I’ve thought for a long time that “action” actresses in particular have had a very raw deal when it comes to recognition of their efforts. There are exceptions – Sigourney Weaver in ‘Alien/s/3’ – but the vast majority never get a mention. So, in answer to the millions of miles of paper used to repeat the same details over and over again about Segal, Van Damme, Schwarzenegger, etc, here is a modest tribute to the fighting fairer sex.
The most obvious, and best, source of films featuring lethal ladies is the Far East where stars such as Yukari Oshima, Michelle & Cynthia Khan, Moon Lee and Michiko Nishiwaki all prove themselves capable of throwing a good punch. However, these are as much martial artistes who can act as the other way round, so let’s concentrate on their American counterparts, on actresses who’ve demonstrated varying levels of skill in combat…
Where else to start but with ‘California Dolls’? This is full of first class female wrestling, as Vicki Frederick and Laurene Landon fight their way from the bottom of the bill to become champions, though to earn some desperately needed money they have to take part in a mud wrestling bout, which becomes a topless match. Considering that Frederick and Landon are first and foremost actresses, the action looks pretty authentic.
This may be the most obvious and best known example, but the genre is much older – it can be considered to have begun with Marlene Dietrich, and her classic brawl with Una Merkel in ‘Destiny’. This is one of, if not the first, real female fight to appear in a major film, and is still thought to be one of the best.
One area that can virtually be relied upon to contain a good catfight is the women-in-prison film – ‘Chained Heat’, ‘The Naked Cage’, ‘Delinquent College Girls’, etc, etc. In ‘Hellhole’, for example, there’s quite a brutal fight between the statuesque Edy Williams (recently seen brawling in ‘Bad Girls From Mars’) and Ann-Elizabeth Chatterton. Now, as it takes place in a room adjoining the showers, you won’t be surprised to hear that Edy is topless, and Ann-Elizabeth starts in bra and pants, though the former goes about two seconds into the bout. Rather than a scratch-andbite catfight, both actresses swing punches like men – one right cross from Williams sends Chatterton backwards over a table – and the pair briefly team up to deal with a hefty nurse who tries to stop the fight.
Almost as entertaining to watch, though for sheer awfulness, are the more badly staged fights, Take ‘The Wrecking Crew’, one of the Matt Helm spoof series, which had a fight between the late Sharon Tate and Nancy Kwan. It is very obvious that the kicks and punches miss by miles, as are the points where the stuntwoman took over for Tate (though Kwan does appear to do her own action). Just as bad/good for different reasons is the battle in the ‘Men from UNCLE’ film ‘The Spy in the Green Hat’, featuring the lovely Janet Leigh against Letitia Roman, and mostly taking place in a large office on top of a huge round glass table. It starts as a knife fight, though the knives are lost, without actually being used, in the first five seconds. After some rolling around the table top, we see the two girls going round on hands and knees, glaring at each other, while the camera alternately goes down Roman’s (impressive) cleavage and lingers on Leigh’s long legs (shown to full advantage by her hiked up skirt). They finally get to their feet and clasp hands in a show of strength before one breaks the hold and knocks the other out with a right uppercut.
I won’t spoil the film by revealing who wins…
There are a couple of interesting gaps in the field. While Sybil Danning may be the Queen of Action Films, I can’t remember having seen her in a cat-fight. And British films are conspicuous by their absence, though I understand that, a few years ago, there was a comedy, possibly featuring Mike & Bernie Winters (a “comedy” in it’s loosest definition, obviously) – with a lovely leading lady of the time, Anne Aubrey. I’m told there was a “sensational” catfight in a laundry, with numerous other battles going on in the background. Everyone got soaked and a lot of clothing was shed, but can anyone come up with any details? Like the title?
Space is tight, and I haven’t even covered the fighting females of TV, including Joan Collins, Heather Thomas, Heather Locklear and Emma Samms maybe next time! But here’s ten more films you may care to keep a (black) eye open for:
Deathstalker – Introduces the new pub sport of Gratuitous Mud Wrestling. The same footage was reused, equally gratuitously, in Deathstalker 2 & 3.
