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Master Chen and his EVIL, Alien Clan Try to Take Over the Powers of the Astral Plane! “Furious” (Visual Vengeance / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Get “Furious” Now on Blu-ray from Amazon.com!

After the murder of his sister who sought pursuit and protection of the astral plane power, the mourning and grief-stricken Karate instructor Simon is summoned to Master Chan’s space-age dojo where’s he’s tasked to track down four connecting pieces of a necklace artifact that will lead him to his sister’s murderer.  As soon as Simon leaves the building, his friends join his quest only to be confronted by Howard, a martial arts henchman with a throng of skilled fighter to descend upon Simon and killing his friends.  Simon finds himself in constant battle against not only Howard but also other highly skilled sub-bosses with ties to Master Chan in a devious and traitorous plot to obtain the power of the astral plane for himself.  Simon uses his Karate discipline to kick and punch his way through hordes of trained fighters to reach Master Chan to stop him and exact revenge for his sister. 

A martial arts movie with aliens, astral plans, a dragon’s head, evil fire-shooting magicians, and more, “Furious” lives up to the moniker as one punch after another action and completely ambitiously and guerrilla style on a miniscule 30K budget.  Entirely helming “Furious’s’” creative control and securing actors and stuntmen willing to take risks on their own accord and dime are USC film students Tim Everitt (visual effects animator and composite artist who would go on to work on “Deep Blue Sea” and “Red Planet”) and Tom Sartori (a career film editor) looking to break into the film industry with their own rapscallion production of a marketable chopsocky genre film at the tail end of its string of success coming out of the 1970s and into the early 1980s when horror began it’s rise.  Everitt and Sartori produced the all-American made martial arts production with funding from a motel entrepreneur.

At the center of “Furious” are two Korean-American brothers, Simon and Phillip Rhee, experts in Karate and dojo sensei who, like Everitt and Sartori, were looking break into the business.  The California-born Rhee brothers play the protagonist and antagonist roles with Simon playing the namesake hero thrust into doing evil’s biding while avenging his sister’s death and Phillip donning Master Chen’s white hair and manically, ruthless plot to exploit not only Simon to obtain astral plane summoning necklace pieces but also his henchmen who carry the pieces that must hold the essence of death.  Virtuosos in karate, the Rhee brothers show and pull off incredible difficult moves done practically, especially in the early 1980s without the help of high-flying wires and only a little help with some camera angle movie magic.  The sparring is fast and realistic without being pull-punching obviousness.  All of the sound was done in post, so the Rhee’s real voices are not used to either replicate the martial arts jagged voice synchronicity or sound design was not in the budget.  Likely, a little of both.  The lower-level bosses are a medley bunch and have a range of talents from a staff wielding wilderness man (Bob Folkard), to a tiger style soul fighter (Howard Jackson, “The Delta Force”), to a crazed wizard (Mika Elkan) with flaming projectiles Simon has deal with, one-on-one, in order to reach the pyramidal top, Master Chen.  “Furious” is purely an action film, casting no love interest for Simon resulting in no emotional or romantical arch.  The former is emphasized more intently by Simon’s lack of expressiveness for revenge; there’s a sliver of poignant energy when Simon has visions of his dead friends’ severed heads served to him on a food platter that could warrant retribution attributions.  Jon Dane, John Potter, and Joyce Tilley who are quicky established as character friends to Simon and are equally as quickly dispatched to place Simon in a world of loneliness against an aliens and evil karate master alliance for astral plane domination.

From the depths of Tubi comes a curation for the ages release of “Furious” for the first time ever having a proper package that’s not related to pornography, as was the first and only VHS issuance by VCII, a well-known adult film distributor at the time who released “Debbie Does Dallas.”  “Furious” is an odd, unpredictable, mashup of throwing darts to see what sticks and in that volatility, anticipation of what’s to come next is considerably high, especially when a shoestring budget production surprisingly opens with incredible helicopter shots tracking a foot chase sequence.  From there, “Furious’ keeps astonishment alive with high-level increments of bizarre alien in human skin behavior, punitive human to animal transformations, talking pigs, astral plane battles, Superman flying, and Devo band mania coupled with extensive and coherent editing to flesh out a feature on the front and back ends.  Granted, the plot’s very puzzling and motives are dubious at best to why Master Chen would task a competent fighter like Simon to track down pieces of a unifying necklace when Chen’s own men possess all of them and could easily have killed them himself for the death essence.  There’s also the alien aspect that goes by the wayside in a lack of explanation or exposition by jumping into assumption just by weird behaviors and flashy, ultra-modern buildings to serve as extraterrestrial evidence.  Even with that ambiguity, seeing Simon Rhee perform a triple-hit kick amongst a slew of other highly impressive stunts and special effects relative to the budget has “Furious” become a cult fan favorite. 

