After a somewhat lacklustre summer, the Transformers are back. Can the mechanical marvels be the juggernaut we’re waiting for? Plus Mark Ryan takes us behind the scenes of the sequel and his own upcoming vampire project...

The thing about Michael Bay is that whatever criticisms you have of his movies and their broad stroke, high-concept remit, in recent years he tends to have delivered on that specific remit. Yes, the likes of Pearl Harbor also delivered hard on the cheesier aspects and The Island didn’t make a whole lot of sense, but to balance that there’s also the Bad Boys and Armageddon and the original Transformers live-action outing in 2007. The latter may not have pleased all die-hard fans but it certainly pleased enough... and also sent a clear signal out to the audience and the industry that given enough budget you could deliver almost anything. ‘Giant robots fighting’ - perhaps the most simple, dynamic three word pitch delivered in a decade - could be made flesh. Or, at least steel.

Two years later and the success of that outing has spawned an inevitable sequel: Revenge of the Fallen. Information on the actual plot was pretty sparse going into the select screening in central London in mid-June, thanks to an effective security blanket only slipped back when the final trailer arrived showing not only mainland America falling victim to the ongoing battle between Autobots and Decepitcons but...

[ This article is available in full in the July 2009 edition of Impact ]

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After our coverage and cover story last issue, we give our opinion of the latest Terminator movie. Is it a case of raging against or for the machine?

There are only a few certain things in life. Death, taxes and the fact that sooner or later cybernetic assassins will hunt you down and try to kill you to prevent you saving the human race. That and... no cinema franchise ever truly dies, it merely waits in the wings for rights-issues to be sorted and for movie trends to swing in your favour. So, it’s no real surprise that the Terminator franchise has made it back to movie theatres. It’s just that the ‘I’ll be back...’ took longer to bring to pass than Judgement Day itself.

The first two Terminator movies are rightly seen as classics of their time. In both cases the premise and execution caught the public imagination and delivered well on their central ‘destiny is a fickle bitch’ premise. The third film was quietly ambitious beyond its reach and had an unexpectedly downbeat denouement, but never felt as committed as the previous chapters. Equally, all had Arnold Schwarzenegger as their pivotal performance, a man who may divide audiences on acting ability but who surely knows how to sell himself and his work. Not so much with Terminator Salvation.

Salvation is a film that goes through the looking glass...

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Stuntman Andy Taylor tells Impact about his experiences on wushu champion Hung Yan-yan’s directorial debut, CoWeb.

Superkicker Hung Yan-yan began his career as a Chinese Wushu champion before entering the film world. Here he rapidly earnt a reputation as one of the best kickers and stuntmen in the business - doubling for Jet Li in several movies, before starting to work as an actor and choreographer in his own right. With credits in both the East and West including the Once Upon A Time in China film and TV series, Van Damme’s Double Team, The Blade, The Musketeer and more, Hung recently returned to Hong Kong to make his directorial debut. The film, CoWeb, introduces a new female action hero in the shape of another Chinese Wushu Champion, Jiang Liu-xia. British martial arts actor and stuntman Andy Taylor worked on the film as part of the action team and brings us his memories of the shoot.

“Shooting on CoWeb began in May 2008. At this time, I had been based in Hong Kong for about three months - I’d previously passed through Hong Kong when I worked on Blood: The Last Vampire and when I did a TV show that shot at the Shaolin Temple. I’d decided to head to Hong Kong to try...

[ This article is available in full in the July 2009 edition of Impact ]

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With the news of David Carradine’s sudden and untimely death in Bangkok, we take a look back at the enigmatic actor and his legacy...

Six months before Kill Bill hit screens, I found myself in the antiseptic corridors of the ExCel centre in London and sitting across the table from David Carradine. On the wall next to us was one of those red circular signs with the image of a cigarette and a dramatic line through it. A few inches below it the star of Kung Fu, the double-billed Bills and more video actioners than you could shake a fist full of dollars at, took another long hard drag on his own cigarette and smiled. It wasn’t going to be put out anytime soon. An elder statesman of the genre he might have been, but he took a certain pleasure in also being something of the black sheep and an unapologetic noble vagabond of an actor who would ultimately go wherever the money, script and the pay-cheque led.

The news that Carradine has died - and, if preliminary reports are true - at his own hand, marks a sad end to a notable career. In latter years his face may have been more weathered and deeply drawn than the roles he was often asked to play, but all the lines were the marks of a...

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He rose to fame with a classic movie short that collided the worlds of Batman, The Joker, Aliens and Predators... so what does a self-cnfessed geek and enterprising film-maker do next? John Bierly talks to Collora about the feature-length Hunter Prey.

