Category Archives: action

To Be an Intolerant Human Is to Be EVIL! “Lion-Girl” reviewed! (Cleopatra Entertainment / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Here is “Lion-Girl.” Hear Her Roar on Blu-ray!

In the year 2045, a rain of meteorites harbingers the possible destruction of the human race as the space rocks contain harmful, radioactive rays that either kill a human within seconds or doesn’t kill them at all but transformers them into bloodletting, mutated beasts with superhuman abilities known as Anoroc.  While the rest of the world collapses, only Tokyo remains as the last human stronghold governed by a fascist dictator Nobuhide Fujinaga and his band of ruthless, police state Shogun led by despotic Kaisei Kishi.  Fujinaga and Kishi’s prejudices extend decades later when children in utero are exposed to Anoroc rays that keep their human appearances and behaviors only to have gained the psychokinetic energy powers.  These evolved man and Anoroc are labeled Man-Anoroc and are sought out for extermination but one defender of the weak and less fortunate, known as Lion-Girl, takes a stand against the forces of evil and bigotry, making Lion-Girl Earth’s last and only hope.

Inspired by the prolific manga works of Gô Nagai (“Cutie Honey,” “Devilman”) and Nagai providing the conceptual illustrations, the Japanese filmmaker behind the pulse-pounding pistol-whipper  “Gun Woman,” starring cult erotic-actress Asami, and the Italian yellow picture, or giallo, influenced “Maniac Driver” turns his eclectic, electric style to reproduce his love for manga and the classic Japanese superhero canon with a new heroine in “Lion Girl.”  Kurando Mitsutake endears to his audiences through passion for cutting-edge manga’s commanding nudity, a hero’s odyssey in a dystopian future, and a comic’s style depicting graphically good versus evil.   The COVID era stymied production costs due to supply issues, affecting various departments such as special effects and even the cast with relative unknown faces, but Mitsutake pushes forward with the Japanese Toei Video Company (“Battle Royale”) co-production with America’s Flag Productions and Nagai’s Dynamic Planning.  Masayuki Yamada, Gaku Kawasaki (“The Parasite Doctor Suzune”), and Mami Akari (“Maniac Driver”) produce the film.

As stated, “Lion-Girl” is filled with unrecognizable faces save for one, an actor who is usually behind the masks, such as in “The Hills Have Eyes 2” ’07,” “Predators,” and even donning the iconic hockey mask for the 2009 reboot of “Friday the 13th” as Jason Voorhees.  Derek Mears headlines being the film’s core villain, shogun Kaisei Kishi, the remorseless, power-hungry right-hand man of the Fujinaga state, as Mears’ towering 6’5” stature and unique facial features pit him against a then 22-year-old newcomer Tori Griffith in a highly visibly protagonist role requiring fully onboard nudity and choreographed physical altercations.  Griffith pulls off both requirements going through the tokusatsu, hoodoo cliffside and other desert terrain, geometries of motion that fortunately conceal a more softened performance when compared to Mears’ who actually puts a fair amount of attitude into the shogun role.  As the Lion-Girl’s sworn protector, as well as one-eyed uncle, Damian Toofeek Raven (“Komodo vs. Cobra”) resembles the sempai fostering and mentoring a younger, stronger apprentice to one day save the world.  Raven, like most of the film’s cross-cultural influences, is able to ride the line as force into an honorable fatherhood with Ken Shishikura but the character poorly exorcises compassion of a father substitute until the very end when the right moment in the script calls for it.  One flaw in “Lion-Girl’s” casting stitch is the feature could have been meatier as keystone supporting characters come and go so quickly that it could rival the likes of “Mortal Kombat 2:  Annihilation.”  Thus, rapid firing subordinate roles just to progress the story creates more questions than answers and creates more plot holes than necessary.   Nobuhide Fujinaga (Tomoki Kimura, “A Beast in Love”) leads as the iron fist of bigotry in a tyrannically society but barely has presence other than on television announcements, a pair of Kishi entourage lackeys (David Sakurai, “Karate Kill,” and Jenny Brezinski, “From Jennifer”) get lifted up by the dialogue and some action but have the rug cut out from under them from really being developed and explored, and even principal character Marion Nagata (Joey Iwanaga, “Tokyo Vampire Hotel”), the gunslinging coyote, has zero foundational building blocks being a love interest for Lion-Girl yet crowns as such at the story’s climatic showdown.  “Lion-Girl” is saturated with supporting cast and stock characters with round out by Marianne Bourg, Matt Standley, Shelby Lee Parks, Hideotoshi Imura, Holgie Forrester, Katarina Severen, Stefanie Estes, and Wes Armstrong.

