Silver Emulsion Film Reviews

My Name is Shanghai Joe (1973)

My Name is Shanghai Joe [Il mio nome è Shanghai Joe] (1973)
AKA The Fighting Fists of Shanghai Joe, The Dragon Strikes Back, Knochenbrecher im wilden Westen (literally translates to: Bone Crusher in the Wild West), Shanghai Joe, To Kill or to Die

Starring Chen Lee, Klaus Kinski, Gordon Mitchell, Claudio Undari, Katsutoshi Mikuriya, Carla Romanelli, Carla Mancini, Giacomo Rossi-Stuart, George Wang, Federico Boido, Piero Lulli

Directed by Mario Caiano

Expectations: High, this one looks great and I’ve heard good things.

On the general scale:

On the B-Movie scale:

Usually in films where two distinct genres are mashed together, the end result is less than it could have been. In My Name is Shanghai Joe, I am happy to say that everything comes together in the best, most satisfying way possible. It is a western first, then a kung fu film, but it truly delivers on both levels. It is also nearly non-stop action, with Shanghai Joe moving briskly through the baddies in one great scene after another. I always go into mixed genre films with apprehension, especially ones that mix two of my favorite genres, but My Name is Shanghai Joe does it so well that I had an absolute blast watching it and will definitely be watching this one again.

There isn’t much of a plot to speak of. Shanghai Joe arrives off a presumably slow boat from China in San Francisco of 1882. He quickly buys a stagecoach ticket East to Texas. At every turn, Joe meets up with some of the most racist fuckers ever put onto celluloid, spouting shitty Chinaman jokes one after another. After working his way through tons of these bastards, Joe finally pisses off the wrong dude, who in turn hires four assassins to track down Joe and take him out. These assassins, with such names as Scalper Jack and Pedro the Cannibal, each go down in interesting and fun ways. My Name is Shanghai Joe is a revenge film, but not one to linger on the pain or the regret such killing might lead another hero to contemplate. Instead most of the scenes follow this general framework: Joe enters, the bad guys say some racist shit and attack, Joe fucking annihilates them. It’s truly gratifying to watch and literally never gets old.

Twin Blades of Doom (1969)

Twin Blades of Doom [陰陽刀] (1969)

Starring Ling Yun, Ching Li, Chen Hung Lieh, Yau Ching, Cheng Lui, Gai Yuen, Cheng Miu, Lam Kau, Fang Mian, Hao Li-Jen, Lau Gong, Hung Lau, Lee Ho

Directed by Doe Ching

Expectations: Moderately high. The name sounds fun.

Just like Smuckers, with a name like Twin Blades of Doom, it has to be good, right? Unfortunately not, as this is one of the most disjointed, boring Shaw Brothers films I’ve seen in a while. It’s not for lack of trying, the film exhibits lots of potential for greatness throughout, but at every turn the filmmakers choose to go in exactly the opposite direction. A lot of what’s wrong with this film can be traced back to its director, one Doe Ching.

Doe was a very successful, award-winning director during the 50s and 60s, specializing in melodrama, comedies and musicals. By the time Twin Blades of Doom was made, those genres had all faded in popularity and the focus of the Shaw Brothers had shifted primarily to the wuxia pian genre of swordplay, revenge and martial struggles. Doe Ching was pressured into making a martial arts film by the Shaws and the result is Twin Blades of Doom. You never want to resign yourself into making a film without any passion behind it, so the lackluster results are understandable. On top of all that, Doe Ching was very ill with stomach cancer and actually had to leave the shoot mid-way through. The film was finished up by Griffin Yueh Feng (a very competent martial arts director), but even he couldn’t salvage the film. If all that wasn’t enough of a downer, Doe Ching died only four months after this film was released, making Twin Blades of Doom his final work.

Mini-Review: Friends With Benefits (2011)

Starring Justin Timberlake, Mila Kunis, Patricia Clarkson, Jenna Elfman, Bryan Greenberg, Richard Jenkins, Woody Harrelson, Nolan Gould

Directed by Will Gluck

Expectations: None, I just hope it’s not too painful.

Just to keep everyone guessing, I have to review a straight-up mainstream movie like this once in a while. Most of the time I have such an indifferent response to these films that I can’t muster the mental power needed to write a full review. Friends With Benefits is pretty much in the same category, but I do have a few thoughts to share. It’s better than No Strings Attached, let’s just get that out of the way. No Ashton Kutcher is a huge plus, but it’s really the R Rating that helps a lot here, allowing the characters freedom to curse as they naturally would and making the sex scenes adequately steamy.

