Fist Of The North Star (1986)

After a nuclear holocaust tears the world apart, mankind is forced to the harshness of not only the oppression of others who are much more powerful, but the dead earth which seems to be getting worse with every passing moment. But a saviour has risen from the ashes, a man who will defeat those who would torment the weak and make the world a livable place once more. A man named Kenshiro…..

Bone-crunching and ultra-violent Sci-fi action martial arts epic. It’s a big assault on the senses in stylish animation. There is a ton of extreme violence throughout the movie like exploding heads, people shredded apart and that kind of thing. This isn’t for the weak stomached or for kids, it’s a battering ram of a movie that hits you to the core. There’s a lot of muscle in this movie and all fighters look like there on steroids. but it’s done in such a way that you’ll never think the fighters are overpowered. You have to be a fan of cruel fighting and drama if you are interested in viewing this. The story is basically “get the girl and save the word” so don’t expect a mind bottling storyline but just a day’s life in a world that is on the edge of destruction. A classic anime in every sense of the word.

Sadako’s Rating: 3.5 stars out of 5

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Goth (2008)

A madman is stalking the Tokyo suburbs, slaughtering young women and severing their hands before posing the corpses in places the police will easily discover them. With each new killing, teenage loner Morino (Rin Takanashi) and her outgoing pal Kamiyana (Kanata Hongo) grow increasingly fascinated by the morbid crimes. When Morino stumbles across what appears to be the killer’s journal, she and Kamiyama try to track his movement in order to get a look at the crime scenes before the police do. But the closer the two friends get to the killer, the greater the danger to their own life grows.

Surprisingly billed as one of the must-see horrors to come from Japan, this is a rather disappointing movie overall. It’s interesting mind you but there’s no real horror in this movie at all. You only get to see severed hands and that’s basically it. What makes this movie interesting is in it’s lead characters – 2 screwed up teenagers who admire the murderer for his artistic killings and try to think where the next body is going to turn up. There’s a rather good twist on the identity of the serial killer near the climax too. Kanata Hongo and Rin Takanashi make a good pairing as we delve into their twisted world of death. I suspect many could find this movie a little bit too slow and boring for their tastes considering nothing major as such happens. I found it rather intriguing and original.

Sadako’s Rating: 3 stars out of 5

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Outrage (2010)

In the Tokyo underworld, dominated by the Sanno-kai crime organization & ruled by Chairman Sekuichi, rival clans clash for dominance while temporary alliances and betrayals become indistinguishable. Kato, the underboss of the Sanno-kai group, warns regional crime boss Ikemoto about his increasingly friendly dealings with rival regional crime boss Murase. In order to appease Chairman Sekuichi’s suspicions of any type of planned coup, Ikemoto orders Otomo, a crime boss for the smaller Otomo group, to take action against the Murase group. What follows is a brutal game of retaliation as the three rival clans battle each other for control over territory.

Takeshi Kitano back to his very best. A very well-executed movie in terms of directing and acting, and it’s a decent watch for anyone who enjoys a good yakuza movie. However, there is nothing new on display. It blends in with the masses and masses of movies in its genre but that’s not a gripe or anything. Outrage is old-school Takeshi Kitano, a welcome return to his glory days, not that he ever left them behind. If you like the man, as an actor or director, then you won’t be disappointed by this movie, just as long as you are not expecting something new and different, that is.

Sadako’s Rating: 4 stars out of 5

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Future Cops (1993)

In the year 2043, the Future Cops (Andy Lau, Jacky Cheung, Simon Yam and Aaron Kwok) are hot on the tail of some villains, who want to free their boss Ken Lo Wai-Kwong. However, the bad guys (led by Ekin Cheng and Billy Chow) use a time machine and hightail it into the past to 1993. Their goal: to brainwash future judge Yu Tin-Hung, who will one day sentence their boss. They want to get him while he’s in high school, but can’t figure out who he is. The Future Cops decide to chase them into the past, but run into the same problem. If they can’t find Yu Tin-Hung, how can they help him? Best thing to do – disguise yourself as a teacher or a student so that you can get inside the school to find him. But the bad guys have exactly the same idea!

