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moller posted:In addition to the answers offered by others, I'd also point to the Hong Kong handover that took place in 1997. Whatever the actual political effects were, an entire generation of veteran directors and actors bailed on HK for Hollywood which gave us The Matrix, Hard Target, Double Team, Shanghai Noon, Sammo's TV show, etc. Hope you're not implying those movies aren't awesome...
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May 6, 2014 10:20
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Daryl Surat posted:Johnnie To's another guy worth checking out, but his movies are so numerous and vary so much that you'd be hard pressed to narrow down a set style to him. As far as some of his great gangster films, Running Out of Time and The Mission (don't laugh just because it starts with people playing DDR!) are must-see. People are really split on Fulltime Killer since it's very "genre aware" on account that the leading lady has seen all the classic action movies that English-speaking nerds who'd track down such a movie would go see, and so she'll be first in line to say "hey, this reminds me a lot of that Luc Besson movie, Leon" or whatever. PTU (Police Tactical Unit), Election (does not involve running for Student Council), and Drug War are more contemporary yakuza pieces by him which are far more serious. You'd never think this same dude would also be the guy who directed Heroic Trio and helped give Stephen Chow his big break. The Mission is fantastic, it's a shame it's impossible to find on DVD and the DVD that does exist is non-anamorphic. Exiled is also great and seems like the spiritual sequel to The Mission. Also I haven't seen many Donnie Yen films pre-SPL but the one I have seen is Iron Monkey from 1993 and I thought that was wonderful. Flash Point is ok but it's really only the last 20 or so minutes with any action and up till then is fairly boring run-of-the-mill crime stuff. The end fight is really good though.
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May 7, 2014 06:00
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moller posted:I recall rather liking it. It's a Tsui Hark helmed wuxia of the same vintage as A Chinese Ghost Story. One thing that stood out to me were lots of special effects via painting on the frame, which I tend to find charming - so lots of laser beams and cartoon energy bats. It also has a man using his eyebrows as handcuffs and a wise giant chained to a rock by a hellmouth. Honestly it does get a bad rap but I agree, I think Knock Off is brilliant. I haven't seen anything like the creativity and inventiveness of the action sequences in any other western movie. The weird wheelbarrow race, the battle at a fruit storage warehouse, and especially the fight on top of a moving truck with some kind of bamboo scaffold caught on the front, are delightful to watch. The plot on paper sounds absolutely horrendous but it does seem to work in a silly kind of way. All (six) of Van Damme's movies with HK directors are pretty good actually. Hard Target is the best of course but Knock Off is very entertaining.
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May 8, 2014 07:32
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Michael Jai White's new movie Falcon Rising is out now - well worth the watch if you're a fan of his. Some excellent, well shot fight scenes and it's always fun to see such a big man move the way he does. Somewhat exotic location, favelas of Brazil, makes the whole thing a bit more interesting, the plot is fairly ordinary but you know what you're getting with this one, MJW being awesome and decent action. I hope people pay to watch this to support this type of film getting made.
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Sep 7, 2014 01:48
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Slaapaav posted:Carano is not a pro actor and the whole movie is built around that fact to try and turn it into a strength. i loving hate hollywood and how they usually portray women like a pile of emotions ready to explode when something in their love life goes wrong. They have her portray someone that talks like someone would talk or act in real life and not like someone would in a movie, she doesnt always show the emotions of her character so the viewer can see it 100% of the time, real people can hide their emotions from others while still having those emotions inside of them. Yeah it's just a shame there's only like 2 brief fight scenes in the whole movie.
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Apr 18, 2015 23:35
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