Django – Two saloon girls fight in the ‘street’ (above), but since this is no more than the muddy bit between two rows of buildings, it all gets VERY messy.
Eye of the Cat – An “oldie but goodie”. Gayle Hunnicutt and Jennifer Leak. As this is the swinging sixties, it’s mini-skirt time. Oh, and colour co-ordinated underwear was in vogue.
Fresno – This American series was a parody of ‘Dallas’/’Dynasty’ and so naturally had to include a parody of the Linda Evans/Joan Collins catfights. Teri Garr, Valerie Mahaffey and some platefuls of baked beans…
The Man Behind the Gun – not to be confused with ‘The Man Behind the Sun’, though that has a cat-fight too (in which the cat loses). This is a 1952 Western pitting Patrice Wymore (better known for musicals) against Lina Romay. Pan, chair and crockery-fu.
Mugsy’s Girls – A mud wrestling contest provides the opportunity for a series of short fights. Worth noting, for the fact that one of the wrestlers is singer Laura Branigan.
The Night They Took Miss Beautiful – Victoria Principal versus Sheree North, on a beach. Lots of decent moves, and a surprising lack of standins given the actresses have a combined age of 76!
Total Recall – If nothing else, probably the biggest budget catfight ever, between Sharon Stone and Rachael Ticotin.
The Under Achievers – The fabulous Barbara Carrera tangles with Susan Tyrrell in one of the best (and longest) American cat-fights. The actresses play school officials and the battle goes through school corridors, classrooms, walls and windows, then carries on outside. Played for laughs, but still very rough.
Jim McLennan begged me for months to write something for TC, and being a kind-hearted soul, I finally agreed to help out by doing the fanzine reviews, thereby making him the object of hatred for every ‘zine editor in the world. By the way, anyone interested in financing a film I have planned can get in touch with me via Jim at the editorial address. Basic plot involves lingerie models crashing in the jungle and being captured by lesbian Nazis…
Number four of Fantasynopsis sees an increase in size from **Jim??? [er, um, more than it was last time – Ed] and now boasts full colour front and back covers. This issue sees an interview with Dario Argento (yawn!) but makes up for this with a great interview with David McGillviray (who wrote some of Pete Walker’s best films), it’s usual mix of reviews and a colour poster of the ‘House of Whipcord’ video sleeve. Dark Star, now in it’s 5th year, caters for the SF fan – issue 8 covers the cult that’s built up round the ‘Princess Bride’, the making of ‘Hardware’, and also includes a three page peek at what’s coming soon in the world of fantasy films. With a glossy two-colour cover, editor Rob Dyer has produced a good read.
Andrew Featherstone, editor of Blood and Black Lace, has worried me ever since I saw him proudly tell the viewers of a C4 documentary that repeated viewing of Fulci’s ‘The New York Ripper’, hadn’t affected him at all. No surprise – you can kick a rock for ever and a day, but it won’t bleed… The ‘zine has had a facelift since No.1 and includes interviews with Dario Argento (Aaargh!) and Mariano ‘Caruncula’ Biano, and reviews ranging from ‘La Setta’ to ‘Spider Labyrinth’. Very nicely laid out, but for my money incredibly overpriced; word reaches me that Andrew now lives in America, so don’t hold your breath for the next issue. A fanzine packed with short story fiction and nothing else isn’t my cup of tea but Dementia 13 never fails to impress. Now up to issue 7 [in the millennia between giving Lino the ‘zines and getting this article, issue 8 appeared – Pam is broadening the ‘zine to include some non-fiction pieces – Ed], every issue has at least one or two good stories. Read ‘Rim’, and you’ll nail the toilet lid shut and start crapping into a bucket. It’s thick to boot, so very good value for money.
