I expected that "Killing Car" would be somewhat similar to "The Sidewalks of Bangkok" from the same director, because both have a crime story and an Asian actress in the leading role. I found these 2 movies are quite different, though.
"Killing Car" falls apart into several episodes. We are introduced to a few people at a junkyard who are killed by a female assassin (Tiki Tsang) shortly afterwards. We are introduced to more characters who get killed, too. And so it goes on and on until we finally receive at least a bit of information what it all was about. I believe the audience would have been grateful to get more information about the characters at the beginning. Bereft of this, viewers may become a bit impatient after a while, when the movie jumps from New York to Paris and nobody knows why. If I may compare again, "The Sidewalks of Bangkok" provided a better story line.
"Killing Car" is meant to be bleak and gritty, but there's no denying that it suffers from poor technical quality in some scenes. Towards the end it seems the negative (16 mm, I suppose) was damaged, also the sound is not very professional in some places (the gun shots, noise of steps, a few dialogs). A good job was done on the editing, though. The speedy cutting in the chase scene at the fair makes the action more fluently, the surprise cut to the killer who hid in the clock (fans recognize a reference to other Rollin movies) provides quite a shock, and the variation of visual rhythm creating insecurity and fear in the scene where a girl is locked in the house and electricity is cut reminds me of the Italian giallo style.
The strongest point of the movie is Tiki Tsang whose only movie this is, unfortunately. She appears like an angel of death, radiating with charisma. When the photographer at the studio accuses her of acting like she was dead, she agrees in cold blood. On the other hand, she is very sexy in her dance scene, so not wooden by any means.
To cut a long story short, "Killing Car" is not one of the Top 5 Rollin films, because it lacks the poetic perfection of "La Rose de Fer", for example. Still it has strong moments like the killing at the photo studio when a playful pose turns into the real thing, so for me it was worth the time!
"Killing Car" falls apart into several episodes. We are introduced to a few people at a junkyard who are killed by a female assassin (Tiki Tsang) shortly afterwards. We are introduced to more characters who get killed, too. And so it goes on and on until we finally receive at least a bit of information what it all was about. I believe the audience would have been grateful to get more information about the characters at the beginning. Bereft of this, viewers may become a bit impatient after a while, when the movie jumps from New York to Paris and nobody knows why. If I may compare again, "The Sidewalks of Bangkok" provided a better story line.
"Killing Car" is meant to be bleak and gritty, but there's no denying that it suffers from poor technical quality in some scenes. Towards the end it seems the negative (16 mm, I suppose) was damaged, also the sound is not very professional in some places (the gun shots, noise of steps, a few dialogs). A good job was done on the editing, though. The speedy cutting in the chase scene at the fair makes the action more fluently, the surprise cut to the killer who hid in the clock (fans recognize a reference to other Rollin movies) provides quite a shock, and the variation of visual rhythm creating insecurity and fear in the scene where a girl is locked in the house and electricity is cut reminds me of the Italian giallo style.
The strongest point of the movie is Tiki Tsang whose only movie this is, unfortunately. She appears like an angel of death, radiating with charisma. When the photographer at the studio accuses her of acting like she was dead, she agrees in cold blood. On the other hand, she is very sexy in her dance scene, so not wooden by any means.
To cut a long story short, "Killing Car" is not one of the Top 5 Rollin films, because it lacks the poetic perfection of "La Rose de Fer", for example. Still it has strong moments like the killing at the photo studio when a playful pose turns into the real thing, so for me it was worth the time!