A cat from outer space teams up with a young alien girl and her knight, along with a novelist named Wisely, to fight an alien that possesses people.

Sounds pretty simple, but from that description, you have no idea just how strange things can get. Based on Old Cat by Ni Kuang, this is like The Hidden with a cat. 

Wisely (Waise Lee) is a writer who comes into contact with a girl named Princess (Gloria Yip) and her cat, General (is this a Cat’s Eye reference?) and a knight named Errol (Lau Siu-ming). They’ve robbed an archaeological find called the Octagon, hoping to use it in their quest. As it is, Wisely is writing their story, even if he only knows them from afar. That soon changes as Wisley and his friend Li Tung (Lawrence Lau) help them battle the shape-shifting and possessing Star Killer.

This is berserk, filled with neon colors, goopy monsters, eyeball destruction, glittery cats, people set on fire and everything else you want from Hong Kong cinema. The scene where the cat battles a dog in a junkyard took six months to create. It’s just a few moments on screen.

If you like this Wisely story, check out The Seventh Curse, a perhaps even more deranged film. It shares the same director as this movie, Lam Ngai Kai. He also made The Ghost Snatchers, Erotic Ghost Story, and another of the oddest films ever made, Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky.

The limited edition 88 Films Blu-ray features a rigid slipcase with new art by Sean Longmore, a 40-page book, a premium art card, audio commentary by Frank Djeng, an interview with Gordon Chan, and an image gallery. You can get it from MVD.

After they both accidentally insult their boss, Tin (Paul Chun), Hsia “Little Monster” (Yuen Biao), who works for the Criminal Investigation Division (CID) of the Royal Hong Kong Police Force, and new partner Lei Kung “Mustache” (Lowell Lo) are given the assignment of finding a missing witness. Only that man’s girlfriend, Rosa (Lu Hsiao-Fen), knows where he is. Little Monster doesn’t help his new partnership when he falls in love with Kung’s sister Lui Lui (Kara Hui). And the case gets dark when Rosa’s lover is killed, and our heroes have to protect her.

Luckily, the girls are way smarter than they are, even if the guys do end up having to save them by the end. The odds are against them, including an entire building of Wang Ping Tang’s (James Tien Chun) henchmen in a warehouse ready to kill them. But seeing as this is an enjoyable action-comedy directed by “Joe” Cheung, things will work out just fine. 

The 88 Films limited-edition Blu-Ray of Rosa features a new 2 K restoration from the original negative, commentary by David West, an image gallery, and a trailer. It comes in a rigid slipcase with new artwork by Sean Longmore, and includes a 40-page perfect-bound book and a premium artcard. You can get it from MVD.

Based on the Dark Horse comic book by John Arcudi and Doug Mahnke, The Mask was directed by Chuck Russell (A Nightmare on Elm Street Part 3: Dream Warriors, The Blob, Eraser) and written by Mike Werb from a story by Michael Fallon and Mark Verheiden. Was it a success, despite having newcomers Jim Carrey and Cameron Diaz in the leads? You bet. It made $352 million on an $18 million budget.

Stanley Ipkiss (Carrey) is a bank teller who everyone abuses. But for some reason, when gangster Dorian Tyrell (Peter Greene) sends his girl Tina (Diaz) into his bank to take photos for a robbery, she falls for him. Even his best friend, Charlie Schumaker (Richard Jeni), is surprised.

Things are looking up for Stanley, who soon finds a wooden mask that transforms him into a green engine of madness. He’s soon chased by Detective Lieutenant Mitch Kellaway (Peter Reigert) and newspaper reporter Peggy Brandt (Amy Yasbeck), who want to figure out who this new crime player is and how he ties into the coming war between Tyrell and his boss Niko (Orestes Matacena).

Russell and Werb turned the violent comic book into a romantic comedy, complete with Stanley performing “Cuban Pete” at a nightclub while dodging cops and robbers. A dog turns into The Mask, Tyrell becomes a giant monster (that’s Jeep Swenson, who also played Bane in the abortive Batman and Robin), and Carrey went all out in this, becoming a living special effect. He was only paid $450,000 for this and had to act even though he was violently ill with the flu at one point.

While Son of the Mask was a flop, Carrey and Diaz have discussed a sequel as late as 2025.

The Arrow Video 4K UHD of this film has a 4K restoration of the film from the original camera negative by Arrow Films approved by director Chuck Russell, two archive audio commentaries (Chuck Russell alone and Russell with New Line co-chairman Bob Shaye, screenwriter Mike Werb, executive producer Mike Richardson, producer Bob Engelman, ILM VFX supervisor Scott Squires, animation supervisor Tom Bertino and cinematographer John R. Leonetti); new interviews with Russell, Mike Richardson, Mike Werb, Mark Verheiden, visual effects supervisor Scott Squires, editor Arthur Coburn, Amy Yasbeck and choreographer Jerry Evans; a video essay by critic Elizabeth Purchell on canine sidekick Milo; archival features; deleted scenes; a trailer; an image gallery; an illustrated collector’s booklet featuring new writing on the film by Alexandra Heller-Nicholas and original production notes; a double-sided fold-out poster featuring two original artwork options and six postcard-sized reproduction artcards. You can get it from MVD.

