THE HEROIC TRIO 1992
A film review by Timothy Voon
Copyright 1998 Timothy Voon
2 :-) :-) for fighting chics
Starring: Michelle Yeoh, Anita Mui, Maggie Cheung, Damian Lau, Anthony Wong Paul Chin, James Pak, Shiguan Ren Directed by: Johnny To Kei-Fung Action Director: Ching Siu-Tung Written by: Sandy Shaw
The only reason why I came across this China Town kung-fu, girl chic flick was because my eyes caught the name Michelle Yeoh on the front cover. A recent convert fan of hers since Bond James Bond, I couldn't help myself but indulge. Fantasy and fascination are quite becoming when there are plenty of flying, fighting women in leathers lighting the screen. So I had a picnic with this movie raging war faring women.
Somebody in modern time Hong Kong is stealing all the babies in town. This has something vaguely to do with the search for the next Chinese Emperor and a prophecy resurrecting Chinese world domination. All pretty unconvincing, mumbo jumbo Chinese fiction, so let's forget about the plot and focus on the women.
Wonder woman (Anita Mui) wears a rather flimsy purple two piece suit, with matching cloak and mask. Boring! Nothing as sexy as the US version of the one piece, flag drag outfit, with wonder belt, lasso and head piece. Otherwise, Mui knows how to give good kick and glass eyed looks of emotion when a baby cacks it, and the music, the music really swells with the moment.
Now to Invisible Woman, my favourite actress Michelle Yeoh is dressed in divine red. What makes her outfit by far the best, is the use of excessive wind to blow lots of cloth about. She doubly knows how to kick arse and when it comes to tragedy, the scale of wind is increased to blow petals of flowers around the room – to remind her of the lover who wanted to smell roses before he died. Hmmmm?
Then there is the effervescent, ever boisterous, femme fatale Maggie Cheung – nicknamed the Thief Catcher - very sexy and very butch. Cheung delightfully contrasts the dramatic styles of the other two females. She is all playfulness and gives the movie cheek, as Mui represents sensibility and Yeoh emits tragedy.
So the ending is all together great fun, as these Amazon sisters combine to fight a demon reminiscent of the original TERMINATOR – no matter what you do he keeps coming back. Making this funfest of female action unbelievably exciting.
Timothy Voon e-mail: stirling@netlink.com.au http://us.imdb.com/M/reviews_by?Tim+Voon http://www.labyrinth.net.au/~bouclier/week/movies.html
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