The first issue of Mentally Penetrated by an Acid Enema claws it’s way out of the mire, and while not up to the production standards of Samhain (so??), it’s full on interesting ‘bits’, from the start of a regular blaxsploitation review section and a real life murder page through to a review of ‘Munster, Go Home’. Great fun, though they could lose the cartoon strips. Max Della Mora’s excellent Gorezilla is always superb value for money with in-depth features and reviews. In past issues, Max has covered Italian horror comics, being a zabbadoing (I don’t know!) and anime – oh, and the occasional Godzilla mention. If you can find the first issue, it had a great interview with Joe D’Amato (or failing that buy the next Cold Sweat, which has an even better interview) [Oi! Any more of that and you’re history!].
Midnight in Hell is mostly made up of short stories, with the occasional interview. No.7 talks with Robert Rankin and also has an article by one Jim McLennan on, surprise, surprise, anime! [Now, that’s the sort of plug I can handle…] Overall, the stories are very entertaining, and I always enjoy seeing a fanzine with a cover that makes it embarrassing to read on the bus! Ah-so, Orient Express has some really nice articles but boasts some of the worst pictures ever drawn, I mean, have you seen the front cover? Pictures aside, issue two has articles on Jackie Chan, Godzilla and the Five Star Stories anime series, plus a letters page which contains a letter by one Jim McLennan [I think my shoes are quite clean enough now, Lino… – Ed]. Strange Adventures 34 (that’s 34!) really is a great read. Along with the usual reviews, it has a well-drawn comic strip (I hope the Orient Express crew are paying attention!) and a profile of Luc Besson. Tony Lee is to be commended for producing a great fanzine at a ridiculously cheap price. Buy one or else!
Horrorshow doesn’t pretend it wants to be the next Shock Express (bozo!), it’s just a six-page photocopied work of love, with some great ad mats, a book review and a review of ‘Confessions of a Pop Performer’. Nice and simple – just like me! I’ve only just discovered Mkultra, and I wish I’d caught up with it from issue one. Intelligently written, interesting, occasionally rambling in some of it’s articles, Mkultra has a very good future for itself. But don’t listen to me, order one and find out for yourself. Volume two, issue one has a four-page pulling apart of Romero’s “Dead” trilogy and an interview with Dario Argento (oh well, all for one…). Killer Kung-Fu Enema Nurses on Crack contains articles on the editor’s hassles (to put it mildly) with New Zealand Customs, and also has features about censorship and the all-important Killer Kung-Fu guide. Frightening reading, I thought the Kiwis were pretty laid back, but the horrible truth is that censorship reaches even ‘Bad Taste’ land. What the bloody hell Jim gave me Reefer Madness for, I’ll never know. 1,001 uses for a ‘pipe’, a double page spread consisting of badly drawn pictures of pipes, repros of comic strips to do with the evil weed, etc, etc – and they’re now up to issue six!! The whole idea makes me shudder…
Now, I think (along with 9/10 of the British male population, including Jim McLennan) that Traci Lords is pretty damned attractive. Steve Rag, editor, creator and writer of Nora K, thinks about nothing else, or so you would imagine by reading his ‘zine. Now up to his sixth issue, Steve takes us by the hand (not the sticky one) and leads us through the streets of Traci… (blimey, that Ralph McTell is good, isn’t he?) Everything you always wanted to know about Traci and more is explored in NK, including reviews of her films old and new. Even if you only buy it for the pictures, you have a bargain on your hands. However, I was very disappointed by the fact that it had no Dario Argento interview and, strangely, no letter from Jim McLennan [that’s your last warning, mate! – Ed]
The last word in fanzines, definitely the best fanzine in the whole world Creeping Unknown goes from strength to strength. It’s just received an Oscar for Best Fanzine and is being made into a mini-series by CBS in the States. The cherries on the top of the cake that is Creeping Unknown are the great, witty articles written by Lino – boy, can he write. I urge you all to steal money and buy a copy of Creeping Unknown…
…That’s it, game over! I wouldn’t have minded if there’d actually been an issue of CU to review!! Lucky I stopped him before he mentioned Film Extremes 2 that was at the Scala on May 31st] Apologies to those Lino hasn’t mentioned (maybe they should be grateful!): Invasion of the Sad, Man-Eating Mushrooms, Scareaphanalia and especially Magazines of the Movies, (a very impressive “Factsheet Five” type publication dealing with all manner of cinema-zines) are all worth getting. And there’s just space (if there isn’t, I’ll hack some chunks from Lino’s bit) to mention Mike Landers, who can get a whole lot of ‘Akira’ stuff, from T-shirts to cels, and the Film Extremes Video Collection, authorised dealers of some impressive Hong Kong films. SAE to both for details.