Visual Vengeance curates another title from out of the shadows and into our Blu-ray players with “Furious,” encoded with AVC, presented in a high-definition 1080p of the original fullscreen aspect ratio 1.33:1, on a BD50.  Sourced from the original tape elements, which I’m assuming was the original VHS release a few years later as the film was shot on an Arriflex camera that used film stock, the Blu-ray contains a new, director-approved SD master print.  Cleaned up to get some color saturation into the anemic picture, the image doesn’t look as washed as the monochromic qualities of VHS and this is a vast improvement in picture quality as well with some better delineation around objects.  There’s quite a bit of aliasing and ghosting that leaves object trails and rough edging but not enough to warrant visual concern for texture properties, such as the pig stubble or the decapitated heads on a pater that show coarseness where it matters.  Print damage, such as virtual scratches and some rough editing room splices and re-tapings, are present but not profound.  All of this is covered in the technical forewarning, regularly at the beginning of ever Visual Vengeance film so the expectation is set.  The English language LPCM stereo is all postproduction additions with ADR and foley artistry.  The first instances of dialogue don’t come up in the mix until the 13-minute mark, leaving much of the opening left to Foley work to build kinetic and atmospheric sound.  With any early postproduction work, three will always be space in between the synchrony and that can be said here but on slightly jagged edge which says something positive about Everitt and Sartori’s handling of the audio track.  Optional English subtitles are available.  Obscurity doesn’t mean less supplement goodies either and Visual Vengeance has proved that over time again and again with their amazing stockpile of exclusive and archived special features.  New interviews with directors Tom Sartori, High Kicking in Hollywood, and Tim Everitt, The Kung Fu Kid begin the exclusive content with length editing discussions from the directors about their time before, during, and after “Furious.”  Filmmaker and podcaster Justin Decloux provides a slew of material, including a feature length commentary, cohosted with Peter Kuplowsky of Toronto International Film Festival.  Decloux does a pair of video essays – North American No-Budget Martial Arts Cinema Primer and Rhee Brothers career overview. The buck doesn’t stop there with an archive commentary with co-director Tim Everitt, an archive podcast with Everitt circa 2013, Super 8 behind-the-scenes footage of “Furious,” Scorched Earth Policy 1987 EP with full six tracks, Cinema Face live in concert, Tom Sartori’s 80’s music video reel and Super 8 short films, original film trailers, and Visual Vengeance trailers. That’s not all! New slipcover artwork brings together an illustrated compilation of what to expect with the same art on the inside Amaray case. The cover art is reversible, depicting the original VHS cover art that’s not as charismatic, or good. Insert section houses a folded mini-poster reproduction of the original one sheet, a double-sided acknowledgement advert with alternate art, Visual Vengeance’s retro VHS sticker sheet, and a ninja star keychain accessory! The 17th Visual Vengeance title comes region free, has a runtime of 73 minutes, and is unrated.

Last Rites: Anomalously action-packed with a fantasy element, “Furious” is a one-of-a-kind, indie martial arts production that has everything, even the kitchen sink, thrown at with a journeyman tale of alien butt-kicking, astral plane dogfighting, and anthropomorphic black arts.

Get “Furious” Now on Blu-ray from Amazon.com!

Etiquette over EVIL Shot in Super 8! “Kung Fu Rascals” reviewed! (Visual Vengeance / Blu-ray)

Posted by Steven Lewis on

Kung Fu Rascals Kicking Butt on Blu-ray!