“Lion-Girl” roars as a wild, untamed animal, mangy in its worst moments but also majestic at the same time.  This paradoxical cultural expression befits the co-superpowers production, blending Japanese and American flavors and faults into one oversized bag of live-action manga.  With a derision mostly toward western affairs, such as the media circus surrounding the xenophobic administration’s handling of the corona virus, to which the filmic beasts known as Anaroc is corona spelled backwards, the haughty, bullying state doesn’t stray far from Kurando Mitsutake’s pen-to-paper handiwork as he also invokes Gô Nagai’s freedom sense of nudity and violence aimed to shake up with acculturation in high level eroticism that’s not seen as sleazy or objectifying but rather empowering and artistic.  What Mitsutake does really well and what’s also to the film’s misstep for today’s audiences is the complete blitzkrieg of background setup that’s bombastically overwhelming with incident backstory, dystopian factions, and the new terminologies in a single, longwinded breath, culminating to an early point in the film with a fight between Lion-Girl and an Anaroc beast where mutated breasts are essentially turned into a flamethrower and psychokinetic battles are commissioned in headspace.  That’s the kind of psychotronic tone that bears the cult seal of approval, or in this film, the lion’s share of cult approval. 

Cleopatra Entertainment, the filmic subsidiary company of Cleopatra Records, scores big with Kurando Mitsutake retro-fitted superhero “Lion-Girl” on Blu-ray.  The AVC encoded, high-definition 1080p, single-layered BD25 is literally stuffed to the brim, presented in a 1.78:1 widescreen aspect ratio.  Compression bitrate swings the pendulum, decoding between low 30s and high teens resulting in smoothed over details.  To the film’s advantage, the abated details play into the old-style Japanese action flicks of yore, creating a pseudo-illusion of a flatten color palette and lower resolution last seen on tube televisions.  Okay, might not be to that extent as therein lies decently popping color scheme and rough contouring and lighting in more scarce settings to make the scenes less complex and rely on more smoke and mirrors to stretch the interior-exterior location budget.  The lossy English language Dolby Digital 5.1 surround track is accompanied with also a Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo.  While nothing to negatively harp on in regard to “Lion-Girl’s” sound design and soundtrack as a whole, there’s plenty to like about the wide-ranged, heavy rock-riffing audio with unequivocal balance between the sounds and channeling albeit a lesser fidelity.  Peppered with Japanese words, the dialogue is forefront and clear that red-carpet the numerous monologues with all-day importance.  The release does not come with any subtitle option.  Bonus content includes a director’s commentary track, a conversation between Kurando Mitsutake and manage artist Gô Nagai as they discuss nudity, working in America, genesis for “Lion-Girl,” and their COVID era collaborations, the making-of “Lion-Girl,” “The Hollywood premier screen with cast and director Q&A, a picture slideshow, and the theatrical trailer.  Cleopatra’s release caters to a conventional standard retail market with a commonplace Amaray and disc release and nothing more.  The front cover design is not terribly appeasing with a crowded image composite bathed in an eye-deafening and searing red.  Disc represents the same front cover image and there is no insert inside the Amaray casing.  The region free release is unrated and has an impressively entertaining runtime of a 121-minutes.  Marketed to be a different kind of superhero movie, “Lion-Girl” is certainly more than that, portrayed by Kurando Mitsutake as a love song toward the pulp exposure of his childhood and the film really glows passionately like an Anaroc with supernatural powers ready to strike with nostalgia at the heart of Japanese pop culture.

