The Invincible Dragon (2019)

Jiu long bu bai (original title)

Director: Fruit Chan
Starring: Jin Zhang, Anderson Silva, Kevin Cheng, Suet Lam .Hong Kong. 1h 25m

The UFC is an absolute goldmine not only does it make super fighters, but it and generally if you can nurture a dynamic Hong Kong action movie with at least one big name you’ll take in cash.. But blend the two poorly and you’ll end up with this disjointed mess, that feels as if the producers knew what they wanted to do, but wrote any bull in to make it happen.

What starts as a really engaging crime thriller following a determined gun happy cop, Officer Kowloon (Jin) who opens the film boiling in a cooking pot, in a seedy backstory restaurant, Lam Suet taunting him as the two compare Dragon tattoos, fortunate that our hero has a better back story featuring an adorable (brightly coloured cgi) Dragon that he met as a child…after the bonding he shoots Lams hand off in a function room and gets suspended, this becomes a trend with Kowloon even while investigating a spate of murders targeting female police officers he manages to fudge the operation, not only letting the only suspect go, but losing his fiancee\fellow officer.

The Perfection (2018)

Director: Richard Shepard
Starring: Allison Williams, Logan Browning, Steven Weber. USA. 1h 30m

There is something surprisingly poetic about, Paul Haslinger’s unabating film, a movie which is pretty easy to fall into and follow despite it constantly throwing the audience a curved ball by rewinding time and showing things from a different perspective, it’s charming but for me there just wasn’t enough obscure strangeness, instead that was reserved until the bitter…. sweet end.

Opening with a somber tone, a woman lays wide eyed on her deathbed, her daughter looking on with a 1000 yard stare, there is a slight sign that something is not quite right , through a montage we see her getting pulled from a prestigious school to return home and look after her mother, scenes of self harming and a girl desperate to escape , but also something much darker from her past. She’s damaged but is hopeful of a better future. She calls her old mentor for help, her mother has gone and now she wants to return to Anton (Webber) the person who was painstakingly training her to be the best cellist in the world but the world has moved on and he has a new best, the stunning Lizzie (Browning) her face plastered all over the streets of Shanghai, China, she’s utter perfection but the hint of jealousy falls into lust when the two virtuoses spend a night on the town then ends up in the bedroom, something pretty strange for rivals but these girls are also striving for the best and see it in each other but this flashy romance won’t last.

Beyond Skyline (2017)

Director: Liam O’Donnell .
Starring. Frank Grillo, Bojana Novakovic, Jonny Weston, Iko Uwais, Antionio Gargas USA. 1h 45m.

Skyline seems to be cursed, the original movie had a great idea and outstanding budget but the story was so basic that it only started to get into motion in the final few moments, after watching this tepid sequel, it seems both movies could have easily made one film, with the original being trimmed down to a mere introduction. Ultimately Skyline remains one of the worst sci fi movies in recent history, and only a little it really saved with this sequel.

Things pick up from the where the last movie left off, the world is under attack from a monstrous species of aliens who have weird mecha technology partially organic and looking quite similar to the machines from the Matrix series, they use lights to brainwash people into coming to them, like the blue lights in the deli are used to attract flies.  In Skyline a hero was born in the finale moments, it seems the aliens are interested in our brains (fools!!) and while the hero was killed while trying to protect his pregnant girlfriend,  his brain is placed into one of the alien “machines” which is a Guyver like suit, he managed to regain his consciousness and started the fight against the aliens, AS one of the aliens! Luckily you’ll know who this good buy is as he glows red while all the other aliens glow blue.. just putting that out there..

Geung Si – Rigor Mortis (2013)

Director: Juno Mak.
Starring: Chin Siu-ho Anthony Chan Kara Hui Lo Hoi-pang Paw Hee-ching. Hong Kong. 1h 41m.

A detailed and superb Hong Kong film directed by Juno Mak, is a tribute to the Mr Vampire (1985+) series and features many of the same actors.

A formerly successful actor Chin Siu-ho (the star of Mr Vampire), becomes depressed and suicidal when he wife leaves him. He moves into a run down apartment and soon after his welcoming ceremony he decides to hang himself, but as he’s losing consciousness a pair of twin ghosts possess his body. Yau, a retired vampire hunter breaks in, cuts him down and exorcises the spirits from Chin’s body.

Chong po gong fu cheng – Dragon Fighter (1981)

I found this epic in CEX for 50p but I do like these bargains as they do yield some amazing B movies, movies that are so bad they are good. and this one is actually ok.

Starting out strangely with a few guys getting violently abducted, one is even clothed lined and stolen as he tries to get help for his pregnant wife, despite her square cushioned shaped baby, he and a few others are chucked into a gold mine and expected to work (without training), the story unfolds quickly after this and it goes something like this..  some dude needs to pay up some cash but his only source of cash is his gold mine (woe be unto him), he’s worked out that if he steals some people to work in his mine he’ll be able to smelt enough gold in time but his prisoners keep trying to escape.. damned peasants. The overseers are total bastards and are constantly rounding people up and beating them. There is one respite as one of the team leaders and his daugher (with long pigtails and a wispy fringe.. no cliches here) do their best to make life a little easier, and secretly teaches a few of them kung fu as they are determined to escape.

Badges of Fury (2013)

Badges of Fury (Martial Arts, Comedy, Action 2013) (PG) D:Wong Tsz-Ming C:Jet Li, Wen Zhang, Michelle Chen, Liu Shishi, Ada Liu 1h 38m. China/Hong Kong

Right I won’t be writing a full review for this because it was awful and I can’t even go there to even detail all of the faults. I don’t really want to talk about it at all because it just makes me angry.

Two troublemaking cops, one a young buck Wang (Zhang Wen) and the other a moody veteran (yeah like always) Huang (Li) are sent to investigate  a string of “mysterious” murders that all lead back to the same ex girlfriend, an aspiring starlet, in order to draw out the killer, one of the cops has to pose as her lover and then movie, crazy antics the end.