A gangster is killed by a female assassin, Princess (Carrie Ng), who smashes his head with a pair of weights before shoots him in the groin.
Investigating the case, Detective Tinam (Simon Yam) correctly surmises that the killer is a woman, but his superior, who believe that Tinam should still be on leave after an accident where he shot his brother, is dismissive.
Later, Tinam goes to get a haircut. The hairdresser hits and abuses his pregnant girlfriend, causing Kitty (Chingamy Yau) to attacks him with susprising ability. Reluctantly, Tinam moves to arrest Kitty. She, however, gets his gun. This causes him to vomimt – ever since his brother's death he has been unable to hold or look at a gun.
Kitty lets Tinam go, or vice-versa, though they later meet up again for a date.
Back at home, Kitty is annoyed to see her step-mother picking on her father. Worse is to come, however, when Dad catches his wife in bed with a local gangster. He attacks the gangster, who throws him down the stairs to his death.
Kitty goes to avenge her father and kills the gangster and half his gunmen. Wounded and trying to make her escape, she heads for the car park with a hostage, Sister Cindy (Kelly Yao), who turns out to be a professional assassin. She kills the remaining gunmen and, thinking Kitty has what it takes to be a "cleaner", ridding the streets of rapists and perverts, takes the young orphan under her wing.
While Kitty undergoes her training and gets to know Sister Cindy, Princess is at work working her way through Hong Kong's lowlifes. Returning to the scene of the crime, she is briefly spotted by Tinam, who is still working on his female killer theory.
Kitty completes her first contract, killing a Yakuza called Taki. Assigned to the case, Tinam goes to follow a lead and visits one Vivian Chang, who looks remarkably like Kitty…
Meanwhile, a contract is placed on Kitty and Cindy, which Princess and her lover/underling Baby are eager to collect…
Perhaps best described as John Woo meets Basic Instinct , Naked Killer is an interesting example of Hong Kong exploitation cinema.
You get the impression that Category III specialist Wong Jing wrote the film by making a checklist of bankable elements to include – martial arts, gunplay, killer lesbians – which he then massaged into a script that director Clarence Ford couldn't take seriously and proceeded to interpret with tongue somewhat in cheek.
Whether one chooses to label Ford's treatment ironic, parodic or deconstructive, his handling is very impressive. Using solid blocks of saturated colour, quick-fire editing and odd camera angles, he gives the film the feel of a cartoon come to life, thereby making it clear that it's first and foremost about entertainment, not to be taken too seriously.
As a result Naked Killer manages to have its cake and eat it: Like a Russ Meyer film it presents fantasy situations for the unthinking viewer, but also leaves it up to more critical/reflexive viewers to decide if their presentation is so deliberately excessive as to highlight that they are merely fantasies.
Consider, for instance, the naming of Simon Yam's character as Timon: It translates as "iron man" – surely the most inappropriate name possible for a vulnerable cop who vomits every time he draws his weapon and is incapable of getting an erection.
This Region 2 DVD from Hong Kong Legends is up to their usual high standards.
First and foremost, fans will be pleased to hear that the film is presented uncut. The transfer is gorgeous, clean, grain-free and super-saturated with vibrant colours.
Moving on to the extras, one can sense that HKL had a bit of a problem: Chingamy Yau, now retired from the screen and settled into married life, was unlikely to be available to discuss the film or her career more generally.
Taking this into account, they've clearly done the best they can. On top of the usual trailers and animated menus and a short biography of Chingamy, we get a full-length commentary with stuntman Jude Proyer and director Clarence Ford and interviews with Ford, producer Wong Jing and leading man Simon Yam.
The commentary works pretty well, with Proyer painting the broader picture and Ford filling in the finer details. It turns out, for instance, that his main inspiration for the film was not Basic Instinct , which he had not seen at the time, but rather an old Shaw Brothers film from the 70s, Intimate Confessions of a Chinese Courtesan – though he was later offered the director's chair for Basic Instinct II .
Ford's interview, which provides additional detail on Naked Killer and his career more broadly is also worthwhile, as is Wong Jings, who impresses with his candour: He admits that commerce rather than art is foremost in his mind and that he'd rather make a 'C' film which cashes in on a trend than an 'A' film which doesn't and thereby bombs at the box office. Obviously a graduate of the Roger Corman school and a subscriber to William Goldman's dictum that "no one knows anything", the only thing one is not sure what to make of is his comments about the end of Hong Kong cinema and its incorporation into a wider Chinese cinema: Is this business, politics or an pragmatic acknowledgement of their interconnection.
Compared to the other two interviews, Simon Yam's is less interesting, feeling more a catalogue of teasers for other HKL releases strung together by uninformative comments about how so and so was good to work with.
But overall this is another excellent DVD from HKL, who really seem to be raising the bar here.
Copyright © K H Brown 2002-2005
Rating:
0.0 / 5
(0 votes)
|
10595 views
|
Previous
|
Next
|
Best prices on Naked Killer
|
Print
|
Email page