A very amusing HK parody of Street Fighter II, other video games and teen comedies. Upon first viewing you may find that your brain is short circuiting due to the bizarreness, but once you finish, you have to go back for more. Every turn in this movie leads to another sight gag, from Broom Man’s hair, big lips, edible furniture, age reducing syringes, live action Super Mario Brothers, and Dragonball’s Son Goku. It’s one of those slapstick comedies which you cannot help but laugh at it because of it’s OTT silliness. Each actor gives a great performance, well it is a comedy so there’s not much reason to flex the acting muscles in this one.

Perhaps you may have heard that this is a bad movie but believe me it’s not. If you’re in the mood for a really silly movie which will provide you with a lot of laughs and fun, Future Cops is just the tonic to make you smile. Recommended.

Sadako’s Rating: 3.5 stars out of 5

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Bayside Shakedown 2 (2003)

Wangan Police Station detectives Aoshima and Sumire find themselves as part of a team investigating several CEO murders in their district along with a possible vampire who has bitten several women and a young family of pickpocketers.

The 2nd Bayside Shakedown movie gives us more inteference by the police higher-ups with local officers trying their best to do their work but coming up against a brick wall. This time the politics is about a women officer who has risen in the ranks and is trying to give a good impression to her superiors but all the while looking down and giving meaningful tasks to the Wangan force. Of course when things go wrong and Sergeant Sumire is shot, former Wangan officer Murai takes control to bring the story to a successful climax.

The same cast is back with a much bigger budget thanks to the success of the first movie! You can tell right off the start they spent a lot of money on this. It has the same style as the first with yet another awesome title intro and music score. I thought it was well crafted and much bigger than most Hollywood movies. The pace of the movie moves pretty fast. The story wasn’t completely mind blowing but it definitely had its moments and kept me focused all the way to the end.

I loved this movie with it’s likeable cast of characters, superb cinematography and a good story. It’s got a great combination of some comedy mixed with drama. If you liked the first movie or the drama series then you’ll definitely like this one.

Sadako’s Rating: 4 stars out of 5

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Ballistic Kiss (1998)

Donnie Yen plays Cat, a hitman-for-hire who regularly seeks solace with a radio talk show host on air. Listening over the airwaves is a cop named Carrie who finds herself hopelessly enthralled by this mystery man, even while she is part of an investigation to solve the murders that he commits. Complications arise when Cat’s old partner Wesley ends up being on the same payroll as his employer. The two had been partners on the police force in New York until Wesley set up Cat, leaving him in prison for six years.Now, Cat is out for revenge but his first target is Carrie, who happens to be friends with Wesley. He kidnaps her in the hopes of luring Wesley into a trap, but being the usual sort of cold-blooded type, Wesley is just as happy kill them both. Carrie eventually realizes that Cat and the radio talk show caller are the same and a budding romance develops. After Carrie’s roommate is kidnapped by Wesley, Cat confronts his former friend.

Ballistic Kiss is over-loaded with bullets but suffers from a thin plot. However, if it did not succeed in becoming a great movie, at least it was a good try. The movie is simply stylish. It has great visuals, every frame is masterfully shot, scene transitions are smooth, and the sound track is unusually good for a HK movie.

Donnie Yen directed, starred in the movie, and choreographed the action scenes. An ambitious filmmaker, he managed to give the movie a fresh look. It’s not a generic Hong Kong action movie, but one that cuts deeper into characters and disturbing emotions. It is a fine example of the Heroic Bloodshed genre and should be viewed by anyone remotely interested in the genre or Asian thrillers in general.

