Get in the holiday spirit with Podcast On Fire

Kenny B has just posted his annual Christmas episode over at Podcast on Fire. This one features Ken, me, and fellow co-hosts Paul Quinn and Tom K-W cutting up and waxing eloquent about all things Asian cinema, including Bong Joon Ho's Parasite and the upcoming Blu-ray release of Kim Ki-Young's masterpiece of insanity Woman Chasing a Killer Butterfly. Pour yourself a cup of  day-old eggnog and give it a listen, won't you?

Podcast on FIre's Taiwan Noir episode #29: Kung Fu Wonder Child and The Legend Of All Men Are Brothers

You may have noticed that, in recent episodes of Taiwan Noir, Ken and I have fallen down something of a K hole with these crazy taiwanese fantasy matrial arts films. But oh what a sweet, um, hole it's been. For example, this latest installment features Kung Fu Wonder Child, a revered classic of weird fu starring the Peach Kid herself, Lin Shao Lu. Alongside that we discuss the lithesomely titled The Legend of All Men are Brothers, which takes a recognized classic of Chinese literature and spins it into something that can accomodate a pair of jabbering puppet aliens, zombies, and a master swordsman in a souped up wheelchair. It's pretty weird, is what I'm saying.

If you want to join us in our happily delirious state, you can stream the episode here.

Podcast on Fire's Taiwan Noir Episode 27: Hello Dracula and The 36 Shaolin Beads

In the latest episode of Taiwan Noir, Kenny B. and I discuss Hello Dracula, Taiwan's casual, more friendly take on Mr. Dracula, and The 36 Shaolin Beads, a film I round in the dollar bin at Walgreen's and quite liked. Stream the episode now and be astounded by the rigor we bring to these arguably silly topics.

Podcast on Fire's Taiwan Noir Episode #23: Fantasy of Deer Warrior and Double Vision

It's hard to imagine Kenny B and I picking two films as different from one another as those we picked for Taiwan Noir #23. The first is the 1961 film Fantasy of Deer Warrior, which I would call a kid's film if not for my fear of some angry parent pounding my face in. Sure, it's got actors cavorting around in silly looking animal costumes and even a couple of songs, and if coupling that with a lot of violence and overt sexuality sits well with--or even entices--you; boy, do I have a film for you!

The second film is Double Vision, a slick serial killer thriller from the early 2000's that pairs Tony Leung with American actor David Morse. Needless to say, the combination makes for a lively discussion. Check it out, won't you?

Podcast of Fire's Taiwan Noir Episode #22: Dragon Inn

With this latest edition of Taiwan Noir, I use host Kenny B. as a kind of father confessor--a sympathetic ear to pay witness as I struggle with my feelings about King Hu's Dragon Inn, which is arguably a canonical work of martial arts cinema. I think it makes for one of our better episodes, but you can judge that for yourself. Download or stream the episode here.

Podcast on Fire's Taiwan Noir Episode 21: Magic of Spell and Magic Warrior

Before I start flakking yet another podcast, I want to remind everyone that I actually did review a film this week. That said, this latest episode of Taiwan Noir sees Kenny B. and myself waxing rhapsodic over another pair of crazy, fun, and crazy fun Taiwanese fantasy films, both of which star gender bending actress Lam Siu Lau as their male lead. In Magic of Spell she returns to the role of Peach Kid (reprising her star turn in Child of Peach, which we discussed in Taiwan Noir episode 20), and in Magic Warriors, she stars as the very Peach Kid-like Little Flying Dragon. And speaking of magic, if you listen to this episode, you will hear me being miraculously cured completely of a nasty cold somewhere around the midway point--something that can only be achieved through the technical wizardry of recording each half of the episode two weeks apart. Download or stream the episode here.

4DK's Year in Review

Any hypothetical person who tried to keep track of all of this blog's various offshoots and adjunct projects could be forgiven for suffering a kind of 4DK fatigue. That is why I have decided to give you a handy rundown of this year's highlights. Here's hoping that I have, by this effort, at least slowed the process of you becoming a glassy eyed automaton that hates me.

FUNKY BOLLYWOOD: For me, the highlight of 2015 was the publication of my book Funky Bollywood: The Wild World of 1970s Indian Action Cinema, which was released by England's venerable FAB Press on March 15th. Sales of the book were healthy and the reviews positive, but for me the best part of being a published author was the in-store events at which I was able to meet readers, answer their questions and hear their comments. The Q & A sessions at these events were lively to say the least, and I probably ended up learning as much or more from them than the audience did. This is as true for the book launch at San Francisco's Lost Weekend Video as it was for my signing at Folio Books. But my favorite event by far was the one held at the Digital Gym Cinema in San Diego, the recording of which was released as an episode of interviewer Miguel Rodriguez's Horrible Imaginings podcast. (The less said about my talk at the SF Public Library, the better.)

