Clifton Ko and Raymond To-adopted stage play with famed theatre actor Tse Kwan-Ho reprising his role as Kiang Yu-Kou. The Mad Phoenix details his life as the wealthy 13th son of his family with a passion for Cantonese opera. His dreams of composing eventually takes off and now known as Mr. Thirteen in the opera circles, his genius certainly isn't disputed. However the eccentric and erratic behaviour drives his surroundings crazy. With absent love in his life, Kiang himself also is driven insane, all taking place over several years of changes in Chinese society.

It's the age old E! True Hollywood Story in structure and Clifton Ko also certainly makes no secret of the stage play roots of The Mad Phoenix. However with a mesmerizing Tse Kwan-Ho performance, it's easy to simply be swept away by acting and dialogue. A gem from 1997 that deservedly received honors at the awards subsequently. Most notably a Golden Horse Award to Tse Kwan-Ho and the Hong Kong Film Award to Raymond To for Best Screenplay. Poon Chan-Leung (Love Au Zen) and James Wong appears in supporting roles.

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Dee (Wong Hei - The Accident) fails as a hair dresser but a reunion with his childhood friend May (Hilary Tsui - Lost And Found) transforms into a romance with a killer edge....towards others! Finally Dee can materialize his mad stylist dreams! A sign of weakness leads Dee to sparing and taking in a mentally retarded girl (Annie Man - Koma) into his and May's lives. All while the cops (led by Kent Cheng and Michael Wong) do their best to catch them...

Bizarre, wild, funny and macabre Cat III offering that uses the distance from the golden era of the rating's filmmaking to deliver something akin to fresh. Far from the graphic and offensive nature of movies like Daughter Of Darkness (among many others), director Stephen Yip actually gives us a character driven story made to work by the performances of Wong Hei and Hilary Tsui. Utilizing a simple starting off point of a harsh childhood as almost always seen in these films, he constructs a story between Dee and May that succeeds mostly in its outlandish ways but also manages to be affecting. Yip isn't out to rival any of the great character dramas obviously but out to make a mark in a genre where it's usually ok to not put in effort. Even his portrayal of the cops as fairly smart and intuitive is original for a Cat III slasher thriller. With only some unfortunate animal cruelty and overly repetitive cinematography choices to drag the grade down, Mad Stylist surprises, amuses, probably disgusts to a degree and affects. Kind of hard to believe and admit.

Watch out for the on-screen duet between Michael Wong and Kent Cheng, performing "Diana". Yes, it's that kind of movie where everything halts to concentrate on that!

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TROY'S REVIEW: The ever impressive Alexander Lou stars in this hugely entertaining knockabout as Jack, a down on his luck sort who one night with the aid of a new found friend called Charlie saves the life of an affable old mob boss from an attempted assassination by his own cronies. Regretfully, this benevolent act proves only to stave off fate for a short time however as four hired professional killers are subsequently called in to kill the old chap, which they eventually succeed at doing. But wait, because now Jack and Charlie are now honour bound to take revenge...ninja style! What follows is a series of non stop, superbly choreographed fight scenes as our heroes fight for justice against an army of bad guys including a gambling addict knife thrower, a samurai who bears an uncanny resemblance to the late Oliver Hardy, a jive talking kickboxer (played by Lou's regular co-star Eugene Thomas aka. Eugene Trammel) and more ninjas than you can shake a stick at. Yay verily, this is awesome stuff from start to glorious finish and is made all the more fun as true to form, Lou acts against the preposterous material with deadly straight faced seriousness.

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Lively and creative Wuxia spectacle from Tsui Hark's Film Workshop. The Magic Crane itself made an appearance in Tsui's Green Snake the same year and yes, effects-wise it wasn't much of a stunner there either. Neither were the snakes in that picture which didn't stop it from becoming an enchanting experience.

While no great shakes in the visuals department, The Magic Crane goes about its business in efficient ways. Meaning great, big doses of broad comedy, gore and high flying acrobatics all in one. While obviously undercranked to the max, the choreography is great fun and offers plenty of entertaining flying bouts. With solid and endearing performances by Tony Leung Chiu-Wai, Anita Mui and Rosamund Kwan, The Magic Crane turns out to be a worthy entry in the new wave craze of martial arts cinema in the 90s. Also with Damian Lau, Norman Tsui, Lawrence Ng and Kelvin Wong.

The Magic Crane is available on dvd by Ground Zero Entertainment as part of their "Brooklyn Zu: Double Features" series, alongside Rivals of the Dragon. Considering the track record that Ground Zero has, it comes as a surprise that Benny Chan's film is presented in widescreen, in Cantonese and subtitled into English. The source is most likely the old Laserdisc. The Hong Kong vcd is out of print while a Mandarin language only dvd has been released in Taiwan by Thundermedia.

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After getting with him the titular magic crystal (or jade) in his luggage when arriving home from Greece, little Pin Pin (Siu Ban-Ban) finds himself a friend in the jade that has the ability to affect human brain waves. But the Russians (led by Richard Norton) wants it for their own dominating purposes so Andy Lau's mercenary for hire protects while Interpol (represented by Max Mok and Cynthia Rothrock) also help batter whatever henchmen come their way. Then there's Wong Jing and Nat Chan doing absolutely nothing to help the cause or the movie...

