wu Ma (“Mr. Vampire,” “Return of the Demon”) as the chief inspector polarized in a complicated history with Uncle Feng.

What director Stephen Tung Wai boils down in essence is another variation of good executants of spirit humbled caretakers versus the wicked necromancers existing inside the fabric of the highly praised and cult-following “Mr. Vampire” universe.  Frankly, there’s nothing wrong with that derivativity since Ching-Ying Lam, Mr. Vampire himself, produces and stars as the titular hero.  Lam can conjure whatever-the-hell he wants in order to battle Hell itself.   “Magic Cop” is also a well-made, entertaining story, balanced between the contest wizardry, slapstick comedy, and the character dynamics, and stacked with improbable yet gratifying step-intensive fight orchestration that has gawked early martial arts films a wonder to behold and continues to do so to today but now trickles with pizzazz more-after-more due to put in place industry safety measures.  “Magic Cop” contains that lost art of potentially hazardous palatable physicality that beguiles more than the movie’s faux magic exhibited on screen.  To add to the authenticity, very little painted composited visual effects were used with makeup and the actors doing much of the heavy lifting with the editing team of Ting-Hung Kuo and Kee Charm Wu in full cut-and-paste fortifying mode to button up each sequence with comprehendible continuity of each punch, kick, and magical chopsocky.  One overtone made well known in “Magic Cop” is the unfillable chasms between old and new, respect and disrespect, and myth and science from whence solves no problems until some unified common ground can be reached in order to succeed, in this case, to stop a bitch of a witch.    

An age-resistance 35mm print scanned onto a buffed 2K Blu-ray that extracts the best print elements to-date. The AVC encoded, 1080p, Blu-ray presents Stephen Tung Wai’s picture in a widescreen 1.85:1 aspect ratio. A fine-tooth comb through the celluloid couldn’t unveil any major issue with the 88 Films release. Colors are richly grafted within the sabulous surfaces that are exceedingly defined with delimited, shadow-creating depth. Decoding speeds average around 35Mbps on a BD50, securing categorical choiceness amongst other releases and formats (that is until the potential 4K release). The release comes packed with four audio options to explore: The original Cantonese DTS-HD master audio 2.0 mix, a Cantonese DTS-HD 2.0 home video mix, an English DTS-HD 5.1 master audio dub, and an English DTS-HD 2.0 dub. Between the variated audio mixes, we preferred the original Cantonese DTS-HD 2.0 due to its cadence with the image and welcoming exactness through the lossless compression process. You can make do with the other three options, but the fidelity is much better with the original mix and only anti-subtitle sectarians would be pleased with an English dub. English subtitles are optional and synch well the dialogue but be prepared to speed read as the pacing is quick much like the dialect. Software special features include an audio commentary with Hong Kong film experts Frank Djeng and Marc Walkow, an alternate, standard definition Taiwanese cut of the film with alternate score, an interview with director Stephen Tung Wai, image gallery, and trailer. Endowed with a limited-edition, cardboard slipcover, the dark green Blu-ray snapper has newly illustrated, front cover artwork by Manchester graphic designer and 88 Films resident artist Sean Longmore, which is also on the cardboard O-slip. The reversible cover art has a reproduction of the original Hong Kong poster art. Stuffed in the insert is a mini-folded poster of Longmore’s front cover and a disc art, a scene moment captured in spherical rotunda, of the opening sequence. Available with a regional playback limited to A and B, the 88 Films release is not rated and has a runtime of 88 minutes. ‘Magic Cop, perhaps, wasn’t the sole proprietor of influence but certainly had a black talisman plying hand in the substrata of more Western favorites like “Big Trouble in Little China” and is a crucial cornerstone in representing the best of the Hong Kong Golden Age of cinema.

No Two-Bit Magician In ‘Magic Cop” on Blu-ray!