POP OFFENSIVE: In 2015, Pop Offensive, a show that had originated as something of a lark, entered its second year of regular monthly episodes--and with that accumulated experience came the confidence to mess with the format a little. This resulted in theme episodes like our characteristically effervescent tributes to girl groups and Bollywood, as well as a Halloween episode that managed the unlikely juxtaposition of songs by Johnny Cash, Throbbing Gristle, and Kylie Minogue. 2015 was also the year that Pop Offensive transitioned from being an internet radio show only and hit the airwaves proper. Of course, this was a boon only to people living within a stone's throw of Oakland's Lake Merritt, who can now, thanks to our mighty 100 watt signal, listen to the show on KGPC, 96.9 FM.

THE 4DK MONTHLY MOVIE SHOUT DOWN: This 4DK sponsored movie Tweet-along continued to be a source of rigorously pointless amusement in 2015, with highlights that included two installments each from the Starman and Kommisar X franchises, as well as the Filmark produced robo-wreck Devil's Dynamite. As in 2014, @lowdudgeon, @avantgardea and @culturalgutter continued to be MVPs, displaying unfailing wit in the face of even the most dispiriting cinematic washouts.

TAIWAN NOIR: The best thing about co-hosting the Taiwan Noir podcast is that its host, Podcast on Fire's Ken Brorsson, has such a clear vision of where he wants the show to go--and such a sure hand in guiding it there--that I feel like all I have to do is show up and shoot the shit. Given the easy repartee that Ken and I have developed over the course of twelve episodes, that is something that is very easy and fun to do. Some of our most enjoyable episodes this year have been love fests in which we showered praise upon some of our favorites--which, of course, included crazy, effects-driven fantasy films like Feng Shen Bang, Taiwanese kaiju War God, and, in our most recent episode, The Child of Peach

THE INFERNAL BRAINS: Sadly, Tars Tarkas and I were only able to squeeze out two episodes of the Infernal Brains podcast this year. Happily, they were both doozies, including our "Space Ladies from Outer Space" episode--featuring guest Carol Borden of The Cultural Gutter--which is surely among our best and most popular ever.  We also gave a typically thorough going-over to Cat Beast, a squalling Pakistani monster/superhero mash-up that appears to have been edited by a garbage disposal and scored by an air raid siren. Our plan is to be more prolific in the new year, a goal which, given this year's meager showing, seems like it should be reasonably attainable.

FIGHTING FEMMES, FIENDS, AND FANATICS: Despite being out of production for just over two years, this video series continues to ratchet up viewers on its YouTube Channel and likes on its Facebook page. And it's no wonder, because it's a great series, one of my proudest accomplishments during my career as a guy talking about weird movies on the Internet.

TELEPORT CITY: After coasting on my backlog of reviews for a good while, I finally got off my butt in 2015 and contributed some new content to Teleport City, writing a review of the Australian superhero farce The Return of Captain Invincible and an overview of Egyptian popular cinema's golden age. I intend to contribute more in 2016 so that I may credibly continue to claim that I write for the best cult film website on the Internet.

4DK: I reviewed 17 films on 4DK this year. This assortment was the usual mixed bag, consisting of gems that I recommended unabashedly (Cairo Station, Having a Wild Weekend, Ana Antar, La Guerrera Vengadora 2) road apples that were only of interest as cultural oddities (the loathsome apartheid-era South African thriller Terrorist) and those that simply had to be seen to be believed (2016). Along the way, I checked in with some old friends (KSR Doss, Armando Bo and Isabel Sarli, Farid Chawki) and said goodbye to some others (Patrick Macnee). I even found time to ruminate on the role of language in film and my continuing habit of watching unsubtitled foreign movies. All the while I was thankful to have found this bizarre calling and to have appreciative readers like yourselves to make it all worthwhile.

OH, AND because I still didn't feel like I was doing quite enough, I followed my 18-year-old nephew's example and got a Band Camp account, then proceeded to make a couple of my long buried musical endeavors available online. One of them is a sort of "best of" compilation of my solo work from the aughts. The other is a frequently requested live recording of my old band B Team's final show, which took place at Wolfgang's in San Francisco in July of 1983. 1983! True, you only have my sincerest assurances that neither of these suck to go on, but, when living dangerously only costs five bucks a pop, why not just take the chance?

As for what lies ahead, as blasé as a prediction of "more of the same" might sound, it is in my case an exciting prospect. Given how much I have enjoyed all of the above activities, another year like 2015 would be welcome.

Happy holidays, everyone.

