Her Vengeance

"Her Venegeance" is easily one of the darkest HK films I have seen.The film is as great as I expected. Very dark and merciless and surprisingly anti-violent in its theme after all which is of course great thing and makes the film much more noteworthy piece of work. The violence is raw and the inhuman rape scene is shot in dark cemetery with incredibly dark blue lightning so the scene is as strong and intense as they come. Also veteran actor the late great Lam Ching Ying does a great role as a wheelchair bound uncle who first tries to make the protagonist forget her thoughts about revenge but after all starts to prefer revenge himself, too, and after that, the hell is on the loose and the final bloodbath is very insane again. Among the greatest HK dark thrillers of all time.So if you are a fan of extreme Asian cinema give this gem a look.9 out of 10.

Her Vengeance is a Hong-Kong rape and revenge movie directed by Ngai Choi Lam.This movie is entertaining as hell i not gonna lie there some scene in this movie i can watch over and over without feeling bore due to the over the top acting of every actor in this movie.From the violence rape scene to the gory revenge scene it all absolutely top notch and live up to the movie name but the main problem for me is the main character played by Siu-Fung Wong.She often bring death to people around her cause she so dumb as making decisions and lack of common sense.The movie end with a awesome fight at a bar with a crippled kung fu master played by the legendary Ching-Ying Lam is the highlight of this movie and probably stick with me forever

A woman gets raped by 5 ding dongs which results in her contracting AIDS thus seeking revenge with the help of a cripple. Her Vengeance is a remake. Oh, you didn't know that, did you? Yup! A remake of a 1973 Shaw Brothers movie Kiss Of Death. And subsequently, got ripped off (borrowed) later on by a Clint Eastwood movie called Sudden Impact. Anyways, was this remake better? Well, the original was highly exploitative and bizarre, bloodier, the violence was cringy with genital mutilations abound (it's a feminist puritans wet dream realized), left field stuff like using a deck of cards like throwing blades and so forth. Her Vengeance is darker and grittier and takes itself far more seriously but is a little less bloody (at least the Cat IIB version), the characters are less interesting, the pacing is slower and the death scenes were silly. Still, I think Her Vengeance was good but no where near as good as Kiss Of Death. Note: I reviewed the Category 2B version. The uncut version is out there to see and I will see it and hope it will change my mind a little because I love Nam Nai Choi movies, a lot!!!!

This is one of those rape/revenge flicks that comes from the East side of the world and still hasn't or a proper release on DVD. If you can catch a copy on VHS then , just like me, you will be annoyed by the subtitles. The translation is so badly done that most of the phrases are hard to understand. Nevertheless, I enjoyed this flick because it has a few cheesy moments. But before you go hunting for Her Vengeance be sure that you will get the full uncut version. I have seen the cut version, easier to get and the revenge and nudity is cut out.

It takes a while before the revenge comes in and you have to sit through silly conversations and the search for the victims to be slaughtered by the victim. The rape itself is shown on the full uncut version and it's not that brutal, yes, it's a rape but there's almost nothing shown. The brutality lays in the fact how it was shot. Close up from the men raping our victim. The reason for raping was just the fact that she asked the men to behave while they were visiting a bar she's working in.

After the rape she goes to visit her uncle in Hong Kong and it's there she comes across the ones who deserve to die. The revenge isn't that gory after all for a flick made at the end of the eighties. But what is worth seeing is her uncle sitting in a wheelchair. the cheesy part comes in when he is defending himself. And towards the end when he is training his abilities on a roof the believability of this flick moves away. But don't stop watching because he uses his skills at the final and that is worth seeing. Here it do becomes bloody and messy. The final, over 7 minutes was left out of the cut version so be aware! Readers have seen the word nudity well that also is only to see in the uncut version and I was surprised that it involved full frontal without the blurry vagina era typical for eastern flick. One of the victim drags in drugged women to perform a lesbian sex act but it soon turns into a trio. Don't get me wrong, it isn't erotic because it's being filmed to be sold as porn.

By now you now what to expect from Her Vengeance. A not so bloody flick, but towards the end the cheesy part comes in. Not a horror at all, more some kind of an exploitation.

Gore 1/5 Nudity 1,5/5 Effects 2,5/5 Story 3/5 Comedy 0/5

Hong Kong film maker Ngai Kai Lam's (aka Simon Nam and Laam Naai Choi) filmography includes gems like the ultra violent and outrageous prison action Story of Ricky (1992), a hysterically gory and fast paced jungle adventure The Seventh Curse (1986), Erotic Ghost Story (1990), Killer's Nocturn (1987) and The Peacock King (1989). His films are definitely among the most interesting to come out from Hong Kong and his style is usually so over-the-top and different so I think not everyone will appreciate his films. Her Vengeance (1988) is among his (and Hong Kong's) most noteworthy thrillers and a very dark piece of the whole HK film industry.