Typically schizophrenic Hong Kong cinema with a little bit of everything from everywhere (Raiders Of The Lost Ark, E.T, Close Encounters Of The Third Kind and so on and so on) crammed into the partially Greece-set film. Wong Jing does nothing but putting his stamp on the film via frequent usage of silliness of the less intelligent kind. Making him and Nat Chan (who literally has no purpose in the structure of the actual narrative) some slightly mild versions of horny perverts (but still horny perverts), you'll have to endure the commercial sensibility of the low-brow kind (at least two gags of said annoying performers slip through into funny territory) in between the terrific Tony Leung Siu-Hung action. Getting the players looking their best and trying their best (Andy Lau in particular) in his fast and bone crunching fights, it's a bearable element erasing thoughts of the unbearable ones but yet Magic Crystal overall charms as a product of its time. Especially cute IS the story of Pin Pin and his newly found jade-friend and the adventure/sci-fi aspect of the last reels provides a cheesy atmosphere of a more correctly tuned kind. Sharla Cheung appears as window dressing as well as Sek Kin, Phillip Ko and Shum Wai.

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Obviously meant to be called Magic Of Spell on the print, this is the sequel to The Child of Peach which was based on the popular character Momotarō from Japanese folklore. Lam Siu-Lau reprises HER role of Peach BOY who gets to fight devils, demons, zombies and wizards at breakneck speed courtesy of director Chiu Chung-Hung (A Heroic Fight). Literally a cartoon come to life not only through the fairly extensive use of animated special effects and over the top design. Director Chiu does dedicate some of the first half to pratfalls and lame slapstick but when proceedings have turned a little somber, the viewer is in for a non-stop ride of Taiwan fantasy madness. Peach Boy teams up with friends Doggy, Chicken and Monkey to fight of a devil in need of youthful power and seeing the various techniques best discovered sans beforehand knowledge in the relentless (and epic) finale is pure, delightful eye-candy. Sure it's lo-fi and not to be considered a full blown movie by any means but much is to be admired in the team that put together this wildly colourful package that when all is said and done makes one easily forget about lagging pace initially.

Conveying scale and ambition with huge battle scenes and terrific costume design, Taiwan veteran Ding Sin-Saai's next to last movie doesn't score as much in the drama- and emotions-department as it wants. Don Wong (who is having tons of fun) as the tyrant Kwan is waiting for a sword to be created by one of the great sword makers (played by Tok Chung-Wa in a rather anonymous role coming from an otherwise fine actor). Kwan himself is apparently having sexual problems, bathes in snake blood at one point and throws a child into a furnace... this is indeed cinematic outrageousness to be remembered but the film aims for more. Mostly grounded action-wise until the supernatural twist at the end, here's even more ambition as we get crude but surprisingly epic computer effects (of an animated peacock and dragon). Doesn't tug at any heartstrings but engages a gear needed for a bit of fun to shine through.

KENNETH'S REVIEW: Why be slow when you can cheaply and frenetically run through your colourful creativity? Sounds deep and scholar-like but still applies to the wild, Taiwan time offered up by Chong Yan-Gin (Revanchist) and Lee Tso-Nam (Shaolin Vs Lama). Dubbed as a second sequel to The Child Of Peach (the other being Magic Of Stell), in fact the only link is female lead Lam Siu-Lau playing another male hero. This time it's Little Flying Dragon and not Peach Boy, who has to protect Golden Boy from the forces of hell. In a story making little sense, nor should it in some odd, logical way, the often infectious blend of animated special effects, wire assisted feats and low-brow comedy (see Lam Siu-Lau turn into a gorilla and Golden Boy offering up piss tea) seems a little downshifted compared to Magic Of Stell but nevertheless is hokey fun. Almost an Wizard Of Oz-like character gallery pops up (including snail- and mushroom spirits), an acid pit turning humans into skeletons in an instant and a terrific finale that definitely sees the crew shift their gears up. Yes, Magic Warriors is a movie with quotable content to the max but despite beans spilled above, there's news around most corners it turns. Alexander Lo appears in dual roles.

In the early days of the Chinese republic, the leftovers of the diminishing Ching dynasty, led by General Huang (Chan Sing), are trying to stage a revolution. Fighting against them is leader Yao (Carter Wong) and along the way, people of good nature are going to stand together, despite belonging to the different camps in question...

From Joseph Lai and Tomas Tang comes a real movie? Yep, no insertions of bad gwailo actors or ninjas (that they did much later with The Magnificent), this is way early where the duo stood together and produced movies in the old school vein instead. The Magnificent is aided by a wise combo to have its serious plot basically be the framework for a pretty constant assault of kung-fu. No extensive talking or filmmaking thinking it's better than it is, because of it director Chan Siu-Pang comes off as an actual genre filmmaker. Especially so when the basic but intriguing ideas of a Ching Dynasty princess (the kickass Doris Lung) siding with Carter Wong's Yao's are brought forth without feeling the need to put the narrative drive in a tub of glue. Betrayal, power struggles and training scenes featuring vital pressure point-mastering, you all know where that is heading... fast. Casanova Wong lights up the screen with kicking every single time he's called into action and while uneven, the rest of the choreography done by leads such as Carter Wong and Chen Sing excites to a decent degree. Well-rounded isn't a very common verdict to slap on an independent martial arts movie but The Magnificent deserves that and a pat on the back.