Blood and Black Lace (£3) Box 1689, Bishop’s Stortford, Herts, CM23 5BW.
Dark Star (£1.50) 64 Arthur Street,Gravesend, Kent, DA11 0PR.
It may be 1992, but as yet there seems little sign that Customs and Excise have slackened in any way from their vital job of maintaining our high moral standards – obviously far more important than stopping the tons of drugs imported every year. If you are sent anything larger than a packet of cigarettes from abroad, there’s a decent chance these brave guardians of our morality will have examined it. Now, TC naturally does not condone anyone breaching the law, even accidentally, and we’re sure you’d want to do everything in your power to help Customs and Excise. So here’s some tips everyone should follow to reduce the risk of importing anything illegal.
Basically, if you’re doubtful, do everything in your power to attract Customs’ attention to your package so they, with their superior wisdom, can decide what to do. Be careful not to disguise the nature of the contents. Anyone looking for video tapes will be expecting packages of a certain size and density and if, like me, you’re a terrible butterfingers, by the time you’ve securely packed a tape in newspaper and Sellotape, it’s possible to end up with a package that looks nothing more like a squashed Toblerone than a video-cassette, and which might slip past Customs.
On the other hand, Customs officials are basically like you and I, so it’s not unreasonable to assume some of them may well be interested in, say, comic art. Now, you don’t want anyone who’s been corrupted by filth like “Hellblazer” to examine a package of comics, as they may prove capable of putting them into their correct context and might not even consider them obscene. This would never do, so be sure not to label the contents of your packages in any way likely to attract the interest of a fellow-fan.
You can buy, on the semi-open market, aerosol cans of spray which make ordinary envelopes go transparent. Since Customs probably use these, be sure not to send goods in padded bags or wrapped inside other things, as this could make things more difficult for them.
When ordering items from abroad, remember to use your own name. If you have just moved house, there’ll probably be lots of mail for the previous occupant lying around and their name can easily slip into your subsconscious, only to emerge when you’re filling in an order form. If this did happen, and the package was seized, when Customs turn up on your doorstep, you might, in all innocence, utterly deny all knowledge, and express shock and amazement at the old occupant being involved in whatever-it-is.
An even worse mistake would be to put in the wrong address, especially if you then accidentally went to the Post Office and filled in a request to have your mail forwarded from this wrong address. The potential problems here are too horrible to contemplate: should Customs alert the police, they’d go round to the wrong address! Imagine the embarrassment you’d feel when you see your neighbours getting raided…
It might be tempting to get things sent to your work address as this helps reduce the chance of some bastard nicking the goods in transit (few thieves will have much interest in “holiday brochures”, “computer manuals” or “stationery catalogues”). However, printed matter from abroad arriving at the offices of a multi-national company is not likely to be noticed by Customs, so it’s really much safer to only use your home address.
Ideally, you should very rarely receive packages from abroad. Customs officers are only human, and if friends and contacts overseas frequently send you packets of entirely legitimate material, the inspecting officers will eventually get bored with reading Swedish TV magazines, Dutch sportswear catalogues and Japanese video-recorder instruction manuals and pass your mail over with barely a glance, which might mean that some impoundable material (ordered in complete innocence, of course) would get through.