Collora’s short film, Batman: Dead End, was the biggest story at the 2003 San Diego Comic Con, where the director’s gift for effortlessly iconic imagery became an overnight internet sensation. When Batman lands on rain-battered asphalt, his leathery cape rises with him as if it’s alive. After a quick clash with a Joker whose yellowed, bloodshot eyes only barely hide the twisted perversion boiling inside, Batman finds himself locked in bloody combat with Aliens and Predators every bit as nasty and as capable as these monsters have ever appeared on film. It’s eight of the wildest minutes you’ll ever see. Collora’s follow-up, an action-packed Superman/Batman trailer called World’s Finest, debuted to similar fanfare in 2004. Its three minutes and forty seconds bursts with more action and charm than all of Superman Returns.
The New York native cut his teeth sculpting and designing concepts and creatures with the legendary likes of Stan Winston and Rick Baker before establishing his own independent production company, Montauk Films, in 1999. His latest project is a sci-fi action film called Hunter Prey. And if its trailer (at www.hunterpreythemovie.com) is any indication, Collora continues to mature into a modern master of adventure and imagination.
Impact:...

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Ninjas vs Pirates? Go Ohara decided that the ultimate face-off would be geishas vs ninjas and who are we to argue?

So raged the debate in Joss Whedon’s Angel season 5 episode A Hole In the World, and much as this question caused much discussion, there’s always a question of who would beat who in the world of sport, in the world of martial arts, ‘which style is better?’ We had ‘Shaolin Vs Wu Tang’, ‘Ninja Vs Ninja’, even ‘Mafia Vs Ninja!’ But perhaps the ultimate - if not immediately thought of match up comes in the movie, Geisha Vs Ninjas directed by Go Ohara...

She dances beautifully and defeats enemies...After Resident Evil and Kill Bill comes a new generation of martial arts action starring beautiful Japanese women. Thus reads the promo for acclaimed action director Go Ohara’s directorial debut, a stylish revenge martial arts take starring Minami Tsukui.

One rainy night in the Edo period of Japanese history, Kotono (Minami Tsukui), a Geisha, confronts the group of Samurai who brutally murdered her father. She bravely battles the Samurai, armed only with her father’s Katana. But as she battles the Samurai, a group of black clad warriors enter the scene, and thus raise the question ‘Geisha Vs Ninjas’ - who would win?

Geisha Vs Ninja (which has just been released in the States with...

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He’s back - but don’t call it a comeback. Dolph Lundgren is about to figure more prominently on the action radar. Impact finds out why...

Don’t call it a comeback, he’s been here for years! Another action hero from the ‘80s and ‘90s who’s in the midst of a well deserved return to form is Dolph Lundgren. Since making his memorable debut in Rocky IV (yes, we know he was in A View to a Kill - but that was a throwaway role), Lundgren went onto headline some classic slices of action including Dark Angel, Red Scorpion, Vic Armstrong’s superb Joshua Tree, Showdown in Little Tokyo and Universal Soldier. Sadly some of his subsequent movies didn’t serve him as well as they might, but recent releases such as The Defender, Direct Action, The Mechanik and, most recently, Missionary man have seen a return to glory. Lundgren recently wrapped work on Universal Soldier 3 and is currently shooting The Expendables as part of the ensemble cast assembled by Sylvester Stallone. So, we thought it was a good time to take a look at two of his most recent projects, Direct Contact which hits DVD this month and the soon-to-be-released Command Performance.

Direct Contact
Directed by Nu Image’s Danny Lerner, this movie hits DVD shelves in the UK this month. Starring Dolph Lundgren and Streets of Fire hero...

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Philip Ng is busy making quite a name for himself both in front of AND behind the camera. Mike Leeder catches up with the rising star in this exclusive profile...

Coming into the industry from a very strong martial arts lineage, Philip Ng (Ng Wan-lung) has carved quite a name for himself in the world of Hong Kong action cinema, working both in front of and behind the camera alongside such names as Jackie Chan, Yuen Woo-ping, Sammo Hung, Yuen Biao, Chin Kar-lok, Andy On, Wu jing and Nicholas Tse in such projects as Dragon Squad, Star Runner, Invisible Target, Wing Chun: The Television Series, House of Fury, New Police Story, Somebody to Love and Bodyguards & Assassins. Impact’s Eastern Editor Mike Leeder caught up with Philip ng for the following interview

Impact: Can you begin by introducing yourself, telling us a little about your martial arts background, some of the styles you’ve studied...
Philip Ng: I was born in Hong Kong but immigrated to the American Midwest while I was still quite young. I first received my training in the martial arts from my father and uncle at the age of seven, in Choy Lay Fut and Hung Gar, respectively. Though my father is an accountant by trade, his real passion is in kung fu, so even while working hard to provide for his family, he...

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Simon Yam and Anthony Wong took time out from the film festival festivities to discuss their experiences in Johnny To’s upcoming Vengeance. Cannes they survive the experience?

