who's a Big Rascal? (大惡客)

A blurry photo from my poster collection and an playbill that was up for sale on eBay. Plus the opening credits!

put the needle on the record

I am expecting it to be middle of the road or crap, but I am looking forward to watching Robert "Enter The Dragon" Clouse's Golden Needles that I just got a copy of. Let's just see how Joe Don Baker is as a hero (and a lover, yikes!), the evil menace of Burgess Meredeth's bow tie, Roy Chiao's sinister sulk, all set to a score by Lalo Schifrin.

And as a reward for getting to the end of this post, go grab some free soul music from one of my favourite blogs, Funky 16 Corners!

Sounds of ZU

Had to get into the storage space to rescue a film print and found this!

blood blood blood

Frankie Chan is BACK!

From www.filmbiz.asia

Jackie Chan's (成龍) Jackie & JJ Productions has added big-budget martial arts action film Legendary Amazons (楊門女將) to its sales slate at Berlin's European Film Market.

Shooting under the direction of Frankie Chan (陳勳奇) is underway in Inner Mongolia and will wrap this month, setting up delivery for summer or early autumn.

The story is derived from a series of books and plays referred to as Generals of the Yang Clan (楊家將) and recounts the unflinching loyalty of four generations of warriors from one Northern Han family. It has twice been made as TV series aired by rival Hong Kong free-to-air broadcasters TVB and ATV (1998). It is also the basis for a rival film project directed by Ronny Yu (于仁泰).

Chan's $16 million Amazons (previously titled Lady Generals of the Yang Family) boasts the biggest role in several years for Cecilia Cheung (張柏芝), the actress who until hit by a sex scandal, regularly polled as one the favourite HK leading ladies among foreign audiences. It also stars martial arts legend Cheng Pei-pei (鄭佩佩). Other leading roles go to Ritchie Ren (任賢齊), Liu Xiaoqing (劉曉慶) and Xiao Mingyu (肖明玉). Martial arts action is choreographed by Wu Bin (吳彬), a mentor to Jet Li (李連杰).

Production is through Jackie Chan International Cinema and Jackie & JJ Productions, which will be operating from Berlin's Ritz-Carlton Hotel. Its slate includes other Jackie Chan-produced titles; historical epic 1911 (now in post-production), contemporary romantic comedy The Break-up Artist (分手達人) and last year's Jackie Chan-starring epic Little Big Soldier (大兵小將).

Frankie Chan is a veteran director and music arranger. Amazons will mark his first film in cinemas since youth drama IQ Dudettes (辣椒教室) in January 2000.

The Grandmasters in Berlin

Best sight in Berlin at the European Film Mmarket so far... Tony Leung. Wong Kar-wai. Kung fu. BRING IT!

kicking into 2011

Trying my best to kick start this year. Been a little preoccupied with other stuff of late, but one of them now has a bigger, online presence: ActionFest

Spent most of the holidays working on that site. Please spread the news of it with Twitter, FaceBook, etc. Currently working on the line-up for the 2011 edition.

Meanwhile, this film's tagline is my anthem for 2011!

a collectors item?

Look what my mom still has! A t-shirt I made of the cover of the 2nd (and last issue) of my HK film zine ASIAN EYE.

An old Christmas card that kicked ass!

Surly I have blogged this in the past, but it is worth pulling out every year. This is a Christmas card I made up several years ago and sent out to friends. I think I did it around 1994-97? Foggy on when it went out, but it was a good one. It has been years since I sent out Christmas cards, but one of my New Year's resolutions is to do that for 2011!

poster a day #25 - The Hunter, the Butterfly and the Crocodile (1976)

I have been neglecting my duties here in the temple and rather than just doing a quick sweep of the temple's floors, I am going to do a little wax on and wax off. While I do that, enjoy more than just a poster, but some photos of some of the rare lobbycards in my collection for this early Chow Yun-Fat flick, The Hunter, the Butterfly and the Crocodile (1976), from the director of one of my fave flicks, Seeding of a Ghost (1983). In fact, it looks like director Richard Yeung Kuen liked Chow so much, he went on to cast him in his 1977 production, Hot Blood.

and speaking of Devil Fetus...

Here is a review from when a print of Devil Fetus ran in Winnipeg in 2008 (click to enlarge):
And I could link to a clip off the DVD, but instead, here is camcorder footage off the screen when it played in at the Sitges Fantastic Fest a few years ago. Beware! Spoilers!

name this movie!

Got some new posters from a trade I did with a collector in Taiwan and one of the fab scores was this oddity, but I have no idea what it is. At first I thought it might be for Devil Fetus, but looking at the characters for Devil Fetus, clearly not a match. Anyone help out here?

Mystery poster

Close-up of the logo of my mystery poster

Poster for Devil Fetus

Wong Tin-lam passes away (1927-2010)

You might not know the name, but if you have seen some of Johnnie To's films in the past 10 years, you just might recognize Wong Tin-lam from his roles in The Mission and Election 1 & 2. Wong was a respected director who made Cantonese cinema in the 1950s and then moved to TV in the 1970s and ended up writing many of TVB's most popular series including Legend of the Condor Heroes. It was in TV that Wong Tin-lam made another great mark on the cultural landscape, as the mentor for the young assistant directors working under him including Johnnie To and Ringo Lam. And of course, his other great contribution to Hong Kong pop culture - he is Wong Jing's dad.

For more info, read the obit over at HKMDB Daily News (for more photos) and at Asian Film Business.

Ringo Lam and Johnnie To with mentor Wong Tin-lam

The cast of Johnnie To's Election in Cannes

Father and Son: Wong Jing and Wong Tin-lam

run baby run: Fatal Termination

I've been absent from blogging, but the other day I was working on archiving my poster/lobbycard collection and came across this gem of a lobbycard that I had to share. It's from Fatal Termination, a film with a WILD stunt scene that I have posted about before. This picture says it ALL. I also scanned a newspaper ad for the film and at the bottom is a YouTube clip of the film for you to experience the mayhem.

Footage from Tsui Hark's Dragon Tiger Gate 3D!

Here's some behind the scenes footage of the filming of Tsui Hark's new Dragon Tiger Gate 3D. The best part of the segment is that there's some assembled footage from the actual film at the end, which looks pretty dang exciting.

Check it out here!

via Wild Grounds' Twitter account.

La fureur du juste!

JCVD intros EAGLE'S PATH

From Cannes in May, some video I shot of JVCD introducing Eagle's Path, the new film he wrote, produced and directed. Sorry for the crap audio.

TONIGHT! IP MAN 2 at The Toronto Underground Cinema

Sorry. I know it is late notice and all, BUT if you are in Toronto, come on down to the Toronto Underground Cinema tonight at 9:30pm for an assortment of vintage kung fu coming attractions and then the main feature of IP MAN 2, all on glorious 35mm film! Click here to learn more.

Tsui Hark + Jet Li in 3-D!

I'm super excited about this news, especially after how much I liked Detective Dee & The Mystery of the Phantom Flame.

Li, Tsui reunite for new Dragon picture

Yup, Dragon Gate Inn 3-D!

Read the full story by our friends over at Film Business Asia.

Oct 22nd - IP MAN 2 plays Toronto!

Stay tuned for details...