While these suggestions will unfortunately not make certain that Customs are able to preserve the sanctity of the British Isles, it should allow them to concentrate their energies on the crucial task of trying to keep Britain out of the 20th century, and the 20th century out of Britain…
In place of the usual random ramblings (mine) and edited highlights (yours), here’s something rather more coherent, referring back to the Mail Order Brides piece in TC10:
Dick Klemensen, Des Moines, USA – “I found it especially enlightening as I married an Asian lady over two years ago. I thought you might find my viewpoints interesting – you are welcome to publish them, or just read them as how one guy managed to luck out…
“If you’ve followed my rather personal editorials in ‘Little Shoppe of Horrors’, you will know I was married to a rather good-looking and well built redhead named Karla for some 15 years, when our marriage fell apart in 1987. I moved to a new town, and was living in a little apartment while I trying to sell my home in Waterloo, Iowa. This was one damned miserable period – one son trying to finish high school while living with his grandparents, the other getting over a divorce of his own (from a 3 month marriage). So it took some time before I got back into the dating area, and a damned strange feeling it was after 15 years to be going through the dating ritual shit again.
“But at 41, I found more available women than at any time in my life!! Maybe when women get older, they get different ideals of what they want in a man. But after joining a high class health club, I was going out 2-3 times a week (with different women) and was always totally broke. Dating is expensive. But I really wasn’t finding anyone I could connect with. I was even finding myself doing something I would never have imagined – turning down sex to avoid getting caught up with women with REAL family entanglements (as opposed to my teen years when just the THOUGHT of sex would split my pants out…). I was ready to have a relationship – so why weren’t the women I was seeing making me feel like I could settle down with them?
“I saw an ad in the back of Premiere, the movie magazine, for an oriental women dating service, or something like that. Well, I’d always found orientals unbelievably cute and sexy, and I sent away for the free packet. Some 16 pages of cute Filipinas and other Asian girls. Hmmm. But it would cost $125 for even the smallest ads and a 3 issue subscription. I let it slide for two more months, and then sent off a check, more out of curiosity than anything else.
“To be honest, I was more than a bit shy about the whole thing. Aren’t the only men who send away for these just too godawful ugly to get girls on their own? Well, I also found there was a second type – someone who had been burned so badly by a first marriage that they wanted someone to whom marriage really meant something.
“I had more women than I could handle right here in the old U.S.A. (for the first time in my life. What an ego boost…), but I had a need for something concrete. And boy, did I get a response from the ads. Hundreds of letters, most of them from the Phillipines or from Filipinas working in Hong Kong. I knew what Mick Jagger must have felt like with the women falling all over him… Many of the letters so sweet, the girls even sweeter. An occasional porno shot. Even some young film actress looking for a way to get to Hollywood (she said she would make it “worth my while”. Lucky I didn’t have a heart attack right then and there). But the ones I found the most interesting were the educated ones. There is no way I could fall for someone unless I knew something about them, and many people in the Phillipines pride themselves on the fact that they get their children educated in Universities, even if it means being a contract labourer for several years in the oil fields of Saudi Arabia, or elsewhere. That described the life that Esperanza (Espie for short) had had.
“It was a real bitch narrowing down who I wanted to write to, but her letters stood out from the rest. She wrote sweetly but honestly: she had a little daughter, while she would like to have a relationship, if I wouldn’t also accept her daughter, I could just “Kiss off”. Well, I liked the honesty and openness.
“To make all this a bit shorter, we fell in love, wrote enough letters to publish as an encyclopedia, and married in Hong Kong in 1989. In May, she will have been in the USA for two years and becomes a U.S. citizen. Espie has a college degree in accounting, and is attending a University in the U.S. while working full time. Suzie Wong she ain’t, but I didn’t pay 1800 pounds for a stupid introduction! It worked for me, I can’t say it would for everyone. To be honest, there are a lot more women at home and it would have been cheaper to marry any one of the other women I met. But who can say where one’s heart will lead them. I’m pretty happy”.