The legendary French movie fest is over for another year, but Impact took the time to sit down with two of the key names in Eastern action cinema and get their impressions of not only their latest project, Johnnie To’s Vengeance, but also the international market. Simon Yam and Antony Wong talk to Laurent Koffell...

Impact: Gentlemen, thank you for talking to us. Let’s start by talking about the fact you’ve known Johnnie To for a long time... How would you describe that relationship?
Simon Yam: There’s lots of good memories. We’ve known each other for over thirty-five years... It’s actually almost forty years of friendship. He has passion and a heart for directing, my passion and heart is for acting. We spend time talking about films, about the world, about everything... and when you do everything by heart you don’t have to have normal communication on the set. You don’t need to talk, you just need to think ‘How does Johnnie want me to do this?’ and that’s good enough. That’s the best way to create something new. I was really happy last night when Quentin Tarantino asked me ‘Hey, Simon, you are in every single one of Johnny...

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One of the classic faces and talents of eastern cinema, toshiro mifune’s career encompassed some of the iconic imagery of the genre. Impact’s overview of a life less ordinary starts here...

In 1984 the Macintosh was introduced, Terms of Endearment won the Oscar for Best Picture, and that was the year Australia swapped national anthems - finally ditching ‘God Save the Queen.’

Here in Japan in a major magazine poll, the actor Toshiro Mifune, at age 64, was declared the winner of the ‘Most-Japanese Man’ competition, singled out from all Japanese males, past and present, over the nation’s known history - no minor feat when you fathom that the Japanese trace their recorded history back two millennia.

Yet just 25 years later, many young Japanese know Toshiro Mifune only as the father of the intermittently wild Mika Mifune. Born to her dad’s mistress in 1982, Mika reportedly dated a man 24 years her senior (Japanese rock veteran George Takahashi) when she was just 14. She since married the man, founded a schlock band with him, then divorced his ageing hide. More recently Mika, now 27, continues to play on the Mifune branding via chat shows round Japan, in order to tweak her fledgling acting career.

Meanwhile, outside Japan, the lasting impression of Mifune for the rest of us seems to have been either his turn as the old daimyo geezer in ‘80s miniseries Shogun,...

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Spring has sprung and summer’s here...so it’s time for a lot of new anime projects to see the light of day. A prime example is Shangri-La, the latest from respected producers, Gonzo (Last Exile, Samurai 7 and Afro samurai).

As it turns out, April in Japan isn’t just special for cherry blossoms. It’s also the month in which a fair few anime production studios worth their salt flaunt their new wares on tellies across the country - and, from this past April, one of the hottest new animated series to be telecast has been SHANGRI-LA, the latest from respected producers Gonzo (Last Exile, Samurai 7, Afro Samurai).

No, we’re not seeing images sourced from the mystical, idyllic valley in the 1937 Frank Capra adaptation of James Hilton’s book, nor drifting anywhere near the 1973 musical, thankfully. This SHANGRI-LA is based instead on a more recently acclaimed novel, written by Eiichi Ikegami, that won the 2005 Japanese Sci-Fi Novel Award.

Think the current issue of global warming accelerated to the point in which Tokyo has become a teeming jungle (they call it a ‘jungle-polis’), wrapped up in a class struggle that sets idle rich snobby sorts against the less-privileged, obviously discomfited masses - and a guerrilla rebellion held together by one riotous, school uniform-clad teenage girl, Kuniko Hojo, and her trusty boomerang... Of course.

Pulling all this together with absolute anime panache are character designer Range Murata (Last Exile, Blue Submarine No. 6),...

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We take a look at the animated Streetfighter trilogy - released this month as a boxset - and the Manga release of a live action take on Zatoichi.

Back in the day, when I was a young pup and still (more or less) in full time education, the only digital brawler worth a look in was the 1991 release of Street Fighter II - hours, and pockets full of change, were poured into learning the intricacies of Chun Li’s ‘Hundred Burst Kick’ and Ryu’s infamous ‘Hadouken’ (a cry that has since inspired a band name). The arcade classic is still played at competition level by gaming professionals to this day (YouTube some of its most famous bouts - they are as dramatic as any a Hong Kong movie classic) and the game has spawned innumerable sequels and offshoots, as well as movie adaptations. The most famous/infamous of these is the cheesy Van Damme and Minogue Hollywood version that brought a level of camp hitherto unseen to the franchise and, sadly, marked the passing of Raul Julia in a less than stellar swansong.
Fortunately, this nadir in Street Fighting history (though retrospectively regarded fondly as a film ‘of its time’) was preceded by an altogether darker and more violent anime adaptation that brought the game’s iconic characters kicking and screaming to life in a far truer manner than any...

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It’s a case of Love & Honour and wondering whether you should rage against the Meatball Machine. Yes, it’s time for another outing to the edges of the Asian Extremes.