Chen Chow Mein expertly steals an ancient tablet from the evil overlord Bamboo Man from Ka Pow whose plan is to seek complete and total dominion with the tablet stone.  Chen regroups with this acolyte pupils, Reepo and Lao Ze, to visit an old wise man for translation of the tablet’s mysteries and follow it’s mapped out quest that’ll lead them to glory over the land’s malevolent beings, but the Bamboo Man from Ka Pow will not let their journey be so easy by dispatching head minion Raspmutant the Mad Monk to hire the corrupt Sherriff of Ching Wa County and his two apprentices, Dar Ling and Ba Foon, as well as summoning the monolithic Neo Titan to stop them at all costs.  Always training their Kung-Fu etiquette, the trio embark on a journey through a land filled with evil ninja henchmen and must fight together to finish the journey.

Sculptor and creature effects guru Seve Wang might be best known for his work on some of the genre’s most memorable and favorite characters, such as designing the final extraterrestrial jungle hunter of John McTiernan’s “Predator,” created the Mohawk Spider Gremlin in Joe Dante’s “Gremlins 2:  The New Batch,” and sculpted the failed Ripley clones in “Alien Resurrection” amongst other notable cult and blockbuster films.  What you might not know is that Steve Wang had also directed, incorporating too his special effects and sculpting talents behind the camera in a debut feature, a homage to the Kung-Fu and Kaiju genres, titled “Kung Fun Rascals.”  Wang also cowrote the 1992 film with another special effects artist and actor Johnnie S. Espiritu (aka Johnnie Saiko) of “Hell Comes to Frogtown” and “Aliens vs. Predator:  Requiem.”  Wang self-produced the film after a series of short films to gain financial backing for a feature-length production.

On any self-produced, independent film, the cast usually wears multiple hats.  “Kung Fu Rascals” was no different as writer-director-producer-caterer-sculptor-and etc., Steve Wang also starred as Chen Chow Mien, an expert Kung-Fu fighter who steals a pivotal stone tablet from the Bamboo Man of Ka Pow, one of the many roles played by Ted Smith.  Wang and Smith are friends, and that age-old motif of a friend casted film holds very true for “Kung Fu Rascals,” comprised of mostly the director’s friends, who are also special effects and makeup artists, to accomplish his dream of branching out into a different field in filmmaking.  Johnnie Saiko is also one of those friends and is one of the two actors in this Kung-Fu romp playing Reepo, the trio’s good-natured goofball stylized like a character out of a “Mad Max” movie garbed in black and with a standing mohawk.  The third that rounds out the team is Lao Ze from one of the few actors initially not a part of Wang’s friend pool in Troy Fromin (“Shrunken Heads”).  Quaintly and quietly inspired by the antics and approaches of “The Three Stooges,” the “Kung Fu Rascals” march to a different dynamic drum as quasi-foolish, good-hearted good guys acted with slapstick, sure-fisted parody against a hapless army of animal-flavored mutants and their master with a flair for villainy.  Along with that master villain role, Smith continues his trend of being the guy in the suit throughout the film by being a giant Kaiju Meta Spartan and hilariously plays out of the suit with Dar Ling, a queer flamboyant henchman alongside fellow henchmen and Chicken-style Kung-Fu fighter Ba Foon (Aaron Simms) as they add a sense of diversity and daffy under the leadership Les Claypool’s Sherriff of Ching Wa County.  Yes, the same Les Claypool from the band Primus.  The cast rounds out with Cleve Hall (“The Halfway House”) as an old wise, creepy, and slightly uncouth clairvoyant, Matt Rose as the wild-eyed torturer, Michelle McCrary as The Spider Witch, Ed Yang as the other Kaiju Neo Titan, Tom Martinek as the hoppy Frog guard, and Wyatt Weed (“Predator 2”) doing the devil in the details with every step as the fully anthropomorphic Pig fitted Raspmutant the Mad Monk.

