Watched 'The Chaser' blu last night.

I liked it. Reminded me of classic films... only with bolder choices by the director.

Where is this on Blu?

This film is fantastic.

I love the old school feel.

Somebody tell me about STORM WARRIORS. Is it a sequel to STORM RIDERS (1998)? Or a sequel to last year's animated STORM RIDER: CLASH OF EVILS? Will it be live-action or animated?

Thanks.

Ash Ketchum, the following review should answer your questions...and "yes" it is a live-action sequel to the 1998 film:

A snippet from the review:
Storm Warriors follows Storm Riders by over eleven years, and was actually beaten to the big screen by Dante Lam's animated follow-up Storm Rider - Clash of Evils, which seemingly took place after Storm Warriors in the official Fung Wan timeline.

And of course the full review:
http://www.lovehkfilm.com/reviews_2/storm_warriors.html

Thank you, Flixtime. I'm curious to see this only because the reviewer asserts that the directors tried to duplicate the look of the comic book. That interests me. What doesn't interest me is the fact that they went back to the same actors who played Wind and Cloud 12 years ago, Aaron Kwok and Ekin Cheng. I'm not crazy about them.

Also, I think the reviewer too quickly dismisses STORM RIDER: CLASH OF EVILS as "dense." I know what he means, but I don't think it's as big a problem as he seems to think. It's quite a masterful piece of animation and I don't understand why it's so little-known. I found my DVD of it in a Chinatown store. But as far as I know it's never played theatrically in the U.S. I don't even know if it played theatrically in Hong Kong or China. It must have, but I've just never found any reference anywhere to indicate that it did.

Finally got a chance to watch a few asian films, so here are my thoughts:

"The Chaser"

Stylish thriller with strong performances by the two male leads. A bit uneven and a tad too long, especially in the third act which could have used some trimming. Pretty good, although I had an impression of déjà vu and it's not quite of "Memories of Murder" caliber. (*** )

"Ip Man"

Great action, look and feel, effective but generic plot and mostly cardboard characters. Donnie Yen is pretty good in the title role but I always got the feeling that this was more about what Ip Man could do (fight) than who he really was. Granted, this is first and foremost a martial arts film and not a "true" biopic. I wonder why they felt necessary to hire Ip Man's son as a consultant though. I'm not sure they needed him in order to tickle the chinese nationalistic fibre... (*** 1/2 )

"Accident"

Not directed by Johnnie To (producer) but this has his footprint all over it. Dark, somewhat minimalistic crime film which fits the (original) Milkyway style perfectly. Chance, fate and karma all rolled up into a tight, moody, meditative package underscored by wonderfully designed and choreographed night scenes. Louis Koo is excellent as "Brain". I really liked this but I'm probably a tad biased since I'm a sucker for these types of films (The Mission, PTU, etc...). (**** )

STORM WARRIORS
Eventhough the first movie had a better story, I thought this one didn't drag like the first movie. This movie is non-stop action with no filler, but that's all it is - just a showcase of action scenes, nothing much more. Storm Warriors absolutely forgot about a story or dialogue. It felt like an empty Two Towers type film - a middle movie with no prequel. But it was visually amazing. This movie would certainly be a better film if it didn't have English subtitles because it would seem like an interesting movie. But the dialogue that comes out of people's mouths is retarded. I just don't get China. Do they have something against writers? Does the government banish creative writers?

"I'm an evil king and I need to know some secret martial arts moves. With these super martial arts moves I will take over the world. Har Har Har." What the fuck is wrong with China? It's the same story in every single goddamn martial arts film.

Either way, Storm Warriors is a good dvd to have playing in Best Buy to peak someone's curiousity with it's 300-type visuals. I remember seeing Storm Riders first playing as a dvd sampler at Tower Records many years ago. And it was Storm Riders that got me interested in HK action films.

FILM: 6
DVD VIDEO: 8
DVD AUDIO: 9
EXTRAS: 8

I'm hoping MULAN and BODYGUARDS & ASSASSINS will be better after I get them next week.

I totally agree. One of my favourite movies overall of the last year.

I've got the blu on the way based on youse two's recommendations.

CRAZY RACER , anyone seen this? Sounds like a really fun flick...

Review: http://twitchfilm.net/reviews/2009/0...cer-review.php

Review: http://www.lovehkfilm.com/panasia/crazy_racer.html

BODYGUARDS & ASSASSINS

Do you want to see Michael Mann's Once Upon a Time In China? Well this movie is as close as it gets to that. An unexpected good film! This is an excellently filmed movie (except for the overabundance of slo-mo emotional scenes). What makes this a good action movie is that it has a good story. Good job China! Having a good story with interesting characters is the key to transforming just an action movie into a good movie. B & A is basically an intense drama movie with tons of action during the second half. There is nothing wrong with that - movies with build up are great!
The main attraction of the film is not Donnie Yen, but Xueqi Wang. He's the main protagonist of the story and he is amazing in this.