Here is “Lion-Girl.” Hear Her Roar on Blu-ray!

Isolated Between Mountains, EVIL Rises Out of the Refuge. “Lycan Colony” reviewed! (Visual Vengeance / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

“Lycan Colony” available on Blui-ray Collector’s Edition!

A big city surgeon on the mend of an alcohol problem and two siblings searching for their father who disappeared in the mountains hunting a mysterious big game find themselves in a small town inhabited by an ancient werewolf tribe.  Mostly seeking a peaceful way of life, many of the werewolves have tamed their inner beast to live normally isolated from their human neighbors to avoid bad blood and fear-driven conflict, but a rogue faction of werewolves has tasted human flesh, transfixing them with an insatiable need to hunt and feed on human outsiders who have uncovered the small town’s truth.  On the verge of the Equinox where every lycanthrope resident will transform into the primal versions of the beast, a select few have been able to conquer not losing their humanity as they team up with trapped, arsenal-ready humans and the eldest werewolf who is half witch to squash the evil werewolf population for good. 

In the rural areas of New Hampshire 2006, Rob Roy tries his creative hand at making a movie, writing a script ingrained with his personal affinity for fantasy and werewolves, with the action-packed, shot-on-MiniDV camcorder thriller “Lycan Colony.”  Roy’s first attempt is ambitious to say in the least with a vim and vigor narrative with a visual and practical effects heavy ornament that Roy single-handily constructs all himself learning all the tricks to the trade as he goes.  What ultimately results is initially a colossal flop of technical mishandlings, bad acting, and rushed final products, but in recent years nearly two-decades later, “Lycan Colony” has been revived with a second chance by fans of the so bad, it’s good sect who, like the evil werewolves in the film, have tasted blood and want more.  Rob Roy self produces the film under his Wits’-End Entertainment company.

In producing a movie yourself, with your time, money, equipment, and the little know-how of the process, Rob Roy casts mostly family, friends, and newcomers in his New England werewolf film.  Both of the director’s sons make it into the picture with the older Ryan playing the mistakenly werewolf bitten teenage son of Dr. Dan (Bill Sykes), the surgeon, and Roy’s youngest, Jacob, as a presumed pup running for his life from hunter Sgt. Roger Allen (Paul Henry) as we see in the preface opening.  Though an important piece to some aspects of the story, such as Stewart’s creaturized adolescent transfiguration to help Dr. Dan and wife Sandy (Kadrolsha Ona Carole, “Attack of the Killer Chickens: The Movie”) understand and cope with their now lycanthropic son, Roy’s boys are not the centralized characters as the narrative awkwardly pivots from building up Dr. Dan’s choppy family dynamics and his alcoholic mishap substory to more nondescript kickass and chew bubblegum action of good versus evil as the missing Sgt. Roger Allen’s offspring, the commando-suited daughter Russ (Gretchen Weisiger) and the bad werewolf killed yet risen to the ranks of being a good lycanthrope Doug (Bill Finley), team up with the eldest wolf-witch  and spiritual liberated Athena (Kristi Lynn, “Hypnagogic”) and David (Sean Burgoyne) who can control his beast side with hero pose mediation and tribal chants.  As you can tell, it all becomes disturbingly clear as mud on what exactly we’re bearing witness to, but the “Lycan Colony” burghers flesh out with Sophia Wong, Steve Pascucci, and Libby Collins.

