After finishing his latest movie, Jose Mojica Marins gives an interview. He’s asked, “Does Coffin Joe exist?” Surely the answer is no. But then a camera light explodes and we wonder, Well, perhaps…”

Mains stays with a friend to write his next movie, The Demon Exorcist.

Everything seems normal at Alvaro’s house. His father Mr. Julio is a nice old man planting flowers, Alvaro’s wife Lucia seems kind and his daughters Betinha, Luciana, and Vilma all seem quite normal. But at night, Mr. Julio tears off his shirt and screams that he has come to collect a debt. The Christmas tree is filled with snakes and spiders. And a mysterious woman keeps intruding into everyone’s thoughts. She just stands there, holding a cat, posed in front of a photo of Coffin Joe.

That’s when the secrets all come out. Lucia shares that Vilma is the daughter of a witch and has been promised to her other child Eugenio, whose father is Satan. Vilma wants to marry Carlo and this enrages the witch, who gave her the child to cover up Alvaro’s lack of being able to impregnate her.

Roosters get their heads bitten clean off, the fiancee nearly dies in car crashes and a naked Vilma knocks out Marins, who awakens to a Black Mass presided over by Coffin Joe, who exhorts “May the blood of those who don’t deserve to live burst out of their bodies! May lightning burn the scum!” Then Coffin Joe walks up a living staircase of naked women who jubilantly dance after he steps across their backs, joining Vilma and Eugenio in unholy matrimony as scenes of cannibalism, torture and dismemberment fill the screen. Up next, young Betinha is to be killed, but Marins finds a crucifix and screams, “I believe in God!”

The witch and her son die as Coffin Joe is exorcised from Marins. All is well, as everyone gathers for the Christmas feast. All except for Betinha. The camera zooms into her eye and there is Coffin Joe, laughing and as always, superior.

A Christmas movie, an Exorcist rip-off, a Coffin Joe sequel all in one movie. How magical is that?

Some consider this the fifth film in the Mr. Vampire series. It stars Lam Ching-ying as Uncle Feng. Seeing as how he’s the hero — he’s also in the second and third movies in the Mr. Vampire films, as well as Vampire vs, Vampire and Encounters of the Spooky Kind II — you can figure out why this movie is tied to those films.

Uncle Feng is a retired policeman leading a quiet and beautiful life in Tung Ping Chau who still occasionally reports to his boss, Chief Inspector Ma (Wu Ma). His next door neighbor asks Feng to make the trip to Hong Kong to bring back the body of her daughter. She was a stewardess who the cops shot after she was accused of smuggling drugs. That’s when he learns the truth: she was already dead when the cops shot her, the thrall of a Japanese sorceress (Michiko Nishiwaki, Passionate Killing in the Dream, In the Line of Duty 3) who is killing others and enslaving them as undead workers for her drug business.

Feng has to team with a young cop, Sargent Yam (Wilson Yam), and find the secret altar of the Sorceress and stop her with his Taoist magic. Director Stephen Tung combines comedy, wild magic fights and martial arts into one incredibly entertaining film.

That said — there is one moment of near-cat abuse, so when you see a black cat on screen and you are easily upset by animals in danger, look away. It’s not comfortable watching a cat get nearly hung, even though one hopes it was well taken care of when the scene was over.

The last twenty minutes of this movie are completely out of control and as a fan of both Lam Ching-ying and Michiko Nishiwaki, I couldn’t help but be in a great mood after this was over. Just total fun and a great mix of modern cop action and traditional magic and martial arts.

As always, 88 Films has the best looking releases both on your shelf and in your blu ray player. Extras include a limited edition slipcase and double sided poster, audio commentary by Frank Djeng and Marc Walkow, an alternative Taiwanese cut with a different score, an interview with Tung Wei, an image gallery and a trailer. You can get it from MVD.

Known in Holland as Gebroken Spiegels, Broken Mirrors is split between two stories. In one, Diane (Lineke Ripman) and Dora (Henriette Tol) are Amsterdam brothel workers at the Happy House Club who begin to tire of their lives. And in the other, a housewife named Bea (Edda Barends) is kidnapped by one of the johns and is slowly starved to death while her captor takes photographic evidence.

Directed and written by Marleen Gorris (A Question of Silence), this film sets forth the belief that all women are captives of men, whether that means that the patriarchy that they’ve created or quite literally the situation in the second story.

