The Boxer's Omen

After his brother is crippled in a Thai Boxing match with champion boxer Bu Bo (Bolo Yeung), Chan Hung (Phillip Ko Fei) starts getting visions of a monk who appears to him in his dreams and also helps get him out of a tight spot. Travelling to Thailand to track down Bo on a promise to his brother to get revenge, he is drawn to the temple that was the source of his visions and becomes involved in a battle of Bhuddism vs Black Magic due to a link to his past life.There are the usual training scenes, but the battle scenes are something else. I am being deliberately vague as it is best that you see the movie yourself. I could tell you what happens but you wouldn’t believe it or think I was exaggerating.The director made a number of black magic and action films for Shaw Brothers, but this was the one where he got to go all out and it was one of his last films as a director. He also came up with the story, which does have elements that were based in reality such as the Abbott being “preserved” after death and being covered in gold leaf by his followers and the various locations used.While there are people in this film, the real stars of the movie are the critters and the special effects. I know they are meant to be scary, but they come across as so over the top and theatrical that they become something more than the film. The first exposure to this movie for a lot of people came when group the Animal Collective mentioned the URL to the Youtube clip of the first battle scene in a magazine interview (since taken down) and it was the first part of the movie I saw also.The black magic practitioners are meant to be the bad guys, but they don’t seem to be so bad as you never see what they are trying to do. The monks have a rod up their arse sometimes, Phillip Ko gets his end wet once with his missus after the first battle and suddenly he has “lost all his power”. C’mon! Can’t you give him special dispensation?I did like the critters as they looked like they would be fun to hang out with if they were not trying to kill you. The bats are very floppy and plastic looking, the spiders are cute and drink through straws, the snapping crocodile skulls are a bit dumb, but like to play fetch with chicken guts, there is a big crocodile who is menacing, but gets stuck in small gaps. At one point the hero gets held down and menaced by fuzzy caterpillars who look like they are tickling him. He also gets a killer nipple cripple in one scene.None too sure about the killing animals on screen though, they don’t actually show the chicken’s head being cut off but you see a head drop. I am well aware it is part of the shock value of some of these movies to show live animal deaths just to get a reaction out of the audience. Most of the animals here are fake so its is not as big a thing.I do not even know how they managed to get the actors to do some of the things in this movie, as in chew raw chicken guts, cut the arse off a chicken, chew it and throw it up, pass it on to the next person to chew on or lie naked under a swarm of maggots. If you just vomited in your mouth, then this is probably not the film for you.There are a series of these sorts of movies form Hong Kong in the 1980s and they do seem interesting and something different from the normal kung fu, comedies or dramas that I have seen in the past. I will try to see more of these movies in the future as I enjoyed this one.I would almost recommend this movie for kids if it wasn’t for the nudity and some of the gorier scenes, it almost reminds me of the Japanese movie House in that it never seems to change its tone even with the scenes that are meant to be serious. It does have the same magical quality to it that makes it special and one that I would recommend to people who are burnt out on the usual fare and what something very different.