Black Cat (Steven Shin) – Hollywood aren’t the only one remaking ‘Nikita’, as this enjoyable but almost pointless Hong Kong film shows. It’s pointless, because Besson’s original was the nearest any Western director has come to reproducing the style and pace of the best Eastern action. Shin’s version tweaks the story in several ways – the heroine is now an innocent waitress, sent down after shooting a man in self-defence (and, admittedly, blowing away a cop as a nervous after-reaction), and her final hit is on the man she loves, but these have little impact on the feel of the film. One interesting idea is using an implanted chip to control the heroine but, save for one beautiful scene on an aircraft, it’s also sadly wasted. However, the set-pieces are easily up to the level of the original and had it not all been done already, it would have been heartily recommended. C+
Body Parts (Eric Red) – I’d have expected better from the writer of ‘The Hitcher’ and ‘Near Dark’ than a rehash of those old “psycho limb” movies, but in essence, that’s what this film is. Jeff Fahey loses his arm in a road accident and gets the limb of an executed murderer. Fill in the blanks yourself for most of the next 70 minutes, as the film skirts the more interesting questions such as, “If he were to jerk off, would it feel like someone else was doing it?”, in favour of predictable menacing-the-family sequences, as the people who got other bits from the criminal meet neo-grisly deaths. Only in the last quarter does the film show much imagination, a pity, as the ideas on view there aren’t bad – if you can stay awake that long. D-
Burden of Dreams (Les Blank) – This documentary chronicles the making of Herzog’s “Fitzcarraldo”, and ends up being more fascinating than the movie it portrays, though with the same central theme: grand folly. Like a Shakespearean tragedy, heavenly ambition becomes hellish nightmare, as Herzog is forced from his first location at gunpoint by local Indians, lead actors Jason Robards and Mick Jagger drop out and the vital rainy season is missed. Then things really start to go wrong. See Klaus Kinski, smiling on arrival, metamorphose into a scowling wreck, muttering about the “fuckin’ stinking jungle”. See Herzog spend four years trying to make a film. See a bulldozer taken on the Amazonian jungle, and lose – the jungle didn’t need spare parts flown in from Miami – all depicted with unflinching detail. A nightmare. B+
Death Leaves No Footprints in the Snow & other films (Justino Gaveleto) Amateur films are usually at their best when they attempt things no Hollywood director would, and this batch of shorts mostly appeal in direct relation to their incoherence. Wisely using film stock rather than video, Justino produces some striking, surreal, and weird images, especially when (as in ‘Death…’) he’s unencumbered by plot. Then there’s ‘Gratuitous Violence & Garlic’, which tries to tell a vampire story, but is let down by seriously bad acting, and actively annoying technical shoddiness. These represent the two extremes – most are in the middle, dumping raw imagination onto the screen without much intervention. While the ideas are definitely there, a willingness to edit out failures would be welcome. Justino would make a fine director of photography, but definitely needs to keep an eye on any storyline. I’ll still be interested to see his next project – a ‘heroic bloodshed’ shoot-out. Contact Just, 77 Crystal Palace Park Road, London, SE26 6HT. B- to E-
The Golden Years (four directors!) – An American TV series repackaged here as one massive four-hour tape. Which is the main problem. It’s unwatchable in one chunk, and barely palatable in a couple – I took three sessions over nine days. Based on a Stephen King story, it’s about a janitor at a research establishment who gets blasted by radiation and starts to grow younger, provoking interest, unsurprisingly, from “agencies”. He’s forced to go on the run with his wife, helped by a renegade agent. The first two hours are nearly redundant (Steve missed them but still sussed the plot) and it could, and should, have been cut down to feature length. Apart from that, it actually has decent performances from Felicity Huffman, R.D.Call and Frances Sternhagen plus some humour, weirdness and things-mankind-was-not-meant-to-know, though the ending is bizarre. C-