There’s nothing inherently wrong with Rob Roy’s good wolf pitted against bad wolf with man trapped in the middle story.  Throw in some subtle themes of alcoholism juxtaposition where the mountain water tames the beast with hints of silver nitrate and Dr. Dan’s post-career predicament that sends him to AA meetings and also themes of puberty or some kind of other rite of hormonal passage and “Lycan Colony” can work as an action-fantasy with a strong horror element.  The problem lies in the ambitious undertaking for a first-time filmmaker with more gung-ho carpe diem than actual experience and Roy will be the first one to tell you, as heard in bonus content interviews, his goal is to go big and not limit himself with a tightknit narrative with little-to-no special effects.  To the detriment of “Lycan Colony” however, that mentality of thinking took a three-month shooting-script down to a mere three weeks, rushing the final product to the point of using a blue screen for the nearly the entire third act in a real shoddy piece of VFX compositing.  Transpiring on screen resembles similar to the early days of 2D fighting video games with its mix of antiquated motion capturing technology, practical effects, and digital matte but while those traits appear raw, lifelike, and add that certain je ne sais quoi that makes it so attractive, for “Lycan Colony,” the effect miscarries for its time in what is a laughable imbrication.  For some, “Lycan Colony’s” campy crust will be a holy grail to obtain; one could compare Roy’s film to Dave Wascavage’s “Suburban Sasquatch,” another Visual Vengeance, early 2000s, revived flick that had similar rough-cut visuals.  For others, like me, what comedy rises to surface is digestible, the rest of the movie might make you sheepishly queasy. 

For the first time on Blu-ray, “Lycan Colony” has become a part of the Wild Eye Releasing’s Visual Vengeance tribe.  The AVC encoded, 1080i upscaled, BD50 is presented in a full frame 1.33:1 aspect ratio, sourced from an original tape shot on a Panasonic DVX100 MiniDV at 24fps.  Safe to say nothing will outshine celluloid, millimeter film or even today’s digital cameras as that period of time where videotape made a stand offered a rival format with cheaper costs and comparable picture quality; yet videotape, as with “Lycan Colony,” squeezes the resolution combined with matted visual effects, making inaccurately distanced composite look even more compressed.  Details suffer through the compression of MiniDV’s interference noise, undersaturation, and vertical tape impression lines seared into a few frames.  The undersaturation lies the biggest concern leaving behind darker tones that keep the image popping with color, rendering the entire scheme more overcast even when not exposed to rough gel lens which is used quite often in various Crayola hues.  The English lossy Dolby Digital stereo 2.0 has enough strength to get around and get through with a tenuous dialogue track complicated by the not truest of fidelities on likely the onboard camera mic and by the boxy echoes of a blue screen stage, likely Roy’s garage.  Stock file notes give the full body suited lycanthropes enough growling canine bite and the gunshots are awarded cacophonous explosivity, solidifying a decent range of sound, but there are missed or asynchronized effects against the action with brief seconds of delayed catchup or just plain omission.  Boxy areas eradicate the depth, especially in the whole third act when the last battle is held in the woods but is mainly a blue screened forest, so the compounding loss of milieu affects atmospheric track greatly.  Visual Vengeance’s track record on delivering new special features has not gone unnoticed and the trend continues with “Lycan Colony” with a new interview with director Rob Roy.  Also included are two commentary tracks:  one with director Rob Roy and a second with B&S About Movies’s Sam Panico and Drive-in Asylum’s Bill Van Ryn.  A second version of the film is a full Rifftrax version, a blooper reel, the “Lycan Colony” music video, original trailer, and the Visual Vengeance trailer round out the release’s ancillaries.  The colorful Stephen Gammell-esque, presumably pastel, front cover illustration greatly over exceeds expectations but is nonetheless phenomenal full-moon imagery on the cardboard slipcover and also dichotomizes the style on the translucent Amaray Blu-ray case’s cover art depicting a scene from the film of a hungry wolf behind the alcohol-decked bar.  And also true to Visual Vengeance, the release is jammed-packed with inner goodies, such as a New Hampshire Forest Scent air freshener, retro VHS Sticker sleeve, a 3-page pamphlet with essay from Sam Panico with color picture, and a folded mini-poster of the Blu-ray cover art.  Not also to neglect to mention is the reversible cover art with the original one sheet art.  The Visual Vengeance release comes region free, unrated, and has a runtime of 90-minutes. I’m extremely happy for the appreciation and newfound love director and enjoyer all-things-werewolf-fantasy Rob Roy is receiving for his resuscitated escapism but, for me, “Lycan Colony’s” jerry-built and doesn’t come anywhere close relieving the so good, it’s bad itch in Roy’s filmmaking first pass done on the cuff. 