Loads of gory guts, kickboxing matches, black magic curses, cheap conjured monsters, Buddhist missions and confusing storylines. This movie is pure lunacy; an acid trip of mixed concepts shoehorned into a single script and a glowing example of what marathoning cocaine could accomplish in the film industry in the early 80s. I enjoyed it.The Shaw Brothers know how to produce movies that will entertain, shock, titillate and offend. Not even 10 minutes into this movie and we’ve already seen a wild kickboxing match, a gangland double-cross is trumped by the sudden appearance of a sprinkler Water God, and a rather raunchy of... you know. And that’s before Chan Hung’s nearly-killed brother demands that his brother defeat the Thai boxer Ba Bo that crippled him in a fight. So naturally, Hung issues a challenge and Ba Bo (Bolo Yeung) accepts.Much to my surprise, there are actually decent fight scenes in this movie—even some long cuts with a constant exchange of attacks. They’re nothing spectacular, but far better than I’d expect from a horror movie! Watch out for Bolo Yeung (Bloodsport, Double Impact) who was basically playing a younger Chong Li, fighting just as dirty and getting just as riled up with crowd love. That dude was a force of nature.But truly, the silly, dumb and nonsensical shifts hard into gear once we are introduced to the black magic practitioner and his undead bony pet bat. There are stop-motion bat skeletons, a cursed man appears to be covered in paste and balloon-pustules, a goopy guts-covered skull gives hacky-sack spiders a stinger and proboscis, the corpse of a murdered Buddhist holy man guides Hung, Hung literally vomits a live leopard eel, and the black magician eats guts and vomit in order to conjure a slimy disembodied goblin head from some gross gobbeldygoop.Amidst all this madness, Hung becomes a Buddhist monk because he’s told he must and does his best to avenge his brother and now also appease the spirit of a recently deceased higher order monk. So now Hung has two very different goals with very different adversaries. The pinnacle of weirdness is when the bad guy magically has his own head tear away from his body and attempt to strangle Hung with its dangling guts (reminding me of Mystics in Bali). This movie actually has quite a few scenes featuring lots of chonky stringy gooey guts. The crocodile disembowelment scene is truly a gross spectacle of slippery sloppy gore.Oh, but wait, this was originally all about a kickboxing match and revenge, wasn’t it? So back to that plotline, Hung faces Ba Bo in the ring. And even though he wins, some curse means he has to now win yet another another match! Or so says a random Buddhist monk. But because Hung broke a Buddhist vow (i.e., chastity), he needs to go find some relic for atonement. This is so convoluted. Meanwhile, more black magic monks are at work. A maggot-covered corpse is hatched from a bloated dead crocodile to reveal a very naked women who is revivified by black magic monks feeding her nasty goopy regurgitated food. This… is… gross!She turns out to be some kind of scantily-clad sorceress who conjures a giant crocodile puppet and some bodily-orifice-invading death caterpillars before inducing a weird sort of birth scene which produces “Seram wrap mummies” which then immediately commit suicide to create diminutive cyclopean Brontosaurus things that shoot lasers at a sacred Buddha statue… which is bad. By the time Hung “wins” we are so lost in all the different bad guys and hurdles and goals that we don’t even realize that he’s accomplished his goal(s).This movie is pure lunacy; an acid trip of mixed concepts shoehorned into a single script and a glowing example of what marathoning cocaine could accomplish in the film industry in the early 80s. God bless the Shaw Brothers and, of course, director Chih-Hung Kuei (Curse of Evil, Bewitched, Corpse Mania). This was really something.

Honestly must be seen to be believed. I mean, what kind if drugs were they smoking when they made this, cause everyone clearly had to be high at every stage of this WONDEROUS creation.

great gore kung fu if you like gore than this is a must have dvd i say buy it now

Over the top occult horror from the Shaw Brothers. Lots of grotesque imagery and fun action. If you are a fan of low budget horror and don't mind "goopey" and gross effects, it's a fun ride.

It pains me to ever give a Shaw Brothers film such a negative review but 1 star was all I could muster... even after reading all the other well-written reviews stating why I should be giving it at least 4. This one truly suprised me. It contains martial arts, horror, gore, and the always enjoyable Lung Wei Wang (THE Master Of The Flying Guillotine himself) and Bolo Yeung (needs no clarification!)... so what went wrong? Probably the fact that everything I mentioned above is so poorly done or underutilized that your left with a mess of a movie and a look of dissapointment (or disbelief) on your face. You get a little fighting here and a little horror there but mostly you get really bad set pieces and special effects that make most of the generic Italian exploitation films from the same era look like documentaries! I don't know though? Maybe I was expecting too much (or maybe I should have been drunk) because I seem to be the only reviewer who didn't enjoy this? If you are looking for action, genuine chills, or even a movie to gross you out then this isn't the one... if you want something to watch with alcohol and friends this may be worth some laughs but even those won't last very long (try Bolo or Fearless Fighters instead for more enjoyment and near endless chuckles in those scenarios).

Absolutely batsh*t insane Shaw Brothers black magic shocker. Ko Fei fights Bolo Yeung and a black magician, in quite different ways. The first hour is a head trip, light on dialogue and heavy on weird black magic. It would probably have been better if it ended after the boxing match and remained a short head scratcher, as there is about 20 minutes of dead time after, but things do get trippy again at the end.

no, really. when the wizard is exhorting the tiny skeleton bat to do better, i'm so, so happy this movie exists and that i have it on dvd. it's beautiful and cool and surprising and weird, there are few movies i'd turn to faster to watch with someone i've never seen a movie with before.