Mission of Justice
Reviewed by YTSL
This “Girls with Guns” effort is one that has
Moon Lee, Yukari Oshima, Carrie Ng, two other women whose names I, unfortunately,
do not know and -- in a bit role -- Sophia Crawford in its actually mainly
male as well as largely non-speaking extra-filled cast. For the most
part, it takes place in rural sections of Thailand. As many fans
of the under-respected genre that this 1992 movie is a fairly typical representative
of will be quick to recognize, these choices of locale can be taken as
a pretty sure sign of the Wang Chung Yeung helmed offering’s being a hardly
high concept or budget work; albeit one that is, happily enough, still
not likely to be as bottom of the barrel in quality as those productions
with Hong Kong movie actors and actresses in them that were shot in the
Philippines.
With a fight between Moon Lee and Gary Daniels
ensuing even before its largely untranslated into English opening credits
flash onto the screen, there is little doubt that MISSION OF JUSTICE is
one work whose makers realize that its main attractions are those action
scenes in which its feisty female stars prominently figure. Accordingly,
they duly provide the viewers of this thinly plotted offering with a bunch
of conflict-packed segments that, in at least one protracted instance,
feature the letting off of hundreds of rounds of ammunition and a bunch
of explosives (in the form of hand grenades and sticks of dynamite) but
more often contain examples of hand-to-hand combat whose variety primarily
stems from the scene’s setting, the gender of the battlers plus the number
of individuals involved in a skirmish.
As can be attested by my losing count of the number
of fights that MISSION OF JUSTICE possesses mid-way through my viewing
of it, the movie -- whose main plus basic plot-line involves two members
of the Anti-Crime League being assigned to go undercover by their commander
to foil a major opium smuggling-trading operation and catch its primary
mastermind and her partner(s) -- certainly does contain its fair share
of such. Lest anybody get unduly ecstatic by this report however,
due warning will be hereby given that I didn’t consider (m)any of those
that were on show in this offering -- despite their all being able to boast
of having at least one of Moon Lee, Yukari Oshima and one of the two fighting
femmes who had villain roles in the work being in the thick of the action
(N.B. In her butch uniform wearing role as Colonel Carry(!), Carrie Ng
is shown firing weapons and issuing commands but never in the kind of situation
where she has to throw a punch or kick) -- to be sufficiently satisfactorily
extended and/or particularly exciting.
At the risk of being accused of having favorites,
this (re)viewer will suggest that MISSION OF JUSTICE suffers quite a bit
from having the undeniably cute -- even when exhibiting remarkably questionable
fashion sense! -- Moon Lee (whose crime buster character, perhaps not incidentally,
is the only one who bears the same name as the actress who plays her) be
the one who has the most fight action as well as overall screen time.
This is not least because she seemed to be the sole performer who was noticeably
doubled in the film. Additionally, I really do reckon that this production’s
more accomplished fighting femmes are the admittedly less graceful but
surely more physically powerful Yukari Oshima (whose also apt to be horribly
attired “Bullet” character is made to come across as Moon’s equally fearless
but definitely less competent fellow undercover operative) and the often
stylishly attired actress who portrayed the movie’s multiple aliases-using
most wanted villain.
In what seems like a bid to add spice to an actioneer
that threatened to be too mundane, some truly bad guys (including the bespectacled
individual portrayed by Tommy Wong) were added to this movie’s mix.
As one might expect, these are the kind of nasty fellows who don’t seem
to think much about double-crossing their partners along with killing innocent
as well as not so innocent women and men. However, the nadir of their
behavior -- and this offering -- has to be the sequence that involves a
triple rape (most of which takes place off screen...but still is most unsavory,
and not just because it involves one of this film’s main female characters).
On such occasions, I found myself dearly wishing for Carrie Ng to go into
primo castrating ‘bitch’ mode. Unfortunately, this is not a work
in which this occurs, and -- as far as I am concerned -- is all the poorer
and more compromised for being so.
My rating for the film: 5.5
Reviewed by Brian
There is no doubt that this film falls fairly
low in the ranking of the Girls with Guns genre for a number of reasons.
The plot is ragged and mundane, the editing is choppy, the characterizations
are nearly non-existent and in a bizarre narrative twist the film decides
to stick with the villains for nearly a twenty-minute trek through the
jungle. The filmmakers seemed to simply forget why most viewers were watching
in the first place – Moon and Yukari. They basically vanish from the film
for a long stretch of time while the bad guys proceed to rape three women
and a strange romance of a kind (handcuffed to one another) grows between
Tommy Wong and the main female villain. Even so, the film still gave me
a fair amount of warm pleasure that only other Girls with Guns aficionados
can truly understand.
Hong Kong film has really not had a lot of pairs
whose names are linked together like Bogart and Bacall or Abbot and Costello.
There was the homoerotic vibes between Chow Yun Fat and Danny Lee in The
Killer and City on Fire, the sweet chemistry between Chow Yun Fat and Cherie
Chung was visible in some eight films, Anita Yuen and Lau Ching-wan bounced
off each other with effervescent delight in seven films, but few pairings
were as electric as those between Moon Lee and Yukari Oshima. It was a
melding of night and day, of heat and cold – the fierce determination of
Moon and the brooding presence of Yukari made a magical duo.
They appeared together in nine films and they
were the heart and soul of the Girls with Guns genre. Without Moon’s lovable
appeal and diminutive stature or Yukari’s inner fury and fabulous physical
skills the genre simply could not have existed. Whether friend or foe in
the film, they play off each other with wonderful effect and tended to
bring out the best from each other. Their best collaborations would have
to be Angel, Angel Terminator II, Dreaming the Reality and Kickboxer’s
Tears. In Angel and Kickboxer’s Tears, Yukari is the villain while in the
other two she and Moon are friends. But whether they were beating the hell
out of each other or protecting the other’s back, they were perfect for
each other.
As soon as they come together in this film, the
warm feeling begins to flow – spunky and at times garishly attired they
are full of themselves and a joy to watch. There is plenty of filler here,
but the film has two good segments – a twenty-minute stretch that is nearly
non-stop action as these two battle swarms of bad guys and very bad girls
– Moon is like the little engine that could and Yukari is a whirling deadly
machine. Then the last fifteen minutes of the film cranks up the action
again and our tender twosome take on a near battalion with a never-ending
supply of hand grenades. When the camera is focused on these two, it is
a little bit of paradise for fans of this genre and of these two actresses.
And I can’t forget the lipsticked one – Carrie
Ng – who doesn’t really do much here but look yummy in her sunglasses,
uniform and red splashed ruby lips. The director is clearly in love with
her look as well and near fetishizes her in one scene in which a fierce
battle is taking place and Carrie is simply watching it – but the camera
takes a near minute break from the goings on below to simply stare at Carrie
as she dramatically . . . removes her sunglasses. It was just lovely!
Note: The film is available on DVD but it only
has the Mandarin track - but the picture is fairly clean and colorful.
My rating for this film: 6.0