As one of the first hip hop movies, this groundbreaking film, directed and produced by Charlie Ahearn, features a legendary cast of scene figures, including Adam “Ad-Rock” Horowitz, Fab Five Freddy, Lee Quiñones, Lady Pink, The Rock Steady Crew, The Cold Crush Brothers, Rammellzee with Shockdell, Queen Lisa Lee of Zulu Nation, Grandmaster Flash, and ZEPHYR.

Raymond Zoro (Lee Quiñones) doesn’t want to sell out like other graffiti artists who are taking hip hop culture to the masses and becoming part of New York City’s trendy art scene. But that’s pretty much just the basics that the story revolves around, as it is a ramshackle narrative that gets into dance, art and music, all elements of the scene. It’s a hangout more than a story.

Debbie Harry was going to play Virginia, which would have made the scenes of her driving around to Blondie’s “Pretty Baby” and the use of “Rapture” mean something more than they did. Chris Stein from Blondie also helped create the soundtrack, collaborating with Fab Five Freddy to produce the actual breakbeats used in the film, “an inspired decision that would provide a source of obsession among crate diggers for decades to come.”

The Arrow Video 4K UHD of this film has a perfect bound collector’s book featuring new and archival essays and articles, alongside an extensive collection of stills and artwork from the film, a reversible sleeve featuring two original artwork options, a double-sided foldout poster featuring two original artwork options, an exclusive mini-version of the Wild Style issue of Hip-Hop Family Tree comic book by Ed Piskor and three Wild Style logo stickers. There’s a new 4K restoration from the original 16mm negative by Arrow Films, new audio commentary with Jeff “Chairman” Mao and Andrew “Monk One” Mason, legacy commentary featuring director Charlie Ahearn and Fred “Fab 5 Freddy” Brathwaite, a feature on the soundtrack, a trailer and an image gallery, as well as interviews with most of the cast, panel discussions and exhibits from the anniversary event and videos, as well as a CD that has a Wild Style Megamix by Jorun Bombay, original radio commercials by Fab 5 Freddy and Queen Lisa Lee, rare alternate mixes of Subway Rap and Wild Style Theme, audio outtakes from the film and soundtrack and a 1983 radio interview with Charlie Ahearn. You can get it from MVD.

Tulsa Terrors is all about the direct-to-video horror boom of the mid-1980s, which was sparked in Tulsa, Oklahoma, and led by United Entertainment (now VCI Entertainment, which released this) and its founder, Bill Blair.

Starting with Blood Cult, Blair’s idea to produce films exclusively for home video revolutionized the industry, leading to a wave of low-budget genre films that bypassed theatrical release. You know, SOV. And yes, I know that Boardinghouse was SOV first, but it was made for theaters, not video. Same as Sledgehammer, which was created for video, but not advertised as such, like Blood Cult.

This film features interviews with everyone who was there and covers many of the movies you know and love. You’ll learn how Blair approached Christopher and Linda Lewis with The Sorority House Murders and the idea to film on video, just like a soap opera. After all, he had two Betacams and Sony editing equipment. And you’ll get to see moments from the films, like The Ripper, Revenge, Toe Tags, Branded and The Stitcher.

If you have any love for SOV, consider this an essential watch.

You can get this from MVD.

Directed by Alex Cheung, this features Eden (James Yi Lui), a private eye, and Li Tien Zhen (Cherie Chung) meeting when they both decide to jump in front of a train. He’s depressed at where life has taken him, and she’s been kidnapped by a UFO and lost her virginity, which ruins her marriage to Mr. Kwok (David Lo). And then, it becomes a series of sketches, including car crashes and a scene that is totally Marilyn in The Seven Year Itch.

Wuxia and martial arts weren’t selling, so Shaw Brothers was looking for something to replace those types of movies, so they were co-producing movies like Inseminoid and Blade Runner. This is a bunch of things thrown in a pot: a werewolf, a food fight, Close Encounters, music videos, some aliens, romance, a Star Wars parody, comedy and martial arts. 

It doesn’t all work, but when the hero pulls his shirt open to reveal the Shaw Brothers logo, I laughed.

The Arrow Video release of this film, part of the Shaw Scope Volume 4 set, features a high-definition (1080p) Blu-ray presentation, newly restored in 2K from the original negatives by Arrow Films. It has commentary by martial arts cinema expert Frank Djeng, an interview with director/co-writer Alex Cheung and a newly filmed appreciation by film scholar Victor Fan. You can get this set from MVD.

I think I’ve seen all the Shaw Brothers non-supernatural films, and the HK Database says that this is a drama, so…let’s just agree that it may have demons and magic, but it’s kind of its own thing.

Long Fei (Jason Piao Pai) left behind the world of martial arts fisticuffs and now lives in a secluded mountain studio, where he and his assistant, Fatty (Wong Chun), have spent five years carving a woman out of crystal. Long Fei wishes that his woman had a soul, so he adds some blood because, you know, nothing bad would happen, and of course, everything bad in this movie happens as the crystal woman (Yu-Po Liu) starts killing people.

