The decade of the 1980s was a banner era for the fantasy film all across the globe. KUNG FU WONDER CHILD probably isn’t the only one to feature bathroom humor alongside martial arts and magic, but it might be the only one that has a monster with blonde bangs and Yukari Oshima kicking dudes into trees.
A mystical sword formed from a meteorite. A nun in a wheelchair flying off a cliff. A motorcycle riding hero in a red cocktail dress. All these random threads converge in the misshapen, cable-knit sweater of a 1980s action film that is SWORD OF HEAVEN.
Have you ever seen a cinematic hero voluntarily crash through a patio door window to jump-kick a guy standing in a living room with no furniture? THE MASTER DEMON may be your only chance.
The sort of film that gives you five straight minutes of old women eating chicken while a man in a kabuki mask performs magic tricks for a baby and a shirtless man twirls swords around in the back of a dimly-lit restaurant.
Above all other descriptors, LET’S SCARE JESSICA TO DEATH is deeply atmospheric, and that’s due in no small part to the choices in location — they are every bit as idyllic as they are menacing.
