Runtime:
103 minutes (at least that's the version I saw; I've seen several
different runtimes for it, all longer than what I watched)
Directed
by: Brian Trenchard-Smith, Yu Wang
Starring:
Yu Wang, George Lazenby, Hugh Keays-Byrne, Roger Ward, Sammo Hung
From:
Golden Harvest
Here
is a film I discovered via clips of it being in Not Quite Hollywood.
Those clips, which you can watch here, made the movie look pretty
great, although apparently you also discover that the star Wang was a
real A-Hole, at least according to those people that worked with him.
Finally, I recently discovered a copy of it on YouTube. It's not too
hard to find... although who knows how long it'll stay up.
The
plot is rather simple: A drug courier from Hong Kong (Hung) is found
at Ayers Rock, so Hong Kong detective Fang (Wang) goes down to
Sydney. He discovers that there's a colorful drug dealer known as
Jack Wilton (Lazenby) and Wilton does not like him being around, so
he tries to eliminate him. It's about as simple as that.
This
movie... it's a quality film and not just a quality example of the
Ozploitation genre. This co-production between Hong Kong and
Australia as a story that's simple yet effective and it's a lot of
fun. You get to see plenty of action and not just of the kung-fu
kind. There's also a big car chase where the cars get utterly
destroyed, for example. Wang is apparently not a nice guy in real
life and his character came across as an A-Hole, but in a good and
funny way, to at least me.
He steals an innocent's person car to
start the chase and he ends up destroying that poor Australian
vehicle known as the Chrysler Valiant Charger. He also disobeys
constantly his Australian cop pals (Keays-Byrne, Ward), which is a
shame as those two blokes are pretty cool guys. But hey, Fang does
plenty of bad-ass and awesome things, at least. He has a great
lengthy brawl with Stunt Rock's Grant Page (a renowned stuntman) in a
Chinese restaurant and it's a great scene; they really destroy that
poor place. All that and a groovy 70's score (along with top 10 hit Sky High, by Jigsaw) makes this something I am glad I finally got to
see and I am glad I was not disappointed by it.
There
are also plenty of things to laugh at (in a positive way), including
how Lazenby-to steal a line-looks just like Ron Burgundy! No kidding.
Seeing Ron Burgundy as a racist martial arts master who happens to be
a suave dude with a totally 70's apartment was quite a sight. Fang
gives Sammo Hung a swirly in a jailhouse toilet. One henchman has big
hair and a big beard and looks a lot like the Geico Caveman. So yep, plenty to enjoy along with the general fun nature of this film. I'll be back Tuesday night.
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