J’Embrasse Pas (André Téchiné) – Not many French actresses get two films to open in London in one week, but Emmanuelle Beart had “La Belle Noiseuse” (four hours long, bearable only to serious film theorists – or those who like Ms. Beart with her kit off) and this one which, like ‘Noce Blanche’, had a totally misleading advertising campaign. The title does not apply to her but the rent boy she befriends – in the first 80 minutes of the film, EB is on screen for about two of them. More truthfully, it’s about a bloke who comes to the city; gets a job; sleeps with his landlady; loses both and is forced into prostitution to survive; then finds the life not that awful. His attempt at a relationship with EB doesn’t go too well – her pimp beats him up and rapes him. There’s a moral in there somewhere (“Emmanuelle really screws you up”?), but I’m not sure I like it. Not badly-made, and utterly cheerless, I’m docking it marks for being a con! D-
The Last Boy Scout (Tony Scott) – While ‘Die Hard 2’ plunged virtually straight into mayhem, this film starts off by trying to set up characters and a complicated scenario involving corruption, gambling and politics. The point of this is not clear. It’s a Bruce Willis film f’heavens sake, we know precisely what’s going to happen – Bruce will end up in his vest, bloody but unbowed, smiling his famous “shit-eating” grin. Nothing should get in the way – not family problems, or brushes with the law. Catch some z’s, as until the Bad Guys (redneck boss, effeminate hitman) turn up this could almost be “Kramer vs. Kramer” (except that didn’t have gratuitous exotic dancing). The sound of nose entering brain will alert you to phase B: which piles mayhem upon mayhem and wins the award for Best Offensive Use of a Stuffed Toy before fading to the obligatory moral, which seems to be “The family that slays together, stays together”, judging from the chortles accompanying the final death. Probably reprehensible, but did you expect anything else? C+
The People Under the Stairs (Wes Craven) – In most Craven movies, the bad guys are more colourful than the good ones. Here, the hero is a kid burglar, who gets a lot more than he expected when he breaks into a house, best described as an unofficial orphanage, run by a man and woman who seem to be inspired equally by ‘Parents’ and the Brothers Grimm. Our hero, who only went into crime to stop his poor, sick mother from being evicted (ha! tell that to the people of LA…), has to rescue the poor, abused daughter. Ignore the clumsy social comment and it holds together, generating a fine head of steam despite the good-guys-by-numbers approach, though the titular creatures are frankly a disappointment. B
Showdown in Little Tokyo (Mark Lester) – “The proportion of Americans who do not consider Japan a dependable partner rose to 42 pct over the past year, a survey commissioned by Japan’s foreign ministry shows. Major reasons given were fierce economic competition, Japan’s attack in 1941 on Pearl Harbour, and the selfishness of Japanese people”. This news item goes some way to explaining why the villains in ‘Showdown’ are Japanese, but xenophobia aside, it’s not a bad film, adding a few twists to the ‘mismatched cop’ cliche – Dolph Lundgren is the pure American hero, obsessed with Japanese culture; Brandon Lee is his half-Eastern partner who couldn’t give a damn about it. They take on the “slopeheads”, rescue a damsel in distress (mostly as an excuse for a very bad pun), learn to respect each other, and make comment’s about Dolph’s penis. At the risk of repeating myself, “Probably reprehensible, but did you expect anything else?” C+
Anime
3×3 Eyes OAV 1 & 2 – Only in Japan – for the moment… Yuzo Takada’s manga series, translated and released in English by Studio Proteus, has also made it to the video screen, with the production in Japan of a series of OAVs (Original Animation Videos). Pai, the last member of the Triclops. a race of immortals, has journeyed from Tibet to Tokyo to find Yakumo, whose father had promised he’d help her become human. Unfortunately, Yakumo is killed, only to be resurrected by Pai, who “inhales” his soul, turning him immortal, albeit with a mark on his forehead that spells “zombie”. This links his fate to Pai’s – she dies, he dies; she becomes human, so does he – and this vested interest provokes him into aiding her search for the Statue of Humanity, which will fulfill her wish.
In the first OAV, they travel to Hong Kong and meet Ling Ling, a sceptical psychic investigator, who soon learns to be slightly less dogmatic! At 25 minutes long, it works well, putting the supernatural elements in an effective modern setting, which increases the plausibility, while the animation is very sharp. But I had to wonder whether the story held any long term interest, as it seemed easy to predict the plot for the rest of the series.