Both Justin Timberlake and Mila Kunis do a great job with the material they are given, giving us a believable on-screen relationship with a minimum of groan-worthy scenes. The supporting cast is also filled out with lots of good actors such as Woody Harrelson, Jenna Elfman and Patricia Clarkson (playing virtually the same character she played in Easy A). While I enjoyed Harrelson as the cock-obsessed gay man, I can’t help but wonder how intelligent gay men reacted to this character. They deserve better than to have broad stereotypes reinforced. And if we’re going down that rabbit hole, where were the people of color in this film? I think almost every one in the movie is white.

As a piece of art, it fails miserably. Director Will Gluck creates a textbook mainstream film with more ugly close-ups and over-the-shoulder shots than I care to think back on. I’m sure the paycheck was great though. He previously made Easy A, another poorly-shot mainstream comedy and one that I just couldn’t understand the hype for. It’s hard for me to watch these ugly, lazy films without losing my shit, but the charm of both Kunis and Timberlake surprisingly went a long way.

As a comedy, it fails less so, but it still contains far too little laughs. I especially enjoyed the fake romantic comedy they watch throughout the film, which features some incredibly funny lines within it, perfectly lampooning the tired genre. What’s unfortunate is that to make a romantic comedy, the story kind of has to follow that general path that they all follow and Friends With Benefits is no different. Oh, and the Barnes and Noble joke was my biggest laugh of the movie. Perhaps not the most clever line in the world, but seriously, buying full prices books really is dumb shit.

Friends With Benefits does a lot wrong, but it does just enough right to make it not as painful as it could have been. It’s way too fuckin’ long though, coming in at almost two hours. I’d only recommend it if you like the leads enough to see them get jiggy wit it.

Creepozoids (1987)

Starring Linnea Quigley, Ken Abraham, Michael Aranda, Richard L. Hawkins, Ashlyn Gere (as Kim McKamy), Joi Wilson

Directed by David DeCoteau

Expectations: Low. Early DeCoteau has burned me before, but the poster looks fun.

On the general scale:

On the B-Movie scale:

I think the best place to start a review of Creepozoids is with the typed narrative intro that informs viewers of the world they are about to inhabit. It reads as follows:

1998 — Six years after the superpowers have engaged in a devastating nuclear exchange,
Earth is now a blackened husk of a planet.

Tiny clusters of survivors eke out a miserable existence in the ruins of the cities, and bands
of deserters roam the barren wastelands… hiding from mutant nomads and seeking shelter
from the deadly acid rains.

This exciting and somewhat clichéd setup is already more story than director David DeCoteau’s first film, Dreamaniac, had, and for the most part Creepozoids delivers on the promises set forth in the text. During the opening credits our group of heroes traverse the burned out urban wasteland, looking to find some shelter before another round of acid rain showers the Earth. Luckily they find what they seek, but unbeknownst to them, they’ve all sought refuge in a government science installation tasked with creating a higher form of life. Since this is a sci-fi/horror film, of course “higher form of life” means a ruthless, unstoppable monster.

Mini-Review: American: The Bill Hicks Story (2009/2011)

World Premiere 2009 in London, US Theatrical Release 2011

Starring Bill Hicks, Kevin Booth, John Farneti, Lynn Hicks, Mary Hicks, Steve Hicks, Andy Huggins, David Johndrow, James Ladmirault, Dwight Slade

Directed by Matt Harlock & Paul Thomas

Expectations: High, I love Bill Hicks.

Bill Hicks is fucking awesome and if you dig stand-up comedy in any meaningful way, you should already know the name and be familiar with his work. If not, he’s one of the best there ever was. Hicks elevated stand-up to levels previously undreamt about by mainstream comics, pushing boundaries way past the bleeding edge. At his core, he was a thoughtful, logical man who threw everything he had up on that stage and American: The Bill Hicks Story seeks to let you in on how he came to be that man. Mostly it succeeds, but as much as I love Hicks and the experience of watching this movie, I can’t let my feelings override the glaring problems I had with the film at a structural level.