Her Vengeance stars Pauline Wong Siu Fung as young lady Chieh Ying who works at a night club. One night a bunch of five ugly and drunken men (played by HK actors Wong Ching, Billy Chow Bei-Lei, Shing Fui On, Shum Wai and Chan Ging) come to the bar and act very abruptly. They touch the ladies and also pay attention to Pauline, who sadly doesn't know what they have decided. Pauline soon goes home but is attacked on the dark streets by these five men who take her to a silent and menacingly dark cemetery where they rape her very brutally and violently. Still she survives and starts to think what next. It turns out she has been infected by a very serious venereal disease by the dirty rapists and she suffers terrible pain, too. Once her blind sister (Elaine Kam Yin-Ling) gets to know what has happened, they decide their mission is to revenge and kill those who abused Pauline. Their wheelchair bound uncle played by the late great Lam Ching Ying from the many "HK Vampire" films first tries to make Pauline forget the act and not continue the violence but his advice is not considered, until it is too late. In Her Vengeance, nothing can be achieved by violence and nobody can be safe from that. In Her Vengeance, after all, there are no "innocent" or "guilty" persons.

The film is written by Woo Suet Lai who has also written The Peacock King for Simon Nam. The film is visually stunning as can be expected from Hong Kong makers. Same year saw the light of day (or maybe not) also Alfred Cheung's dark On the Run (1988) starring Yuen Biao and Pat Ha, and that film belongs among the greatest HK crime noirs and dark thrillers ever with sudden bursts of violence and over all feel of depravity. Her Vengeance was shot by Kwan Chi Kan who has also shot films like Peacock King and Saga of the Phoenix (1990) again both films by Simon Nam. In Her Vengeance, the cinematography is brilliant at many points and the rape scene bathes in a very strong blue mist that makes the act look as brutal and strong as it is in real life, too. Also the religious elements in that scene give a unique impact to the scene and of course what happens after that. Also many bright lights are reflected to the asphalt in the tradition of the mentioned On the Run by Alfred Cheung and many other HK films that have this almost unique sense of visuals and different lights. The various scenes involving raining in Her Vengeance are very melancholic and depict the depravity of the situation very powerfully so the cinematography in the piece is among its strongest sides.

These visual elements are for me among the most important things in HK cinema in general because their usage of light and different kinds of mist and smoke is truly wonderful in the hands of the most talented makers. For example, the finale in Ringo Lam's City on Fire (1986) is among these scenes that hardly have any comparison from too many Western films. Also Billy Tang's hyper dark and merciless films like Run and Kill (1993), Red to Kill (1993) and his co-direction with first timer Danny Lee Dr. Lamb (1992) show his incredible sense of visual terror and menace. Also many of the recent Milky Way films from Patrick Yau and Johnnie To, especially their The Longest Nite (1998) masterpiece have a breath taking impact in their atmosphere created by lightning and darkness.

The characters are pretty great and have only very few irritating aspects and things that can be considered as over-acting. Pauline Wong's character has some exaggerated face expressions at times as she shows her hatred towards the men who raped her and again it would have been much more effective if she had acted a little more restrainedly. Lam Ching Ying's wheel chair uncle is calm and convincing as always and he is definitely among the most sympathetic HK faces I know. The rapists are ugly and dirty and fortunately don't act as idiotically as they could. The doctor who tells Pauline about her serious disease is among the film's most brutal and coldest characters as he just says without any empathy what will follow her and what kind of forms the disease may have. Without any visible reason, he acts very inhumanely. I think this doctor character should have been written differently as he is now completely unexplainedly unsympathetic and unmotivated character in the film that otherwise has pretty carefully written characters in it.

The ending is very strong piece of bloody Hong Kong carnage and the mayhem level is very high. The characters just hate and loathe each other so much that the act really looks like a bunch of wild animals let on the loose to kill each other, and that is also the theme of this film. Revenge and thoughts behind it. Nothing like this would have happened if Pauline's character had believed her uncle and not started to think about revenge, because like in real world, violence creates only more terror and hate and death comes only closer to you when you start thinking about revenge. When even Lam Ching Ying's character starts to think positively about the revenge at one point, it all has been lost and there is no way it can end happily anymore. The film is very pessimistic, almost nihilistic but honest all the time. At the end of the film, everyone is dead or dying and only one character can be seen walking away, but definitely not undamaged or in the condition he/she expected to be after the decided mission.

The violence is very strong throughout the film and the mentioned finale is the kind of hyper violence that can be found in Hong Kong cinema only, and elsewhere only very rarely. But it is not just low exploitation like some other Hong Kong revenge films like Johnny Wang Lung Wei's City Warriors (1988) or some of the more recent films like Aman Chang's insane Body Weapon (1999) or any other HK film which has violence which hasn't got any meaning other than itself. Her Vengeance's theme of weak human mind who searches for revenge is presented so that the brutal imagery has a meaning and at the end it is much more than just itself. Some of the killings are so planned and sadistic it is very difficult to like the revenging characters at all especially at the end when it is revealed what their deeds have resulted.

Her Vengeance belongs to the Hong Kong cinema type I appreciate perhaps the most. It is this dark, honest, non-humorous or entertainment oriented type that has its unique films in various genres like horror, action and thrillers. Her Vengeance has just very few flaws that don't earn it as high rating as possible, but still this is among the most noteworthy Hong Kong dark thrillers I have had the chance of seeing and at this point, it easily gets 8/10. As in most Hong Kong films, subsequent viewings are almost essential and that goes to Her Vengeance, too, even though this is pretty easy to see through only after one viewing.