Jackie Chan

[Crenners]

Cheers Crenners, Amazon has sold out but 88Films still have stock so that's my Christmas evening film sorted.

Good stuff. I had preordered via Amazon but not sure what their issue is with stock. When they told me it would arrive in a couple of months, I cancelled and went direct.

I've had more of a read of the booklet and there's a great section on all the 8-bit Jackie computer games. It really is a fantastic labour of love.

[Magnum Valentino]

After finishing Armour of God which doesn't belong in the pantheon of top tier Jackie films because no cunt gets cunted through a window or glass cabinet or table.

I'm not dying about the shot of the woman getting punched into the diddies either.

Enjoying the extra with the two lads talking about the action scenes in a sort of Zoom picture-in-picture format. Think this is the first time I've seen DVD extras
visibly impacted by the pandemic.

[Magnum Valentino]

Watched Drunken Master again last night. Takes a while for me to settle (I must have got up and left three or four times before sitting down and finishing it, but part of that's having a toddler I suppose) but I really came to appreciate the odd "taking turns to strike" style of choreography it showcases and I love how there's only really three or four sound effects for the massive variety of moves, and that one of those is for contactless posing.

Proper guffaw from me when it ends literally one shot after the baddie is bested in combat on a freeze frame. Also Drunken boxing (and Lei from Tekken 2 by proxy) is cool as fuck. Went with the deliberately un-fixed translation subtitles on the Eureka Blu-ray which features excellent fractured English like "don't you know who I'm?" and I wish this was a feature on more Kung Fu discs.

I'm watching City Hunter again now (going over all my old discs before an 88 Films spree next month I reckon) and it's much harder to get on with. It's played like a live action anime but so far it's very leery and as I think I mentioned upthread there's definitely a scene where a nerd is cheered by a crowd of amazed onlookers after passionately declaring his intention to rape someone, and I don't mean figuratively.

Also after not seeing a single window in 100 mins of Drunken Master I'm hopeful this one has a few for people to be thrown through, and if that means being thrown into the ocean like that one time in Tomb of Dracula, all the better.

[Famous Mortimer]

Proper guffaw from me when it ends literally one shot after the baddie is bested in combat on a freeze frame.

A lot of the Godfrey Ho movies do that too, they're clearly aware no-one could possibly care about the fate of the characters so just go "see ya".

[Magnum Valentino]

Quentin Tarantino does it in Death Proof as well come to think of it.

[Rodan]

I just watched the 88 re-release of Snake and Crane Arts of Shaolin and I enjoyed it a lot, I think it's a little slept on (by me, as well).

It's Jackie just moments before he truly developed/had licence to express his 'Jackie' persona but he's at his trad kung fu absolute peak here. There are some humorous touches but he's still quite a long way from Drunken Master or Snake in the Eagle's Shadow. His character is more of a confident dickhead who rarely shows any vulnerability.

Nevertheless, I wish he'd done more films in this vein where his astounding physicality is focused on pure combat scenes. There are possibly higher highs in DM and Young Master but for sustained pure trad kung fu action, I think this is his best. Aside from Jackie, you've also got a large, diverse cast of different players and styles. Nora Miao is reliably great twirling her metal bar, as is the beggar chief with his pointy bendy stick and the fella holding the metal balls. The main villain is also superb, as are the spear trio. It's like a demo of lots of unusual and cool styles, weapons and character types. How could I forget the swearing simpleton who fights with a smoking pipe?!

While the murder mystery story and different factions can get a bit convoluted, it nicely sets up loads of different encounters and the surprises and subterfuge are fun, if nothing especially clever. If you skipped the older Jackie stuff, I'd definitely recommend checking this one out. The best fight sequences are up there with top tier Shaw Bros.