I almost didn’t get around to this because I thought it was another “disqualified” tape.  As it turns out, the problem was with the connection between my VCR and the tuner.  And also because of how terrible the quality of the actual tape was.

Yeah, that certainly couldn’t have helped.

Anyway, despite being headed by someone actually famous, this makes the “Crap You’ve Never Heard Of” section because I’m willing to bet you’ve never heard of it, much less watched it.  And so, my review of the 1977 film…

 

The movie starts off with some old big-shot being greeted for his 60th birthday.

As preparations are under way, we see the house maids being all weird and samey… then one of them separates from the group and gets addressed by name, so you know THIS maid is the one that’s important.

 

The maid’s name is… Chin-Chin?  Isn’t that the monkey from Speed Racer?  Whatever.  Anyway, she’s also the love interest of the young lord of the house, Cao Lei, played by Jackie Chan.

Cao Lei appears to be in a bad mood.  Despite her fawning over him, he tells her as the lord of the house, he can “take her” at any time, “without asking.”  O… K…

Naturally, Chin-Chin decides now is the perfect time to tell him she’s pregnant with his child.

Cao Lei’s response?

Things you never expect to see Jackie Chan do:

1. Bitchslap a love interest.

Cao Lei practically accuses her of being a whore and tells her to get out of his sight.

For his next feat of douchebaggery, Cao Lei arrives at his father’s birthday party late, accuses everyone present of being parasites, and orders them to leave immediately.

Cao Lei’s father demands an explanation, and Cao Lei gives it to him.  Actually, what he gives him is…

A severed tattooed hand.  It’s basically a message from the “Killer Bees Gang,” an organization the old man destroyed 15 years ago.  However, he didn’t kill every member of the gang, and now its remnants have come for revenge.  In order to protect everyone else, Cao Lei had them all leave early.  He also plans to stay and fight alongside his father since the “family name” will live on through Chin-Chin’s child.

Cao Lei, you magnificent bastard.

Unfortunately, this is about the last moment in the movie where you will feel at all impressed by Cao Lei.

Later on, the Killer Bees Gang attacks, trying to psych out the Lei family with tricks.  I should mention that the people remaining are Cao, his father, his mother, and a handful of bodyguards.  Those poor, poor bodyguards…

 

 

While the other Killer Bees look ridiculous and fight exclusively with torches, the leader uses sais and is brutal as hell.

The Killer Bees (well, the only one that matters) manages to kill off the entire Lei family pretty handily.

Well, all of them except Cao Lei, who continues the fight and gets his ass kicked thoroughly.  Though I have to say, this fight has some signature Jackie Chan fight styles like frantic evasions and rapid blocking.

Things you never expect to see Jackie Chan do:

1. Bitchslap a love interest.
2. Get utterly curbstomped by a girl with no name.

Well now, that’s not entirely fair… actually, Cao Lei manages to hold her at swordpoint off some very lucky positioning.  While at his mercy, the mystery girl guilt trips him by revealing the elder Lei nearly killed her while she was only 5 years old.

Confronted with the fact that his father wasn’t the saint he believed him to be, Cao Lei lowers his weapon and gets knocked out because man what a bitch.

Meanwhile, Chin-Chin is still running away like a dolt and ends up lost in the forest.  Apparently, she’s been running all night since the entire fight sequence happened at night, and it’s morning now.  Jeez.

Well now, let’s take a guess what happens here…

It would be bandits.  Luckily for her, she gets rescued by Cao Lei’s friend, Chien Chun.

Cao Lei sent Chien Chun to make sure Chin-Chin was safe, and also to confuse us because THOSE NAMES ARE ENTIRELY TOO SIMILAR.

Chien Chun takes Chin-Chin to his house, but she doesn’t want to stay in the area and be reminded of Cao Lei, who she still thinks is a girlfriend-beater.

Meanwhile, Cao Lei wakes up somewhere in the forest, having been spared by the Killer Bees Gang leader.  She wants him to suffer for the rest of his days and want revenge on her, knowing he will never be able to defeat her.  I-it’s not like she wants him to live or anything.  Stupid!

By the time Cao Lei reaches Chien Chun’s house, it’s empty.  He sticks around just in case they come back.  Sounds like the right time for mystery girl to show up and troll!

Mystery girl mocks Cao Lei for crying out for Chin-Chin.  In a bizarre turn of events, Cao Lei is delirious with grief and thinks the girl in front of him is Chin-Chin.  He promises he’ll never let her get away again, forces her on the bed, and the camera turns away to some wind chimes and shit.  In the next scene, Mystery Girl is angry and leaves, and Cao Lei is sleeping on the bed, shirtless.

That’s right.

Jackie Chan just raped a girl.

Things you never expect to see Jackie Chan do:

1. Bitchslap a love interest.
2. Get utterly curbstomped by a girl with no name.
3. Rape.

Suddenly…

He gets attacked by assassins!  So, it’s a classic 3-on-1 Jackie Chan fight in close quarters, eh?

Surprisingly, all the damage done to the house results in… Cao Lei pretty much ignoring all the debris and fighting with either his hands or his attackers’ swords.

Despite fighting valiantly and killing one of his attackers in hilarious impalement-related fashion, Cao Lei gets knocked out.  The man who hired the assassins steps up and interrogates Cao Lei, but soon finds out they got the wrong guy.  The target of the attack was Chien Chun, who allegedly stole some valuables that belong to the governor.  The assassins from the “Blood Rain” gang want to kill Cao Lei to avenge the death of their comrade, but the old man refuses to allow it and fends them off with his spear, clearly showing he’s the superior fighter.  Which makes us wonder why he didn’t bother going himself.