Masked Poison Yama (Wei Hao Ting) and his son (Yu Hsiao) want to kill Long Fei, so they spend much of the movie inside a treehouse lab where they mix plants, snake venom — yes, the film shows us it being extracted, it’s a Shaw Brothers movie — and animals to make a poison that blows people up from inside their stomach. Yes, they show it. You know you want it.

Yet the son is soon killed by the crystal female, and Yama declares revenge on everyone, first using poison gas to kill everyone in the family of former fighter Prince Tian Di (Jung Wang). As this is all going on, he sends his men, White Judge and Black Judge, after Long Fei and Fatty, who are hiding out in an inn where the owner decapitates people and serves their flesh.

This movie is, well, absolutely wild. There are battles in a graveyard, a school of masked female assassins, wire-assisted swordplay and every character coming together for one final battle. I just realized that Hus Shan also directed Inframan, Kung Fu Zombie and Dynamo. Yeah, that makes sense even if this movie doesn’t — like, how is the crystal woman related to the assassin academy? — but who cares? It looks good, it moves fast, and it’s super weird.

The Arrow Video release of this film, part of the Shaw Scope Volume 4 set, has a high definition (1080p) Blu-ray presentation, newly restored in 2K from the original negatives by Arrow Films. You can get this set from MVD.

A black magic sorcerer is just trying to dig up some bones for his latest spell when he’s chased by a group of angry citizens, right into the cab of our hero, Chau. He lives through getting hit by the car, but tells the cab driver that he’s about to go through some bad luck.

And just like that, Chau’s wife starts sleeping with a gambler who really doesn’t care about her, even leaving her in a bad part of town where she’s assaulted and killed, falling out a window to her death, her spirit calling to Chau via his CB radio.

That’s when Chau decides that it’s time to find that black magic dude and get some horrible, horrible revenge.

The spell that ensues is so powerful, it blows the lid off Chau’s wife Irene’s coffin. There’s also corpse sex and a monster baby sent to destroy the two villains who dared to ruin Chau’s life. And he also learns that the more magic he uses, the more his body pays the price.

Look, a ghost has sex with a reanimated corpse over a black magic altar, a tentacled demon baby runs around, and a toilet blows up real good. It’s not the best movie you’ve ever seen, but it may be the goopiest, the kind of film that tells The Thing, “Oh yeah? Hold my San Miguel.”

The Arrow Video release of this film, part of the Shaw Scope Volume 4 set, has a high definition (1080p) Blu-ray presentation, newly restored in 2K from the original negatives by Arrow Films. It has commentary by critic James Mudge. You can get this set from MVD.

The first film by Lung Yi-sheng, this is the tale of Yuan Fei, the Flying Monkey (Chin Siu-ho), who takes on the challenge of finding a weapon that can defeat the Demon Lute, a weapon made from dinosaur muscles. In his journey, he meets swordswoman Feng Ling, the Rainbow Sword (Kara Wai), the drunken Old Naughty and his scissors, the Woodcutter and his son Doraemon, called that because he carries around a Doraemon doll.

They will battle  The Long Limb Evil, a demon who has an arm that can keep growing; the One Eyed Dragon, who has a crazy spider eyepatch; Red-Haired Devil, who can attack with his afro and the demonic lute itself, which becomes a transparent hand with six fingers that keeps grabbing for our heroes before they use the only weapon can stop it, a bow that was jammed into the stone wall of a cave.

There’s a dog-pulled chariot, a rainbow sword, gigantic axes, and wirework fights made for kids, all set to 80s guitar-driven music. There are some people online who have given this poor reviews, and what kind of heartless creep do you have to be to watch something so perfect and judge it that way?

The Arrow Video release of this film, part of the Shaw Scope Volume 4 set, has a high definition (1080p) Blu-ray presentation, newly restored in 2K from the original negatives by Arrow Films. It has commentary by martial arts cinema expert Frank Djeng. You can get this set from MVD.

Made two years before Ghostbusters, this early Lau Kar-Wing supernatural comedy (one of two he did for Shaw Brothers) has Bao Tuo (Hsiao Ho) and his cousin Zhou Peng (Cheung Chin-Pang) scamming people as fake ghostbusters. As you can imagine, they end up fighting real apparitions. A screwed up exorcism leads to the death of a client and her haunting them…and that’s just the beginning.

This may be wackier than some like, and the script is totally all over the place, but hiding ghosts inside umbrellas, possessed gamblers using that supernatural event to cheat and win money, and supernatural spectral battles should keep you on board. Sure, Golden Harvest did these sorts of movies better — Mr. Vampire, Encounter of the Spooky Kind — but this should at the very least keep you interested.

The Arrow Video release of this film, part of the Shaw Scope Volume 4 set, features a high-definition (1080p) Blu-ray presentation, newly restored in 2K from the original negatives by Arrow Films. You can get this set from MVD.