Sadako’s Rating: 3 stars out of 5

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Be-Bop High School: Elegy (1986)

This is the 2nd of 6 movies that came out during the mid to late 80’s. A drama series also came out at the same time. It’s a very funny comedy drama centering on 2 rival high school gangs who like nothing else than pound each other senseless, do some outrageous posturing, have stupid hairstyles and swagger around with exaggerated gaits. Welcome to Be-Bop High School! The plot what little there is of it is the 2 gangs chasing each other with weapons and such, making the girls swoon with their manliness and try and impress the local yakuza……and basically that’s about it!! It’s just fight, fight, fight!!

I really enjoyed this movie due to it being so over the top. It’s all quite ridiculous and very amusing. I was laughing through most of this movie. Every 10 mins or so there’s a skirmish of some sorts happening. The climax is incredibly funny where the 2 gangs literally destroy a cliffside beach diner to nothing during a massive brawl. Seriously there’s nothing left of it after these guys have trashed the place apart. You just know this movie is so OTT when characters survive being electrocuted and a vehicle full of thugs fighting drives off a cliff top only to miraculously land on a platform at sea where they just carry on scrapping as if nothing has happened! Judging on this movie alone, I will have to watch the other 5 movies to see if they’re just as entertaining as this one. If you want to disengage your brain and just watch an all out 90 min brawl then this movie is the one for you. Loved it.

No trailer or clip I’m afraid.

Sadako’s Rating: 4 stars out of 5

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Suspect X (2008)

A brilliant but eccentric mathematician-cum-high school science teacher develops a crush on the fetching Hanaoka Yasuko , a saleswoman of bentos who lives next door with her daughter. Hanaoka, as it turns out, is something of a criminal. Having successfully murdered her abusive ex-husband in tandem with her daughter, she needs a foolproof alibi, and Ishigami draws on his scientific genius to help them construct one. The police are just as determined and resourceful, however, and enlist the support of their own scientist in the murder investigation, the equally brilliant and eccentric physicist Yukawa Manabu – who just happens to be an old classmate of Ishigami’s.

The spinoff movie from the popular J-drama Galileo. In this case, Yukawa Manabu aka Galileo comes up against a person who matches him in the brain department so who will crack first as the two try to outwit each other?

If you’re a fan of the Galileo TV series you may be disappointed by the lack of complicated pseudo-science in the movie’s mystery. Likewise, the chemistry between Yukawa and Detective Utsumi takes a back seat. What the movie is really about is a character drama between a single mother Hanaoka, a reclusive maths genius Ishigami, and Yukawa. The character of Ishigami is genuinely well played and intriguing. His interactions with Hanaoka and Yukawa are convincing and help to carry the movie.

As a mystery, the story was neither thrilling nor exciting, in my point of view. It was kind of too easy for me to guess what would happen next and what was awaiting in the end. The highlight of the TV drama was to shake the alibi of suspects through logical thinking and scientific approach; unfortunately the highlight seemed to be neglected in this movie.

Your enjoyment of the movie will boil down entirely to how much you’re willing to ignore Ishigami so-called “genius” plan which just doesn’t make any sense if you think about it properly. If you can switch your brain off and just enjoy the acting then the interaction between Ishigama, Yukawa and Hanaoka will keep you interested. Recommended for Galileo fans.

Sadako’s Rating: 3.5 stars out of 5

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Kunoichi: Ninja Girl (2011)

As the fierce rivalry between the Iga and Kouga ninja clans rages on, a pair of psychotic eunuch ninjas, are tasked with abducting young women to serve as “tools of pleasure”. Little do they realise that one of their latest victims is a kunoichi, a highly skilled female ninja (Rina Takeda). She is also a kunoichi on a mission of revenge who’s determined to smash the evil flesh trafficking heritage to which her own mother once fell victim.

Frankly I was disappointed with this short 65 minute movie. If you compare it with Rena’s 2 other movies High Kick Girl and Karate Girl you’ll see this movie doesn’t even come close to matching them for quality martial arts and action. I was underwhelmed by the fight choreography and I don’t think it showed Rena at her best. Most fights were brief and over in a couple of minutes. Only hardcore Rena fans should watch this otherwise it’s best to look at her other movies if you’re a new fan of hers.