Podcast on Fire's Taiwan Noir Episode 20: Child of Peach

This latest is the twentieth episode of Taiwan Noir and my twelfth as co-host. It is also the first in a series of episodes in which we will be addressing the mind bending Peach Kid films and their progeny, starting with 1987's Child of Peach. If you like your trippy fantasy kung fu films served up with a generous splash of urine, this podcast--which you can "stream" now from the Podcast of Fire website--is so you.

Kung Fu Wonder Child (Taiwan, 1986)

I know. It’s unbelievable that, in seven years of writing for 4DK, I have until now failed to review Kung Fu Wonder Child. The fact is that it was such an obvious choice that writing about it began to feel like a fait accompli. I myself was surprised to find that I hadn’t covered it.

I discovered this oversight during preparation for an upcoming episode of the Taiwan Noir podcast in which Kenny B and I provide an overview of the Peach Kid series. Kung Fu Wonder Child is generally considered to be a spiritual sibling of the Peach Kid films because, like them, it (a) stars gender-bending actress Lam Siu-Law in its titular male role, (b) it is very 80s (glam metal hairdos, perky synth-pop soundtrack), and (c) it is very silly. It also, like them, is representative of two prevailing trends in Chinese martial arts cinema at the time, one being the increasing reliance on flashy special effects spurred by the success of Tsui Hark’s Zu: Warriors of Magic Mountain, and the other the prevalence of kung fu comedies that combined martial arts action with broad slapstick involving lots of people (and animals) peeing, farting and shitting on one another.

The threat in KFWC comes from a rogue holy man (Lee Hoi Hing) who, ensconced within his creepy graveyard lair, is accumulating all kinds of arcane magics toward unknown nefarious ends. When the priest suspects a gifted young village boy, Hsiu Chuen (Lam), of stealing some of his tricks, he dispatches his ghoulish minions to take care of him. Meanwhile, Hsiu Chuen encounters Hai Chiu Hse (Yukari Oshima), a girl whose father and sister are being held captive by the priest. Joined by Hsiu Chuen’s grandfather Hua Won (Jack Lung Sai-Ga) and the requisite pair of bumbling disciples, they set off to confront the evildoer. All in all, it’s a simple plot that nonetheless allows for the introduction of a lot of peripheral characters, among them a guy named Master Crazy, because that is the kind of movie that this is.

The above scenario also allows the opportunity for a lot of fun spook show elements—not all of which have much utility to the plot, such as a pair of orphaned vampire babies who appear to have briefly popped in from one of the Hello Dracula movies. This also means that there is an abundance of cartoon lighting--perhaps as much as there is urine--shooting out of everybody at everybody. The evil priest, in particular, seems to be using his palm rays to slow roast his captives in a pair of over-sized urns. And while I earlier credited Zu with inspiring the effects-dependent fantasy kung fu boom, there is no escaping the Hollywood origins of the face-hugging beastie that attacks Lam Siu Law or the light saber that the evil priest produces during the climactic fight. A giant flying worm that looks like it is made from the world's largest pipe-cleaner, however, is all Kung Fu Wonder Child's own.

About the time that I was first getting into writing about cult movies, Kung Fu Wonder Child, along with films like Kung Fu Zombie and Taoism Drunkard, was considered to be the gold standard of batshit crazy martial arts cinema. And it can’t be said that it doesn’t have the pedigree: It’s writer, Cheung San-Yee, in addition to also writing the loopy Polly Shang Kwan epic Little Hero, had earlier directed the mind-suplexing Thrilling Sword, and its director, Lee Tso-Nam, could also claim Magic Warriors as parts of his filmography.

Nonetheless, re-watching Kung Fu Wonder Child now only reminds me of oh how much I have seen since my first viewing of it. For example, having recently revisited the first Peach Kid film, Child of Peach, which is both furiously paced and expertly realized, I must report that KFWC pales ever-so-slightly in comparison. Part of this is due to its relative sidelining of the always charming Lam Siu-Law; ascendant ass-kicker Yukari Oshima (who would become a figurehead of the “girls with guns” subgenre with films like Angel) is a damsel in little need of rescue, and so leaves Hsiu Chen with little to do in the way of chivalrous derring do. There is also a sense of childish indulgence to Child of Peach’s toilet humor that makes KFWC’s more adolescent, mean-spirited approach seem somewhat tiresome by comparison.
 

All of which is not to say that Kung Fu Wonder Child does not deliver its share of dazzling visual hocus pocus. Indeed, its most noteworthy achievement is a climactic composite sequence involving a cell animated dragon that is executed with admirable precision. There are also a lot of goopy practical effects employing pulsating bladders that rival the work of Cronenberg in their visceral repulsiveness. The fact that the film seems relatively normal in comparison to some of the films I've seen since testifies only to the cornucopia of riches that the broader category of Taiwanese fantasy films offers. Because, believe me, Kung Fu Wonder Child is not a normal film by any standard. That it focuses on Yukarim Oshima fighting vampires and cartoon dragons to the detriment of its titular flying, fire-breathing, monster-battling child is not a criticism that I can level against it with a straight face. Truly, there are no losers here.

