It's quite a trip watching 'The Man From Hong Kong' almost thirty years after it was made. Writer/Director Brian Trenchard-Smith went on to make the Aussie trash classic 'Turkey Shoot' and the early Nicole Kidman vehicle 'The BMX Bandits' so you know it's gonna be class all the way. 1970s buffs will get a kick out of seeing the One Armed Boxer himself (Jimmy Wang Yu) battling it out with "the Aussie Bond" George Lazenby. Their scenes together are very cheesy but a lot of fun. I almost kept expecting Jim Kelly to appear on screen at any moment ('Black Samurai' anyone?) The rest of the cast includes legendary Aussie camp icon Frank Thring, martial arts veteran Sammo Hung Kam-Bo, and half the cast of the biker classic 'Stone' (Hugh Keays-Byrne, Roger Ward, Rebecca Gilling, Ros Spiers, Bill Hunter). Yeah, that's right - BIKER CLASSIC. Keays-Byrne is a great favourite of mine. He's probably best known as Toecutter in 'Mad Max' (in which Ward played Fifi Macaffee), but was also in 'Mad Dog Morgan' and 'Salute Of The Jugger', two movies that have pride of place in my DVD collection. This man deserves a web page NOW! 'The Man From Hong Kong' is stupid but hugely entertaining martial arts schlock, and highly recommended. And boy, isn't that theme song catchy! I haven't been able to get it out of my head since 1975!
Review of The Man from Hong Kong