Sadako’s Rating: 2 stars out of 5

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Gantz Perfect Answer (2011)

The 2nd Gantz movie turns decidedly darker and improves on the first. After a brief flashback to the first movie, we fast forward 5 months on. A new breed of shape shifting aliens appear who basically want to eliminate the black sphere Gantz for sending out warriors to hunt them down. Gantz brings back past warriors to tackle this threat and Kei’s girlfriend is in the firing line – targeted by both Gantz and the aliens. Why does Kato show up as alive even though Gantz still has him as being dead? This and other questions are about to be answered in this action packed sequel.

I thoroughly enjoyed this sequel. It blew me away. The first hour culminates is a brilliantly staged fight onboard a crowded subway train between the Gantz warriors and the aliens in which innocent human beings are caught in the crossfire and massacred. There’s also a fantastic scrap on the streets of Tokyo between Kato, Kei and a fake alien Kato. This movie does have some of the most intense and exciting set pieces I’ve ever seen in a sci-fi movie.

Everybody performs well in this movie with Kazunari Ninomiya from the J-pop band Arashi and Ken’ichi Matsuyama as the main characters leading from the front. The special effects are also pretty decent.

Overall, Gantz Perfect Answer more than surpassed the first movie for me – it had more exciting action sequences, a taut storyline with a great ending. Highly recommended for those that saw the first Gantz movie.

Sadako’s Rating: 4.5 stars out of 5

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One Piece Movie 9: Episode of Chopper Plus: Bloom In Winter, Miracle Sakura (2008)

The 9th One Piece movie is a ‘What If?’ story recounting an alternative tale of how the crew of the Sunny met Chopper. You know it’s different as Robin, Franky and the Thousand Sunny were not in the manga or anime when Chopper first appeared originally.

The 2nd movie to focus on Chopper. You might be thinking why bother watching the Drum Island Arc storyline again if you’ve seen it once before as the majority of the original storyline still remains. Some little things have been changed but really have no real impact on the story but it still makes this an interesting movie to watch. The events in Chopper’s past haven’t been altered at all but of course with the new characters that weren’t in the storyline originally now popping up it still worth checking out this movie. It’s not my favorite One Piece movie by any means and many fans have complained that the filmmakers were lazy in not giving them a new storyline instead of rehashing an old arc with some minor changes. You’re not going to miss anything by skipping this movie but if you’re a die hard One Piece fan then I think you won’t be disappointed if you watch this. I liked it.

Sadako’s Rating: 4 stars out of 5

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One Piece 3D Movie: Mugiwara Chase (2011)

In the 11th One Piece movie shot in glorious 3D, Luffy drags his crew on a chase to retrieve his strawhat which has been stolen by a mysterious bird but by doing this he leads them into an ambush by the Marines who captures both Luffy and the bird. But why has the bird stolen Luffy’s hat? Is it linked to a sick old man that Chopper took onboard the Sunny?

It took me about 5 minutes to get used to seeing One Piece in 3D and overall I really liked the finished result. I know a lot of fans are sceptical about watching this as they’re used to seeing the animation in 2D and the trailer they might have seen looks like it’s out of a videogame – the only thing I can say is give it a go. You might be pleasantly surprised? This movie is the shortest One Piece movie to date and only runs for 30 mins. There’s no big storyline obviously as there’s no time. Of course I would have liked this movie to be a lot longer but I can’t complain as it’s still a great little adventure for the whole crew.

Sadako’s Rating: 4 stars out of 5

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The Ghost Of Yotsuya (1959)

A samurai Iemon and his conniving servant Naosuke commit multiple murders to secure the affections of two sisters, Iwa and Sode. Iemon soon tires of Iwa, and given the opportunity to marry a wealthy man’s daughter, he removes the inconvenience of an existing wife by poisoning her and slashing to death the masseur he’d bribed to seduce her. The two bodies are nailed to opposite sides of a shutter and sunk in a pool. Both victims’ disfigured ghosts return to haunt the two murderers, leading them to further crimes and, ultimately, retribution.

