Lee Jung-Chool (Song Kang-ho), a Korean police captain working under the Japanese occupation of Korea in the 1920’s is ordered to hunt down a group of resistance fighters who plan to smuggle explosives into the capital. When Lee poses as a businessman and accompanies his chief suspect on a trip he ends up persuaded into switching sides after an unexpected … Read the rest
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Blade Runner 2049 (Denis Villeneuve, US, 2017)
In Los Angeles Detective K (Ryan Gosling) hunts down and kills an artificial human known as a replicant but his death leads to an astonishing discovery that threatens to upend the status between replicants and their human masters. Ordered by his boss Lieutenant Joshi (Robin Wright) to eradicate all traces of his discovery K’s investigations are shadowed by a replicant … Read the rest
Desperate Outpost (Kihachi Okamoto, Japan, 1959)
In Manchuria during WW2, newspaper reporter Okubo (Makoto Sato) arrives at a beleaguered frontline garrison nicknamed Desperate Outpost and immediately takes an interest in the double suicide of a captain and his lover who supposedly killed themselves on the eve of battle. However when an old flame of Okubo’s named Tomie (Izumi Yukimura) inadvertently gives away his true motives to … Read the rest
The Gauntlet (Clint Eastwood, US, 1977)
Boozy Las Vegas cop Ben Shockley (Eastwood), gets the job of delivering prostitute Augustina ‘Gus’ Mally (Sondra Locke) to her court appearance in Phoenix. According to Ben’s boss, chief of police Blakelock (a brief but memorably repulsive character played by William Prince), it’s ‘a nothing witness for a nothing trial.’ Unsurprisingly then, Mally turns out to have a story that … Read the rest
The Human Vapor (Ishiro Honda, Japan, 1960)
Opening with a taut robbery sequence in which employees react with terror as doors and bank vaults seemingly open at will, a second robbery gets even stranger when a dead employee is found inside the locked but ransacked vault. With both keys in the hands of the authorities it’s a mystery as to how someone could have gotten into the … Read the rest
Spider Forest (Song Il-Gon, South Korea, 2004)
At a cabin in the woods, Kang (Gam Woo-sung) is witness to the blood-soaked corpses of two murder victims, one of which is his girlfriend Su-yeong (Kang Gyeong-heon). While chasing the killer Kang is badly injured and nearly killed when he stumbles into the path of a passing car. Waking up in hospital a fortnight later Kang’s first action is … Read the rest
The Winter of Three Hairs (Yan Gong and Zhao Ming, China, 1949)
In Shanghai, eight year old orphan Sanmao (Wan Lung-chi) joins a team of beggars, becomes the unwilling recruit of a Fagin-style criminal and is adopted by a wealthy lady who cleans him up, renames him Tom and tries to control him like one of her pets. But at a party in his honour Sanmao can’t stand the sight of his … Read the rest
Killer Calibre 32 (Alfonso Brescia, Italy, 1967)
In the Old West an elegantly attired contract killer known as Mr Silver (Peter Lee Lawrence) is hired by the owners of local banks to find and eliminate the masked outlaws who’ve been robbing stagecoaches and who on their last raid ruthlessly murdered all the passengers.
Well-plotted and pacy Euro-Western featuring some rough and tumble stunt-work in which none of … Read the rest
The Twin Swords (Sui Jang-Hung, Hong Kong, 1965)
In this sequel to Temple of the Red Lotus eloping lovers Kwei Wu (Jimmy Wang Yu) and Lien Chu (Chin Ping) are fooled into attempting the rescue of four ‘maids’ (in reality members of the evil Red Lotus Clan) from a Buddhist temple the Clan have tricked out with all manner of deadly traps. Kwei escapes but Lien is captured. … Read the rest
Temple of the Red Lotus (Sui Jang-Hung, Hong Kong, 1965)
On his way to Jin Castle to meet his fiancee Lianzhu (Chin Ping) and avenge the murder of his family young swordsman Kuei Wu (Jimmy Wang-Yu) is witness to a robbery that implicates the head of his betrothed’s family, Dragon Jin. But on arrival Kuei’s suspicions about his new in-laws prove mutual. The real culprits turn out to be the … Read the rest