“Lycan Colony” available on Blui-ray Collector’s Edition!

Even Bad CGI Crocodiles Have an EVIL Smile. “Crocodile Island” reviewed! (Well Go USA Entertianment / DVD)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Journey to the “Crocodile Island” on DVD from Well Go USA!

The Dragon Triangle is known for being the Bermuda Triangle off the coast of the Asia continent.  Ship and plane mysteriously disappear due to the area’s supposedly distorted navigational and mechanical instruments, wreaking havoc on commercial transportation and the directionless travelers who have wandered into its esoteric province.  When an Australian outbound commercial flight GZ261 is forced to violently crash land due to this very phenomenon, survivors find themselves not in the middle of the sea but on an uncharted island full of man-eating crocodiles, large and ferocious spiders, and a giant, prehistoric crocodile that can swallow a person whole.  With no food or water and danger lurking around every corner, the remaining, uneaten passengers must survive with the tools around them and locate the wreckage of a World War II plane that crashed long ago, salvage it’s radio, and call for rescue but the journey is perilous with a very hungry, colossal crocodile on their tail.

The Dragon Triangle, alternatively known as the Devil’s Sea or the Pacific Bermuda Triangle, is actually a real stretch of urban legend approximately located from the Northern Tokyo to the narrow vertex down below the island of Guam and enveloping most of the Japanese offshore islands.  The suspected berth of paranormal yarn has a long history of marine mysteries and aviation ambiguities and it’s also the basis for the 2020 Xu Shixing and Simon Zhao creature-feature actioner “Crocodile Island.”  Shixing, who went on to helm “Sharktopus” released this year, and Zhao, who oversaw the directorial duties for “The Antarctic Octopus” also released this year, seem to have knack for exaggerated megafauna movies beginning with “Crocodile Island” from a script by Minming Ni of “Exorcist Judge Bao.”  The undivided Chinese production showcases under the banner of Perfect World Pictures, an entertainment content company that often co-finances films with American studios, such as with “Jurassic Park Dominion, and New Studios Media, the company behind Ni’s “Exorcist Judge Bao.” 

At the very core of “Crocodile Island’s” larger-than-life CGI creature extravaganza is a life ordeal larger than any crocodile could ever be with a strained father-daughter relationship that takes surviving a plane crash, man-eating reptilians, and supersized spiders to resolve.  In steps Gallen Lo as rigid father Lin Hao to agitated and rebellious daughter Lin Yi, or as called continuously in the film as Yiyi, played by Liao Yinyu.  The “Vampire Controller” Lo takes parental responsibilities like a high-end security guard at an exclusive night club exhibiting almost zero emotion toward an equally stoic daughter who just lost their mother, the reason for the plane ride from Australia where Yiyi’s mother, Lin Hao’s ex-wife and Yiyi resided after a suspected divorce. I say suspected because Lin Hao hasn’t seen his daughter in years, solidifying his estrangement to the extreme, but deep down he reticent care for her despite the lack of expressive emotions and awkward alienation.  He shows this be becoming a gatekeeper against Yiyi’s romantic interest Cheng Jie (Wang Bingxiang) who boards the same flight but keeps his distance by concealing his presence from what would ultimately be a father’s sundering wrath in effort to protect and reconnect with her having been absent during her adolescence and still thinking she’s a child.  That becomes the underlining theme to “Crocodile Island,” to fight to protect what’s most dear to you, as Lin Hao fights against man and beast to protect his child and going through the learning curve of her growing up.  One significant flaw in Lin Hao’s development is his background is never divulged.  We’re hinted by other survivors that he might be former military, but nothing is clear except that he’s had some survivalist and leadership training, two apex personality attributes that collide in reconnecting with his daughter as well as sewing a connection with her boyfriend who’s eager to protect Yiyi too.  Out of all the survivors, this triad dynamic is harder pressed than the others – a first child expecting couple, a social media junkie and her creep of a friend with a bad heart, a pair of single men – who seem like they’re just a long for the ride, to be crocodile chow, or to give the principals more time to work out their internal issues.  Wei Dang, Xue’er Hu, Qiwei He, Zhao Zuo, Zhiyan Zhao, Jack Wayne, Bruce Alleyn, Patrick Alleyn, and Jinyi Zhao costar.