Classic Japanese horror/ghost story from the late 50’s based on a kabuki play which has stood the test of time very well and still has the power to give anyone the chills whilst watching it. Excellent visual effects throughout and even has some great horror effects too such as showing a just-poisoned wife catching a glimpse of her hideously disfigured face in a mirror. That has to be one of most striking horror images of all time. The story takes it’s time for actual ghosts to appear but once they do they are a sight to behold. The director Nobuo Nakagawa wanted to build the mood and atmosphere of the movie by showing how low the protagonist would go before retribution comes his way. Excellent acting by all the cast. If you want to watch a brilliant adaptation of one of Japan’s well known ghost stories then this is the one to watch. Recommended.

Some clips from the movie below:

Sadako’s Rating: 4 stars out of 5

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Dynamite Warrior (2007)

After seeing his parents viciously murdered by a mysterious, tattoo-covered killer, a grieving young man named Zieng vows to avenge their tragic deaths. When Zieng learns that the murderous maniac who slew his parents also runs with a nefarious group of cattle rustlers, the righteous martial artist’s mission of vengeance takes on the larger task of stopping the group’s illegal activities and ensuring that each head of cattle is delivered back to its rightful owner.

I usually quite like Thai action/martial arts movies but this one just isn’t good enough and hasn’t anything really to grab and hold your attention. The plot I found fairly dull about a young man seeking revenge on a dark wizard that killed his parents. The acting is generally awful and too camp and the fighting scenes involve too much wire work and are repetitive. However, not all of the fights are poor and one or two sequences saved this movie from being a total disaster but on saying that I really did want this movie to finish as I was starting to get bored. There are far better Thai martial arts movies out there for serious fans. Only watch this is you have time to waste otherwise don’t bother.

Sadako’s Rating: 2 stars out of 5

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The Untold Story (1993)

When rotted human remains wash up on a beach, the police are dispatched to investigate. Their search leads them to the Eight Immortals Restaurant, with it’s local proprietor, Wong Chi Hang. But it seems Wong has ownership of the restaurant without proof, which leads one cop, above all his bumbling peers, to think there’s more to Wong than he’s willing to tell. As their investigation progresses, the cops find themselves on a missing persons case: the man who originally ran the restaurant and his entire family have just gone missing without a trace. The only man with knowledge of what happened to that family is Wong, who very well may be responsible for the disappearances of employees too. What the cops must uncover will be an unlikely horror they couldn’t anticipate, from a very dangerous man capable of doing even more evil acts, in the one thing no one had even considered…

Famed for being one of the most shocking Asian horror movies, “The Untold Story” is surprisingly not as gory as one would expect with that reputation; however, this is not saying that the movie doesn’t live to the hype, as it is definitely a shocking experience although for a very different reason.

The movie features a couple of pretty graphic and sick moments, that makes this movie stand out in its genre. It’s one of those movies that got banned in numerous countries at the time of its release and is heavily cut in others. Not that it’s the most nastiest movie around but it does have its moments that will make some people’s stomach turn.

The first half would make you think that there’s nothing grisly about this movie – in fact it’s pretty light hearted and pictures a comical view of the Macau cops but all that changes in the second half when the horrific stuff appears which includes the shocking murders of several children. “The Untold Story” is often hard to watch, but it’s definitely never boring, and while crude, the portrait of sadistic violence it makes of the crime is captivating in a way that few horror movies are. While this is definitely one of the best CAT III movies of its time, it’s not without flaws.

This movie is now a classic of Hong Kong cinema, and essential viewing for those interested in the infamous exploitation movies rated as CAT III. It’s not a movie for everyone, but if you have an interest for gritty tales of serial killers, “The Untold Story” is a must-see.

Sadako’s Rating: 3.5 stars out of 5

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