Do not buy region 1 iron monkey!

[Guest DVD Spree]

Howdy y'all.

 

Looks like there won't be a proper news update this week, so I thought I may as well drop by.

 

I know that Hong Kong flicks are all the rage in the US since  Crouching Tiger, and Iron Monkey has just got a Region 1 release. Well, if you were thinking of buying it, DON'T!!!!

 

The Region 2 release is from Hong Kong Legends, and is WAAAAY better; remastered, anamorphic transfer, 5.1 track, production gallery, interview gallery with Donnie Yen, trailers, animated bios - in other words, infinitely more than the barebones R1 release. Well, except for the Quentin Tarantino interview (I'm guessing he talks about everything HK except how he completely ripped off City on Fire to make Reservoir Dogs).

 

Jus so ya no.

Jay Spree

[Guest starvenger]

That's generally the case with most HK flicks that get released here.  I've no idea why.  The best region 1 DVD I've seen for HK flicks was Tokyo Raiders, which was quite loaded...

[Guest evenflowDDT]

Yay, it's Jay! Thanks for the info... its actually sad how many bare-bones releases in R1 and U.S. there are.  One specific (non-HK) example that comes to mind is Ginger Snaps.  I rented it and was going to write a review of it tonight (probably still am), whining about a lack of special features and crappy transfer, when I read that the Canadian version has a much better transfer and a bunch of special features.  And yet they can give Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring 4 DVDs?

[Guest starvenger]

Well, let's face it - HK cinema is still very much a niche market.  We're probably lucky that we get as much as we do now.

[Guest Karnage]

Well once you find the HK version of Iron Monkey, you gotta figure out if its a bootleg or not.

[Guest pinnacleofallthingsmanly]

I thought you were going to say don't buy it because Iron Monkey sucks the big one. I didn't like it and I saw it in 1999 so you can imagine how shocked I was when I saw that they were releasing it over here. I thought I had escaped the pestilence, but I was wrong. I don't like the idea of a movie where humans can fly and do all types of other stupid unrealistic shit unless there is a reasonable explanation why. A movie like the Matrix and the One I can understand and I am actually looking forward to Zu Warriors, but if you are supposed to have human characters in a regular environment, please don't have them flying through the air.

[Guest starvenger]

>Well once you find the HK version of Iron Monkey, you gotta figure out if its a bootleg or not.

 

If you get it in Chinatown and it cost you $15, it's probably a bootleg.  

 

>I don't like the idea of a movie where humans can fly and do all types of other stupid unrealistic shit unless there is a reasonable explanation why. A movie like the Matrix and the One I can understand and I am actually looking forward to Zu Warriors, but if you are supposed to have human characters in a regular environment, please don't have them flying through the air.

 

Many of the HK movies (and serials) set in ancient China mix fantasy with reality, hence all the flying and other wire techniques.  So it's not a "regular environment" per se, and that may be where your dislike of the genre comes into play.

[Guest DVD Spree]

Oops, a little late - been out of the internet loop for a while!

 

Region 1 territories get TOTALLY screwed when it comes to HK cinema. I know it's still a relatively niche market, but so are French films with subtitles, and they don't get hacked to pieces by distributors (coughBEUNAVISTAsplutter).

 

As for teh fantasy stuff in HK flicks, I can take it or leave it. It's a pretty traditional feature in HK cinema - it was actually Bruce Lee's films that made them "out of style" for a time, before they made something of a comeback. ANd since Crouching Tiger, well...

 

I think Iron Monkey's release is largely because it feels a lot like CTHD - certainly the masked ninja getup and the flying. Although it is considered a classic by the HK film community. Sadly, I prefer the much trashier Storm Riders, which is kind of like Crouching Tiger but with Street Fighter II-style fireballs and special effects. Maaad crazy.

 

And as far as bootlegs go, there's a Chinese guy I know who buys DVDs for 50 pence (about a $0.71) loose with the cover, and 80 pence ($1.14) with a case. The odd one doesn't work, and they're sometimes missing a couple features, but for a BUCK? "I'd buy that for a dollar"...

 

Jay