Author: Andrew Skeates

Not the best example of heroic bloodshed from the golden age but an entertaining footnote in the careers of heavy hitters Chow Yun-Fat and Andy Lau, and certainly worth checking out for completists.

A mix of historical drama, romantic melodrama, and frantic wuxia superhero charged action, Yen and his crew certainly go all out to create an epic and kudos to their ambition.

‘Blade of the 47 Ronin’ is slick albeit silly fun that rightly plays everything just earnest enough to be taken seriously but having fun with the hokey concept of Samurai’s running around modern Budapest fighting evil witches.

Scraping to the 80-minute mark, proceedings propel along slickly (despite the low budget) bouncing between scenes of melodrama and furious fight action, with rarely a break for character development.

‘Jung_E’ is some solid grown-up sci-fi that while not always satisfying nevertheless gives one something to chew on in between all the ballistic action.

‘Shadow Master’ is some fight packed fright fun for the most part that sticks to its own path and certainly delivers some superb fight sequences for the fight film fans out there.

The makers conjure an intense and propulsive energy that keeps the flick moving and engaging, mounting the action with innovative verve to deliver powerful action scenes.

‘The Bullet Train’ delivers a lot of thrilling spectacle and drama nearly fifty years after its initial release.

Mixing tones and styles, ‘The Big 4’ is reminiscent of action films from Hong Kong’s glory days providing stunt-filled chaos to sate action junkies but plenty of laughs and heart in between the action to make us smile.

With its refreshing 90-minute runtime and welcome 1990s action movie approach to delivering as many set-pieces as possible, ‘The Killer’ may lack overall character development, but it delivers stellar done-for-real action.

Finally arriving after those teaser trailers taunted us with big-budget rampaging robot action, ‘Warriors of Future’ may not quite live up to its barmy high concept, but it gives it a good go.

A tough film with many unlikable characters but a thrilling tale of gangster revenge that has lost none of its force over the past 50 years.