“Crocodile Island” stands alone as a 100% Chinese backed product for the often American partnered Perfect World Pictures as the carnivores look nothing remote similar to the likes of “Jurassic Park” and, instead, has all the hallmarks of a midnight feature on the Syfy Channel but even through the shoddy computer imagery, the feature remains one-up from those made-for-television premiers by turning on and building up some tense atmospherics, a fog-laden forecast with Kaiju-lite spiders dangling-dormant overhead the survivors or the close-quarters cave battle against the giant crocodile, that does keep concentration from veering off into a ditch of mundane dullness.  Still, every creature, every aircraft, and every explosion from the muzzle fire of the U.S. military issued Thompson submachine gun to the fragmentation detonation of the MK II grenades are CGI rendered and poorly at that.  The laws of physics do not apply to “Crocodile Island” as the regular sized reptilians can leap forward, airborne, for feet on end and the action is almost a near, undefinable blur on screen of the pallid, fringing translucency composite mockup.  While visual effects can be 90’s intro-level rubbish (what year are we in?), I found the story to be palpable enough and to a point of plane crash survivors find themselves basically on a heavily reduced variation of “Land of the Lost” or “Journey to the Center of the Earth” where instead of a T-Rexes and other giant, prehistoric creatures nipping at their heels, massive ocean crocodiles and arachnids lay claim to their flesh and bones but that part of the story wavers on wishy-washy rationalization.  The World War II plane that crashes, because of a flock of pterodactyls nonetheless, was carrying radioactive material which is alluded to being the cause of the giant spiders and crocodile, yet the crocodile was present at the WW II plane crash when snatching one of the pilots right out of the sky with a vertical leap, so the mysterious Dragon Triangle Isle remains still a mystery.

If I had to choose between the Bermuda Triangle and the Dragon Triangle, my chances of survival definitely reside better west side of the prime meridian and now you can make that determination yourself with a DVD copy of “Crocodile Island” courtesy of Well Go USA Entertainment.  As part of their Hi-Yah! collection, despite depicting no martial arts, “Crocodile Island” is presented in a widescreen 16×9 aspect ratio and stored on a MPEG2 encoded DVD9 with a average bitrate between 7 to 8 Mbps.  Aside from the absurd VFX, “Crocodile Island” looks pretty good compression-wise and detail-wise with a blight free digital image that pops with lush greenery and stark contrast, the brilliant sandy beach and bright blue water comes to mind as examples, with a grading range that runs the natural color spectrum.  The Mandarin language audio comes with two options:  a Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound and a Stereo 2.0.  Both render a clean, damage free mix with prominent dialogue and a pinpoint ambient sound design only to be besmirched by the laughable CGI and creature noises.  While the track is listed as strictly Mandarin, an English dub on the same track combs over the natural voices of the English-speaking actors, the pilots in the movie who are obviously speaking English when reading their lips, but the English dub sounds like Asian actors attempting English vocal impersonations that synch up egregiously.  Subtitles include English, traditional Chinese, and a simplified Chinese, which I’m not entirely sure if that means for a child’s benefit or another reason.  The English synch appears to be oversimplified as well with a slew of straight forward statements and exclamations, adding little depth to what the meaning characters attempt to convey in more significant conversion.  There’s not much in the way of special features in the rainy motion DVD menu aside from the film’s trailer and other Well Go USA Entertainment preview trailers for “A Creature Was Stirring,” “Creepy Crawly,” and “Gangnam Zombie.” The Amaray front cover has run-of-the-mill, campy Giant crocodile pomposity of a cover art with the doubled-sided, one-sheet inside insert of other Hi-Yah! Well Go USA Entertainment titles. What I found aesthetic is the simple designed, yet eye-catching disc pressed with a shimmering glint. Not rated and locked on a region one playback, the release has a runtime of 87 minutes. While this crocodile’s skin remains without a tangible leathery hide in the semi-aquatic beast’s digital creation, “Crocodile Island” has sporadic action and atmospheric value vastly needed to combat the cringeworthy croc.