Fortunately, part 2 confounded the predictions, though it returns to a favourite anime cliche, the Demon High School – Japanese monsters must be the most learned in the world, judging by the time they spend plaguing educational establishments! So with a nod to ‘Urutsoji Doji’, and perhaps one to ‘Mr Vampire’ too, the OAV splatters it’s way towards an impressive climax. There’s now two more in the series, and hopefully the imagination shown in them will be on the same level. B-
Fist of the North Star – Island World, 12.99. Island World deserve credit for spotting anime’s potential. Spurred on by the success of ‘Akira’, they’re promoting the genre in a big way, and have planned a whole series of releases, of which. ‘Fist’ is the first – unfortunately, it’s not brilliant, with animation no better than competent Saturday morning TV, and a plot reminiscent of bad kung fu fodder. I can see why they chose it to follow up ‘Akira’: “Fist”, with it’s post-holocaust, urban decay setting and gleeful violence, might have sounded like Katsuhiro Otomo’s masterwork. But anyone expecting ‘Akira 2’ will be disappointed.
Ken, the hero, has his girlfriend kidnapped, and sets off to rescue her. Luckily, he’s the Fist of the North Star – ten seconds or so after he hits someone, they explode – so before you can say “..and you must pay!”, he’s spraying around the internal fluids of anyone who gets in his way. Which is the major appeal; ‘Fist’ is undoubtedly the bloodiest animation ever to get a UK release, even with the (imposed?) digital blurring. If only they’d put more effort into the animation or story, and less into finding a striking range of ways to kill Ken’s foes!
So I can’t really recommend ‘Fist’. It (just) succeeds on a one-off viewing but anyone interested in Japanese animation should hold fire, as there’s better anime coming. AnimEigo are planning to release the excellent ‘Bubblegum Crisis’, and Island World have lined up ‘Dominion’ for July and ‘Project A-ko’ next, with ‘3×3 Eyes’ and ‘Legend of the Overfiend’ (BBFC permitting!) planned for later in ’92. ‘Fist’ seems to have sold quite well, but how much was follow through sales from ‘Akira’? However, hopefully interest in anime has been established – either that, or it’s back to scouring the children’s section for mutilated anime, a frightening prospect for films like ‘Nausicaa’, which lost 26 minutes in becoming ‘Warriors of the Wind’. That’s more than the BBFC cut from ‘Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2’… D-
Project A-ko (US Manga Corp, $39.95). America, spurred on by a fandom numbering in the tens of thousands, is now a sufficiently large market to allow the release of a wide range of anime. And for sheer entertainment, ‘Project A-ko’ is among the best. The title is a homage to Jackie Chan, and they have a similar spirit humour, mayhem and sailor suits, though ‘Project A-ko’ has these on schoolgirls, rather than coastguards! The story is centred around two girls, A-ko and B-ko. They were at kindergarten together, where B-ko challenged A-ko to a battle, but it never took place as A-ko had to move away. Now, the pair have met up at high school and are squaring off for the long-postponed duel, once again over the friendship of a third girl, C-ko.
Now this may sound terribly twee, like a story in ‘Bunty’, but things aren’t quite what they seem. C‑ko’s a princess, abandoned when she was a baby; her family is now on the way to reclaim her and they’re more than willing to total Tokyo or anyone who interferes, including A-ko & B-ko. Fortunately A-ko & B-ko are no average citizens either – A-ko is capable of leaping through tall buildings with a single bound (right at the end, we glimpse her parents, and heredity may be blamed!) while B-ko can design and build a robot from scratch in an evening, and wields an interesting range of weaponry. When these two clash, the results would keep several construction companies in work for months, so when they realise C-ko’s family want to take her away, it’s major urban renewal time!
The animation is smooth and fluid, the humour comes across well, it’s got a neat soundtrack and the story develops beautifully from near-normality towards wild SF. The pace occasionally slackens too far in the first half and some scenes might provoke sniggers from a Western viewpoint, but leave your brain at the door, and you should have a thoroughly enjoyable 80 minutes. US Manga Corp have done an excellent job of presenting the tape. It’s letterboxed, and subtitled, using the black space below the picture, which makes the text highly legible. $40 may seem expensive (it should be less when Island World release it here in August, albeit dubbed), but as it’s just about an all-round winner, it’s hard to complain. A-.