“Kung Fu Rascals” is the tastier, punchier, made with more heart version of “Kung Pow,” and I don’t mean the Chinese spicy stir-fry chicken dish with hints of peanut and accompanied with vegetables and peppers.  For an independent, first-time feature on a budget, Steve Wang and friends sculps and fashions meticulous creatures from head-to-toe.  Not one latex ear, not one molded snout, and not one full-body outfit appears shoddy or cheap overtop encased actors who know what to do underneath all that masking makeup and rubber.  On top of that, the fight choreography, editing, and dimensional effects are high level pointing in all the right directions with interesting camera visuals and angles to turn a little production like “Kung Fu Rascals” into a fully-fledged feature that audiences of 1992 weren’t ready yet until Power Rangers explosively came onto the scene a year later.  Of course, there was “The Guyver” a year earlier, also from Steve Wang, but “The Guyver” was geared for a limited audience that blended science-fiction with gory elements.  “Kung Fu Rascals” settles at the other end of the spectrum with a more family-friendly façade with an homage to Asian cinema and medieval monsters.  “Kung Fu Rascals” might not have been made today being quite politically incorrect with its play-on-names, stereotypes, and white-washing Asians but in the end, it’s Kung-Fu etiquette is entertaining chop-socky. 

Visual Vengeance once again delivers.  A high-end presentation and package of Steve Wang’s “Kung Fu Rascals” finds Blu-ray gold with a high-definition release despite the film being shot in Super 8 film.  The AVC encoded, 1080p resolution, BD50 is presented in a 1:33:1 aspect ratio.  Super 8 is not peak definition or color saturation as the image is captured straight onto the celluloid, color and contrast in all, in a direct positive process that left hardly any room for cleaner reprocessing.  Scenes often look darker at a higher contrast on a lower, blockier resolution, decoding at a broad range of 8 to 25Mbps, and the editing, though keeping continuous fighting scenes seamless, fluctuates with surface finish inconsistency in shots that make some scenes appear dark in the daylight; this could also be result in the filming time-of-day.  Yet, the cinematography is excellent in capturing interesting visual angles and the lighting setup is stunning despite the unpolished Super 8.  Visual Vengeance continues to supply the technical disclaimer with the caveat of using the best possible source materials for their releases, including this director-supervised version of the standard definition master tape and original film elements, which had a few, very minor, linear scratches and dust/dirt speckles.  The English language Dolby Digital Stereo mix is quite sharp and clean that emulates the boxiness of Asian dubbing/ADR.  Thrown punches and kicks hit their audio marks with timed whack and thud Foley and the dialogue, through the cheesy and cheeky antics, suffers from no fidelity loss or reel damage.  I’m surprised how clean the track is with little-to-no static, crackling, or hissing. English subtitles are available though no listed on the back.  If looking for special features, Visual Vengeance has the definitive special features for the Steve Wang’s obscurity with a brand new feature length documentary The Making of Kung Fu Rascals containing interviews with cast and crew, two new feature-parallel commentary tracks with the first being the “Kung Fu Rascals” themselves, Steve Wang, Troy Fromin, and Johnnie Saiko, as well with composter-actor Les Claypool and actor Ted Smith and the second with film superfans Justin Decloux and Dylan Cheung, an exclusive reunion of the Rascals with a sit down conversation between Wang, Fromin, and Saiko, a Steve Wang and Les Claypool reunion, Film Threat editor Chris Gore interview on distributing the VHS, a behind-the-scenes video diary, the 30-minute “Kung Fun Rascals” Super 8 short film, the 9-minute “Code 9” Steve Wang short film, Film Threat video #6 behind-the-scenes article, film and behind-the-scene stills, and Visual Vengeance cut version of the “Kung Fu Rascals” trailer.  Visual Vengeance also has your physical needs covered, and no I don’t mean sexually, with a cardboard O-Slipcover illustrated with a new art design by Thomas “The Dude Designs” Hodge overtop the clear Blu-ray Amaray case.  The reversible sleeve contains two compositional, Asian cinema-homage illustrations that an eye-appealing.  Inside contains a 13-page, Marc Gras illustrated, official comic book adaptation, a 2-sided single sheet insert with a fourth artwork design and Blu-ray acknowledgements, a folded mini-poster of the primary Blu-ray art, and a Visual Vengeance rental stick sheet containing 12-rental theme descriptor stickers.  The unrated release comes region free and has a runtime of 102 minutes.

Last Rites: Phenomenal creature suits and makeup, a lost sense of irreverent, spot-on comedy, and butt-kicking Kung Fu, Steve Wang’s little-known picture is the poster child for satirical, independent comedy-action and a good time overall.

Kung Fu Rascals Kicking Butt on Blu-ray!