Journey to the “Crocodile Island” on DVD from Well Go USA!

A Thousand EVIL Little Legs Wriggle Inside You! “Creepy-Crawly” reviewed! (Well Go USA / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Get Wigged Out by “Creepy Crawly” on Blu-ray!

During the COVID lockdown, a group of tourists are confined to a quarantine appointed hotel in a Thailand city. Fielded by skeleton hospitality, the hotel aims to make the tourists comfortable as possible with the limited number of staff and security on hand. Though frustrated and displaced, the quarantined few feel ultimately satisfied by their popup accommodates spearheaded by the Thai government. However, one amongst the staff and tourists is a shapeshifting monster of local legends, jumping from body to body in hopes to find a person with unique blood in order to survive for eternity. Forcibly detained by a sleazy and easily persuadable hotel manager, Leo, Fame, and their families hardly trust anyone, even themselves, as a hidden creature invades a new host to become closer to living forever. It’s true shape like a centipede, the creature summons its smaller, poisonous brethren to wreak havoc inside every crevasse of an inescapable shelter.

Tapping into the same slithery vein as “Night of the Creeps,” “Invasion of the Body Snatchers,” or even “Slither” itself, co-writers-and directors Chalit Krileadmongkon and Pakphum Wongjinda channel their inner spirit animal, the thousand-legged wriggler, back to their home country of Thailand for a new creature feature sure to have your skin recoil with formication.  Also co-written alongside, Charoen Kaithitisuwan, “Creepy Crawly,” or better known in Thailand as “The One Hundred,” is the second feature for Krileadmongkon behind another unearthing creature construction in “The Beast Below” that was released the same year as “Creepy Crawly.”  For Wongjinda, the 2022 released film marks the 9th feature in the filmmaker’s 20+ year-long career who began in 2001 with a script surrounding a feminist ghost killing men victims in “Body Jumper.  “Wongjinda has been once around the horror subgenre carousel to now collaborate with the fresh perspective and ideas from the up-and-coming Krielandmongkon to extend Thai’s catalogue of cinematic chills and thrills.  Neramitnung Film and Fatcat Studios serve as production studios with producers Natchanok Kamonrattananan, Punyanet Tanaprapass (“The Beast Below”), and Kamonwan Kanaraksunti. 

Perhaps better if told in the perspective of an ensemble cast, “Creepy Crawly” reduces is principal character pool to just two, a hot-headed Taekwondo champion named Leo and a social media influencer aptly named Famed.  The two cross paths while being COVID quarantined, sharing a smoke in the stairwell while sharing breaking the hotel rules of remaining locked in their rooms.  There’s not much in the way of connection between the two characters, played by one half of the Golf & Mike musical group Mike Angelo (“The Misfits”) and the mixed heritage of English, Chinese, and Thai actress Chanya McClory, as the progressive action teases something more than just stairwell strangers as Leo frequently comes to Fame’s aid whenever he his sixth sense senses danger.  Both principals carry collateral damage weight with family members also being in quarantine with them; Fame has her brother and social media partner Fiew (Benjamin Joseph Varney, “The Promise”) while Leo has a slightly more extensive circle and greater family drama with sister Lena (Kulteera Yordchang) and their mute, widowed father (Paramej Joiam, “407 Dark Flight 3D”) to which with the latter Leo has an aversion in connecting with periodical flashbacks of Leo and Lena’s dying mother and somehow, which is revealed later, their father is to blame.  This creates more of an arc for Leo with an imbalanced, shared protagonist lead with Fame who we don’t get to know as intimately other than she has an incurable blood disorder that could be fatal if not treated with meds.  “Creepy Crawly’s” cast is beautifully eclectic, and I don’t mean with appearances but rather their interesting, robust with personal motivations, and not terribly dull or overtly bland with performances from Wanpiya Omsinnopphakul, Chanidapa Pongsilpipat, Sita Chutipaworakarn, Chutaporn Chaikawin, and David Asavanond as the slimy hotel owner.