Dora explains to Diane that these men rent their bodies, not who they are, so they don’t need to give them anything more than seconds of fumbling sex. They’re supported by the lady of the house, Ellen (Coby Stunnenberg), who allows them to turn down customers and gives them a line to call for help.

Bea is in a strikingly similar situation and knows that she’s going to die. But if she does, she will only give the killer brief moments and none of the emotion that he craves. He only has her body as well, not who she is.

It’s also worth noting that we see the women’s faces, learn their emotions and become sympathetic to them, but never really see many of the men, even the killer. They are near-silent and almost always anonymous.

The Cult Epics blu ray release of this movie has a new 4K HD transfer from the original 35mm negative, commentary by film scholar Peter Verstraten and an interview with American sex worker Margo St. James. You can get it from MVD.

Directed by Kwak Jeong-deok, Night of the Assassin is the story of a killing machine named Lee Nan (Shin Hyeon-jun), who discovers that he has a deadly, long-dormant health condition. As he goes into hiding to seek the magical herb that can heal him — mahwangcho — he learns that he can’t stay hidden for long, as the restaurant owner Seon-hong and her son Chil-bok who took him in are under threat.

Now that Lee Nan is sick, it’s easy for the women and her son to only see him as a beggar. But to the other killers, he’s now a target, as they may finally have an advantage against him. Well, his doctor said he can never fight again. Or be with a woman. He better find that healing herb soon, right?

Just a simple waiter at Seon-hong’s cafe, Lee Nan must eventually battle gang boss Ibang (Lee Moon-sik), who has the locals all hooked on opium and whose bandits are keeping him from seeking his cure. All the while, Lee Nan is going through a crisis of the soul, wondering if this is his punishment for a life spent killing others.

I really enjoy this movie. It feels kind of like a fairy tale and does a great job of presenting the emotional toll that being a bad ass action hero must put on your soul.

Night of the Assassin is available on DVD and blu-ray from Well Go USA. It’s also streaming on Hi-YAH!

It took more than thirty years, but Coffin Joe was finally able to complete his story that began in At Midnight I’ll Take Your Soul and This Night I’ll Possess Your Corpse. Creator and star José Mojica Marins felt that since he compromised on the sending of the second film, he was cursed. Now, he could finally tell the story.

After being released from a mental ward, Coffin Joe is taken care of by his most loyal servant Bruno (Rui Rezende), who along with four fanatics has been waiting for the return of the master. Of course, his order is simple: bring the perfect woman and continue the blood.

There are so many women and so little time. Like eugenist Dr. Hilda (Cléo De Páris), who is drugged and hallucinates that Coffin Joe is feeding her one of her ass cheeks. Or a young gypsy woman named Elena (Nara Sakarê) who willingly gives herself to him.

But all is not snakes and spiders in Brazil. Coronel Claudiomiro Pontes (Jece Valadão), a police captain blinded by Coffin Joe when he escaped his fate at the end of This Night I’ll Possess Your Corpse — young Joe is played by superfan Raymond Castile — and Father Eugênio (Milhem Cortaz), a priest who is the son of Dr. Rudolfo from At Midnight I’ll Take Your Soul, have joined forced to destroy the undertaker forever.

Coffin Joe is also dealing with the ghosts of his many victims, including Terezinha and Lenita from At Midnight I’ll Take Your Soul and Laura from This Night I’ll Possess Your Corpse. He’s also been cursed by Elena’s witch aunts, which turns the opportunity to make love to Elena into a trip through a gigantic intestine into a meeting with the Mystifier (José Celso Martinez Corrêa), who shows Coffin Joe purgatory and Hell, as well as a vision of his death.

As the police close in, Joe escapes through the woods and into an amusement park where he kills the cop but is impaled through the heart by the priest. He’s convinced that he’s killed Coffin Joe, but you can’t kill an idea. His shadow comes loose from his body to chase the priest while Elena mounts the dying body of our, well, hero and his hands, trembling in the throes of death, hold her breasts.

Coffin Joe’s funeral should be sad, but as we see the women throw roses at his grave, so many of them have continued the blood and are filled with his heirs. The gravestone is shattered by lightning and multiple faces of Coffin Joe appear within it.

For being seventy years old. José Mojica Marins in no way took it easy in this. It’s the bloodiest of all the films and the most complete. Not the best — I really think This Night I’ll Possess Your Corpse is incredible — but I had a total blast watching it. It’s a return that is in no way unwelcome or one that feels like it doesn’t belong.