While there is tons of action in the second half of the film, the movie has three awesome memorable fight scenes:
1. Rebel Girl bodyguard vs. assassins with explosives
2. Donnie Yen vs. Cung Le (holy shit, this guy is bad-ass), especially for the parkour Donnie and rhino Cung Le scenes - you'll know what I mean when you see this action scene.
3. Leon Lai vs tons of assassins

The movie could have been better but it's basically a well-done action drama film with a good story and intersting characters.

FILM: 8
DVD VIDEO: 8
DVD AUDIO: 9
EXTRAS: 8

I liked 'Accident' too.

Thanks for the head's up.

Great thread everyone.

I'm going to head to my local Asian DVD store and pick up some of the recommendations. I'm especially excited to see Bodyguards and Assassins. Sounds like one kick ass film!

Glad you liked it.

If anyone is interested, the great Korean action movie "A Bittersweet Life" will be on the Sundance Channel tomorrow at 1:40 AM. Dunno if they're showing the directors cut or what not. I'm still shocked that it still has never been released in region 1 in some form or another

Is Haeundae really that bad? I watched a clip of it the other day. It looks pretty entertaining...

I bought the R3 dvd of that the second it came out, and similarly, I would buy a blu-ray the second it comes out.

Fantastic flick - starts a bit slow, but man, once it gets going, it's so awesome.

The man knows how to stage action, the 20 min scene from Bittersweet Life and pretty much all the shootout scenes in The Good, the Bad and the Weird are brilliant.

Needs to work on substance though.

Thumbs up for Joon-ho Bong's "Madeo" aka Mother (2009). A mother searches the murderer who framed her handicapped son. Reminded me a lot of Bong's Memories of Murder (2003). A very interesting thriller set in a South Korean village.

HAEUNDAE

This is probably the first Korean movie I've seen since The Host. Haeundae is not that bad. The disaster scenes are all great though. The build-up is not so great though. Too much goofy acting and dummies trying to act. The only two actors that were good in this film were the scientist dude Joong-Hoon Park, his ex-wife, and their child. That was the only interesting storyline in this film. The rest of the movie was filled with Korean people trying to act.

The special effects were good enough and it was nice to see some people get killed in a disaster movie which is rare (the electrocution scenes). I loved the Chaplinesque scene of the buffoon dude fucking up the bridge. It was fucked up and funny at the same time.

Entertaining enough, but not really worth watching again.

I got the HK Edko DVD with awesome Korean DTS-ES but the English subtitles had a bunch of flubs...


FILM: 6.5
DVD VIDEO: 7.5
DVD AUDIO: 9
EXTRAS: 2

One point to note about HAEUNDAE...it looks like the various DVDs out there might contain different cuts of the film. IMDb (and I know IMDb isn't always accurate, but still) is showing a 129-minute Director's cut, a 120-minute Korean theatrical cut, and a 103-minute International cut.

I think the UK DVD is the International cut...and I believe the HK DVD might be the shorter International cut too as I've seen the runtime listed as 108-minutes. I believe the Korean DVD seems to contain the 120-minute Korean theatrical cut (though I'm referring to it as the Korean theatrical cut I don't know that for a fact). And there's a Malaysian DVD that I think is at least the 120-minute cut, though there might be a decent chance it could be the even longer 129-minute cut instead.

Again, I don't have any of the discs so I can't say for sure. But, for those considering a future purchase, the aforementioned might be something to consider...and research further.

only if someone really loved the film. A director's cut of this type of film would be the equivalent of a bad movie getting an "Extended Version". Adding or deleting scenes ain't gonna help this film! It would be nice if a Director's Cut of HAEUNDAE would pull a Kingdom of Heaven (theatrical version is bad - director's cut is masterpiece), but I doubt it.

Johnny To's Mad Detective: awesome

Some very tentative information at k2dvd.com, it looks like the Korean release for THIRST is finally coming. K2 has a tentative listing of March 15th for a Korean Blu-ray (and a special offer if you buy it along with the Blu-ray for HAEUNDAE). There is no Korean DVD listing as of yet, but it seems logical a DVD will release soon too. There are no specs as to running time aka don't know yet if it'll be the 12-minutes longer director's cut or the shorter cut released to DVD in the US/UK.