As I sit down to gather my thoughts about this review squirming with venomous centipedes, a house centipede, or what we like to call in our house a thousand-legger, steps hundreds of feet-over-feet on the wall in front of me. Talk about good timing, bad omens, or just a straight up coinkydink when a cousin of the deadly antagonist you just bore witness in a film crawls up the wall in front of you. Despite the inspiration that scuttles in front of me, “Creepy Crawly” has a more fantastically gigantesque infestation. The story has a COVID-19 backdrop and is supposedly based off the story of Battambang told by King Chulalongkorn, aka King Rama V. I, unfortunately, can’t elaborate much about the story as I couldn’t dig up anything that closely resembles the analogy between a centipede invasion and a French conflict. Or are the centipedes a metaphor for the European encroachment? Or are they a metaphor for the COVID pathogen that’s hidden amongst the atypical carriers? Either way, “Creepy Crawly” is visual effects driven with a crevasse-trenched and many-moving-leg scaled arthropod with a pincher-laden head but before the monstrosity makes face, the mega-centipede can hop from body to body, able to protrude tentacled pinchers like spears, impaling victims as well as transposing itself into another body before sucking and skinning the host dry of life and flesh – very reminiscent of an Edgar suit. The jutting spears from the host never harms the body, alloying to-and-fro the skin, and clothing, in a compatibility of supernaturality that fits the folklore mold explained during the opening credits. That’s where I imagine the lore ends and the exoskeleton evil begins as we’re sucked into Leo’s daddy issues, the hotel manager’s self-preservation, and Fame’s bad blood that’s good for the big bad bug. Though Leo’s emotional pull the right heart chords and the hotel manager selfishness and greed adds tension and conflict to an already imposing no way-out scenario, the blood disorder plot device is skimmed to be barely tolerable without diving into the science of why a 10-foot centipede can survive on a compromised blood.

As far as COVID-theme foreign productions, “Creepy Crawlers” checks out as a roach motel monster movie from Well Go USA Entertainment. The distribution company’s Blu-ray is an AVC encoded, 1080p high-definition, and presented in a 2.39:1 aspect ratio. Visual effects conducted by Thailand’s Matchmove team have remarkable detail in the composited scenes with the exception of one latter scene that compromises the blacks of reality to a darker shade of gray or blue when overlaying it with the digitally added creature. Details are generally delineated nicely, color grading pops natural tones, and the BD25 offers sufficient space to suppress compression artefacts. The Thai DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio with optional English subtitles greatly exudes the centipede click-marching and pinch clips to effectuate an army of killer scurrying arthropods swarming onto, into confined quarters and those suspected of sickness, COVID-19 to be exact. Dialogue cleanly renders, especially between the majority of Thai and the medley of minority languages, such as Chinese and English. Bonus features are limited to just Well Go USA previews/trailers in what has become another barebones release for the company. The Blu-ray comes in a standard amary case with snapper with fantastically to truth image of the creature on the front cover while the inside has a paper advert for three Well Go USA films with the disc art displays warm shades red and yellow in what is a very culturally appropriated Thai coloring. “Creepy Crawly” scritch-scratches the lousy sensation of a buggy creature feature with loads of action that tries to add and induce more into the narrative beyond what’s innately there and that can be a great repellant to this wecl invasive species of Thai genre films.

Get Wigged Out by “Creepy Crawly” on Blu-ray!

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!