Honourable Mentions: Kung Fu Wonder Child

This was a 1986 Kung Fu movie directed by Tso Nam Lee and starred Lin Hsiao Lan as the Kung Fu wonder child of the title. The actress played a grandson and, it appears, she made a career primarily playing male roles. Thanks to Leila, who got the DVD for me, it was greatly appreciated.

It is a madcap film that primarily looks at the actions of a corrupt priest as he tries to steal the powers of a defeated enemy and how the grandfather and grandson – the cooks of the temple – try to save the day. It has a reference to Rambo (in the English dub at least) and something that looks suspiciously like a facehugger from Alien as well as a cartoon dragon (that is actually quite well done).

Kyonsi wise we should mention the guardian. It isn’t totally clear whether this green faced creature is a vampire – though it appears to have fangs. It also has its brain exposed and is referred to as a zombie. The creature demonstrates kung fu ability and lives in a funereal jar when not protecting the area charged to it.

However we do have a full, though rotten faced, kyonsi – hops and all. He has two children kyonsi and gets quite upset when they mention their mother – it appears she left the family unit. However there isn’t much point to the creature except as a random encounter for one of the characters and so this back story is never satisfactorily fulfilled.

When said character comes along, the kyonsi tries to hunt her. It appears that the kids are helping him at first – though he fails to get her due to slapstick occurrences. Then it appears that they are actively preventing him hunting the girl – which leads to him falling face first into a cow pat. Obviously this does not sit well with our vampire.

His fangs elongate and he grows talons and the human and vampire fight. The fight culminates in the kyonsi being pinned beneath a tree branch and the human walking away. It is the last we see of the kyonsi – however the five minutes or so of kyonsi does earn this film a honourable mention.

The imdb page is here.