Violent Cop (1989)

A brawl in the street in slow motion. Cop and gangster wrestling on the pavement in front of neighbourhood boys frozen as bystanders. Mellow jazz scoring the violent image of a baseball bat striking down upon a cop’s head, resulting in a geyser of blood spatter. A chase results, and continues by foot and by […]

Dark Breed (1996)

Delving further into the world of PM Entertainment productions was a highlight for me of 2023, a repository for direct-to-video B-grade action schlock from the 1980s and 1990s, where they put the money on the screen with the amount of explosions featured, cars flipped on the streets and stunt-people flung through the air. My compulsion […]

Seventh Code (2013)

Seventh Code (2013): file under the category of “good one-hour movies.” Shot and filmed in Russia, a young Japanese woman named Akiko (Atsuko Maeda, pop singer and former member of girl group AKB48) races into frame, dragging a suitcase behind her. She is in pursuit of a Japanese man in a suit, Matsunaga (Ryohei Suzuki) […]

A Better Tomorrow II (1987)

An action thriller about two brothers on opposite sides of the law, A Better Tomorrow was a smash hit in Hong Kong and helped birth the “heroic bloodshed” sub-genre. With Chow-Yun Fat’s performance as the third member of this triangle, the antagonistic but loyal gangster Mark, it was a role that cemented the actor as […]

Cyber City Oedo 808 (1990)

“Adios, bozo – this time I’m downloading you straight to hell!” Powering through 1990s cyberpunk cinema, particularly direct-to-video terrain, and the glistening vistas of anime await. Cyber City Oedo 808 (1990) is some cyberpunk anime that I’d never heard of before, but on the title alone was compelled to check out; fundamentally three 45-minute episodes […]