The man is the leader of the Dragon Escort, a sort of bodyguard service.  Also, this is already the second time in the movie Cao Lei wakes up not knowing where the hell he is.

Cao Lei evades the Dragon’s attempts to be chummy and leaves his protection so he can engage in more important matters like moping after Chin-Chin.  Surprisingly, the mystery girl appears just to mock him and let him know that the Dragon buried Cao Lei’s parents and is, well, a good guy.  Cao Lei decides to return and repay some favors.

An old man meets up with the Dragon Escort in the woods and offers a painting as a gift.  When asked what it means, he replies “The death of the Fourth Dragon.”  Whelp, time for a fight!

Turns out, the old man was a member of the Blood Rain gang, and they’re here to exact revenge on the Dragon Escort.  Cao Lei decides to step in and repay his debt in this fight.

Now wait… Before, Cao Lei got beaten by three members of the same gang.  Now he plans to solo the whole lot of them?  Well, he IS the hero of the flick.  I guess it’s time for some good ol’ fashioned friendship-powered power boost.

Well hey, good going!  Looks like things are looking up for the good guys!

Er…

So, Cao Lei gets stabbed in the chest during the fight, and the mystery girl has to show up and save everyone’s asses.

Things you never expect to see Jackie Chan do:

1. Bitchslap a love interest.
2. Get utterly curbstomped by a girl with no name.
3. Rape.
4. Get fatally wounded halfway through the film by nameless mooks.

Mystery girl says to hand Cao Lei over to her and he’ll save his life.  Since the Dragon Escort don’t know who the hell this crazy chick is, they refuse.  She responds by saying “you’ll regret this, I promise you!”

That’s right.  She just vowed revenge against these guys for not turning her boy toy over.

At any rate, there’s nothing they can do to treat Cao Lei’s wound, so they eventually give in and hand him over.

Meanwhile, Chien Chun reports to Chin-Chin that the Lei family palace was utterly destroyed.  With Chin-Chin’s lover and Chien Chun’s best friend confirmed dead, they decide there’s nothing left to do but get married.  Because that’s what bros do, right?

The Dragon Escort reports to the governor that they haven’t found Chien Chun yet, and the governor asks if they’re willing to pay for their failure with their lives.  They are.  Good.  Because he’s going to take that payment.  Because not only is he the governor, he’s the leader of the Blood Rain gang!

Oh, and he’s one more person…

He’s Chien Chun.

Goddammit.

Chien Chun proceeds to completely destroy the Dragon Escort using only his bare hands.

Killer Bees Gang leader finally gives up when her servant says Cao Lei has lost the will to live, only calling out for Chin-Chin in his sleep.  The leader finally tells Cao Lei that Chin-Chin is engaged to wed a local governor, that the Dragon Escort was killed by the leader of the Blood Rain gang, and that Chien Chun is BOTH of them.  She also tells him that he is not allowed to leave until he beats her first.  Cao Lei agrees and fights, only to lose.

Thus begins a training from hell sequence.  However, every time he loses, he must do whatever she says.  The first loss resulted in him being forced to swallow a burning coal.  The second loss?  Burning his face.

Things you never expect to see Jackie Chan do:

1. Bitchslap a love interest.
2. Get utterly curbstomped by a girl with no name.
3. Rape.
4. Get fatally wounded halfway through the film by nameless mooks.
5. Get pointlessly mutilated.

The third loss was to drink poisoned wine.  However, after seeing him drink the wine with no hesitation, the mystery girl reveals the wine was actually laced with her own blood.  And anyone who drinks her blood gets her skills… because why not?

Just to be clear, Cao Lei NEVER beats her.

After receiving training and a cheap power-up, Cao Lei is ready to storm the castle and challenge Chien Chun.  What does he say before the battle?  “I have to avenge Fourth Dragon!”  Okay… Chin-Chin’s standing right there, just saying…

The battle is almost entirely in Chien Chun’s favor.  Not only is he a better fighter, he’s supernaturally durable.  Even though he occasionally blocks Cao Lei’s attacks, direct hits appear to do absolutely no damage.  Chien Chun isn’t even bothered.

However, Cao Lei notices that Chien Chun is especially defensive of his hair ornament, and decides that it MUST be the source of his power or somesuch.  Because we’ve already crossed a line, so fuck it.  That’s definitely his weak point.

Cao Lei spends the next few minutes focusing entirely on trying to take that hat away, and he finally does it.  Not that it helps him.  Chien Chun is visibly staggered by Cao Lei’s attacks, but he’s still stronger and more durable than Cao Lei; he’s just not INVINCIBLE anymore.

After taking Chien Chun’s shirts away, he goes after his sash.  Luckily, he doesn’t decide to go after his pants because the battle ends shortly afterward.

Things you never expect to see Jackie Chan do:

1. Bitchslap a love interest.
2. Get utterly curbstomped by a girl with no name.
3. Rape.
4. Get fatally wounded halfway through the film by nameless mooks.
5. Get pointlessly mutilated.
6. Choke a guy to death with his own pyjamas.

Afterwards, he’s reunited with Chin-Chin, and the gang leader girl remembers Cao Lei’s parting words to her.  Something along the lines of “I owe you so much, and I’ll never forget you.”  THE END.

Really?  Ending there?  By the way, did you forget that this crazy bitch KILLED YOUR FREAKING PARENTS?