Podcast on Fire's Taiwan Noir Episode 19: Feng Shen Bang

This latest edition of Taiwan Noir is the second of our back-to-back episodes covering special effects laden Taiwanese fantasy films. This time we cover 1969's Feng Shen Bang, a mythological adventure crawling with crazy creatures. Listen here.

Podcast on Fire's Taiwan Noir Episode 17: Requital and Hunting List

You might be forgiven for thinking that, with everything going on, I might have forgotten about Taiwan Noir, but nothing could be further from the truth. Indeed, my life would be sorely lacking without my periodic check-ins with my old pal Kenny B, a mysterious foreigner who never fails to take me down some intriguing new back alley of Taiwanese commercial cinema. This latest episode finds us exploring the grey area between homage, plagiarism, and imitation as we discuss two films by director Chu Yen Ping that are both based, to varying degrees, on Phil Joanou's State of Grace. Listen here.

Podcast on FIre's Taiwan Noir Episode 14: Challenge of the Lady Ninja and A Life of Ninja

With Taiwan Noir, Kenny B. and I head up an international coalition of pasty white people bent on impressing upon all of you, by means both prolific and prolonged, just how many goddamn ninja movies there are in the world. With our latest episode, we check Challenge of the Lady Ninja and Life of Ninja off the list. Listen here.

Podcast on Fire's Taiwan Noir Episode 13: The Devil Returns and Kill for Love

Let's be honest: The Devil Returns and Kill for Love are shitty movies. Nonetheless, Kenny B. and myself had a lot of fun talking about them. So much fun, in fact, that I think you will actually enjoy listening to this latest episode of Taiwan Noir, what with all of our audible nose holding and carrying on and such. Also, it's pretty short.

Sold? You can either stream the episode or get details on how to download it here. Enjoy!

Podcast on Fire's Taiwan Noir Episode 12: The Ghostly Face and Little Hero

Neither my or Kenny B's affections for Polly Shang Kwan can be overstated. And, as if in perversely obstinate demonstration of that fact, we have turned the latest episode of the Taiwan Noir podcast into a filibuster length, intercontinental mash note to the loveable Taiwanese star. Among the discussed films is The Ghostly Face, a Taiwanese/Indonesian co-production that is one of Polly's best and most unusual films. And speaking of unusual, what discussion of PSK would be complete without touching upon the awesome Little Hero? Which means that you once again get to hear me gleefully recount that scene where she battles the giant rubber octopi.

Give us a listen won't you? You can either stream the episode or get details on how to download it here.

And, Polly? If you're out there, call us, okay?

Podcast on Fire's Taiwan Noir Episode 11: Virago, The Anger, and Inferno Thunderbolt

I had long heard tell of these IFD “Franken-Ninja” movies, wherein ill-famed producer Godfrey Ho ill-advisedly “spiced up” repurposed footage from various Asian martial arts films with footage of aging mustache farmer Richard Harrison. Luckily, I had somehow avoided actually seeing one. Then along came Ken B. of Podcast on Fire, a callous ruiner of innocence if ever there was one, to put an end to my happiness.

In this latest episode of POF’s Taiwan Noir podcast -- in which I once again play guest co-host to Ken’s accent-y master of ceremonies -- we take a look, not only at the 1982 Taiwanese thriller The Anger, but also the misshapen creature that Ho molded it into, 1986’s Inferno Thunderbolt, in which Richard Harrison mostly hangs around the house a lot before finally going to war against the mob. Happily, we also review another one of Elsa Yeung’s cheesecake permeated lady ninja romps, Deadly Silver Angels, aka Virago, so all is not totally lost.

You can either stream the episode or get details on how to download it here.

Podcast on Fire's Taiwan Noir Episode 10: Thrilling Sword and Country of Beauties

Bless Kenneth Brorsson's mohawked head for inviting me back to co-host the latest episode of his Taiwan Noir podcast. In this installment, we salute Taiwanese screen queen Elsa Yeung with a discussion of Thrilling Sword -- which those of you who are creepily attentive will know is a favorite of mine -- and Country of Beauties, which asks the question "How many beautiful amazons does it take to cut a dude's wiener off?" (The answer may surprise you!) Get the deets and stream the episode here.

4DK on Podcast on Fire

I'm proud to have been asked to co-host the latest episode of the Podcast on Fire Network's Taiwan Noir podcast. This one's not for the squeamish, as we're delving into a particularly ooky corner of Asian exploitation cinema with the odious snake murder porn of Calamity of Snakes. On the plus side, we're also discussing the recently reviewed The Witch With Flying Head, which is almost a little bit awesome. Lend them your ears, won't you?