There’s an odd choice made by the documentarians to focus on audio-only interviews of his family and friends, instead of traditional video interviews. While they’re talking, still photographs are animated into whatever scene the interviewee is describing. It took a while for me to come around to this style, and while I eventually was OK with it, I never really liked it. It creates an odd disconnect from the person speaking and unless you’re extremely good with placing a voice to a name, you’re going to lose track of who’s who. Bill Hicks, via these animated pictures and live video footage, is always front and center and the film takes on something of a video shrine to him instead of a true documentary. Then in the final few minutes of the film, the filmmakers break character and finally show the people who’ve been narrating our experience. The only problem is that besides Hicks’ mother, I have very little idea who everyone else is, unless their current look unmistakably resembles all the photographs we were shown from the 70s and 80s. They also never flash the person’s name on the screen when they’re talking, so we literally have no help in this regard.

Despite this, the film succeeds as a document of the legacy and power of Bill Hicks’ stand-up act. It follows a very linear path from Bill’s childhood to his death, so you do get a great sense of the overall arc of his life, and some of the twists and turns it took along the way. I greatly enjoyed the film, but a lot of that enjoyment is just discovering bits and pieces of what made a guy I greatly respect who he was. Hicks was the man, and this documentary only seals that fact deeper in my mind. If you’re unfamiliar with him, I’d definitely watch a couple of his stand-up sets before hitting this doc up. I highly recommend his HBO One Night Stand set, currently available on Netflix Instant as Episode 1 of the series: Bill Hicks Live: Satirist, Social Critic, Stand-up Comedian.

The Fastest Sword (1968)

The Fastest Sword [天下第一劍] (1968)

Starring Liu Ping, Chu Jing, Go Ming, Han Chiang, Liu Wai, Chiu Keung, Lee Goon-Cheung, Law Hon, Man Gau, Chuen Yuen, Gam Lee-Sang, Man Man, Tai Leung, Ling Siu, Cheung Ching-Fung

Directed by Pan Lei

Expectations: Low.

Going into The Fastest Sword I had little to no expectations. It featured no one that I recognized from a quick look at the cast list and I had never heard of director Pan Lei either. The Fastest Sword took me by surprise though, as it’s actually a very good martial drama that revolves around the classic story trope of the cursed warrior who wants nothing more than to leave his past life behind him. It surprisingly brings together nearly all the necessary elements for a fun film: great directing, quality acting & martial performance, and a well-written screenplay.

The film opens with a badass swordsman from the South (Liu Ping) taking on three combatants who have come to avenge their brother’s murder. He quickly takes them out and an old man steps up and challenges the swordsman to a duel. If the old man wins, the famous Southern Sword must stay with him and train for three years. The cocky young man agrees and within the space of a few seconds he’s bested by the bearded elderly master. The film then moves into what is the first real extended master/pupil sequence I’ve seen while doing this review series, and I welcome the scene with open arms. It isn’t the training sequences martial arts fans are accustomed though (so don’t envision Challenge of the Masters), but it features some of the best moments of the film, specifically when the master tasks his student with carving a statue out of a giant rock. The master gives his student his task and then says, “I’ll be back in six months.” It’s a fantastic scene and one that eventually leads our hero to seek a new life as a mason in a small town.

The Artist (2011)

Starring Jean Dujardin, Bérénice Bejo, John Goodman, James Cromwell, Penelope Ann Miller, Missi Pyle, Beth Grant, Ed Lauter, Joel Murray

Directed by Michel Hazanavicius

Expectations: High hopes, but moderate expectations.

I love film, if I didn’t I wouldn’t bother writing about it. I consider myself something of a film historian, not that I collect and catalog old works, but that I’m concerned with maintaining an understanding of the industry in its many forms throughout the years. Silent films were a huge part of my life about ten years ago, so much so that I was pretty much watching nothing else. It is this foundation that instantly gets excited when talk of a new silent film emerges. Then I happened to see the trailer and I realized that not only was it a silent film, The Artist is a film set in the silent era and its plot revolves around the film industry. Great. As much as I love film, I kinda hate films about Hollywood, so my expectations were instantly cut in half, which is honestly the best thing that could’ve happened.

And now that I’ve seen it, I can honestly say that I don’t really understand why it’s getting so much praise. I mean, I get it… if Drive was the movie that lit millennials’ bulbs in 2011, and The Tree of Life was the one that rang the bell for arthouse fiends, then The Artist is the film that floats the boat of the nostalgic lover of old Hollywood, but shouldn’t a film actually be good beyond the hype, pretense and nostalgia? All three of these critically acclaimed movies fell far short of the mark for me, and as much as I didn’t care for it, I’m tempted to say that The Tree of Life is the best of the bunch, regardless of my star ratings (which I stand by). Didn’t expect to ever say that.