When Evil Dead II writer/ Hostel producer Scott Spiegel declared “The gore the merrier” many years ago, he may as well have been foreseeing the future of fear filmmaking. Yes, in the wake of the Saw series and the likes of the new Friday the 13th, Planet Terror and Turistas it is safe to say that Hollywood has never been more enthusiastic about funding commercially-geared, ultra-gruesome genre products. The only catch is that - when it comes to a bout of the old ultra-violence (to quote Alex DeLarge in A Clockwork Orange) - the US is easily out-matched by its foreign equivalent, as anyone who has sat through such recent French nasties as Frontière, Inside and the abominable Martyrs can attest.

Naturally, this observation also applies to our own Eastern strain of terror. Sure, the boom in J-horror has meant that subtle ghost stories remain prolific (although the trend has finally started to drain out) but the recent likes of The Machine Girl and Tokyo Gore Police clearly indicate that The Land of the Rising Sun has not totally rid itself of its notorious legacy in graphic splatter flicks. Indeed, many of those who found themselves discovering Ringu and its ilk...

[ This article is available in full in the July 2009 edition of Impact ]

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Impact rounds up the winners and losers of America’s most recent televisual action season and examines which will be returning in the autumn/fall.

the STATE OF PLAY
May and June are the time when US networks start to announce which shows will be coming back for another season, which ones will not and what new product we can expect. With Life on Mars, Eli Stone, My Own Worst Enemy, BSG already confirmed as done and dusted, Impact takes a look at the winners and losers...

SHOW: Dollhouse
CONDITION: Still ‘active’
COMMENT: Well, if there was ever proof that God was a geek, then this must surely be it. Written off by absolutely everyone after a luke-warm, very un-Whedonesque start, the first season of thirteen episodes only seemed to pick up after the halfway mark and, by then, most felt its fate was sealed. Poor ratings and the decision not to air that thirteenth episode appeared to be the final nails in the coffin, despite being picked up by the UK’s SciFi channel.

However the time-shift ratings (where viewers use the likes of TiVo/Sky+ to watch the show after original broadcast) were impressive and FOX - hardly ones to give a genre show an even break - decided that if Whedon, Tim Minear and co could produce episodes on a tighter budget, then they’d give the...

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Each month we look at an action show that might have flown under your radar, but deserves your undivided attention. This month we keep the home fires burning for Burn Notice...

There’s a thin line between thinking you’re cool and actually being so - it’s the same distance between style and lack of it and is measurable only by a formula that is somehow connected to the ratio of confidence to over-confidence. Thus...a lot of projects aren’t so hip they hurt, they merely hurt. So, it’s quite an achievement that Burn Notice doesn’t just walk that line but merrily skips along it with the grace of a skilled assassin and the speed of an improv performer on speed. And, of course, there’s Bruce Campbell in the mix too. In retrospect, how could it fail?

Burn Notice tells the story of Michael Westen (Jeffrey Donovan) whom we first meet in the middle of a complex arms deal in Nigeria. Halfway through the transfer of payment, he’s dutifully informed by cellphone that the CIA has dropped him like the proverbial dud hand-grenade. He’s been issued with a ‘burn notice’. He’s been disavowed. He’s ceased to be. Bascially, he’s on his own, except for the armed men he’s surrounded by (who are expecting a hefty payment transfer that’s no longer coming) and the subsequent shady characters who’ll also want him dead for something he’s not...

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John Bierly steps into Beau Smith’s shoes this month and examines the changing relationship between comics, Hollywood and their audiences.

We’re living in a comic book renaissance where sprawling classics like the seemingly un-adaptable Watchmen are given the red-carpet treatment by Hollywood. Batman was once the source of snickers and snarls when the franchise lost its marbles in the 1990s, but less than a decade later Bruce Wayne is back to bringing in a literal billion in ticket sales - not to mention subsequent merchandising and DVDs and even award nominations. (Belated congratulations to the late, great Heath Ledger for his deserved Oscar win thanks to a Joker performance so spectacular that I don’t think I could have told you it was Heath Ledger if I hadn’t already known it was him before I saw the film.)

But it goes beyond the fact that we’re lucky enough to live in a world where Christian Bale is Batman. Despite the faults of the latest installment, Hugh Jackman continues to bring total dedication to Wolverine and his fans. (And I bet its sequel, being written now with plans to take the adamantium-clawed X-Man to Japan, will be everything the recent prequel should have been - and more.) Edward Norton didn’t just star in The Incredible Hulk - he got involved in the writing,...

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Once upon a time you could blast space invaders with no fear of offending anyone, but as CGI and gaming improves and geographical borders cease to be the restrictions they once were, are there more serious consequences for what we can access in the name of entertainment?

Remember when all you had to do was stop a blinking Space Invader, maybe smash a skeletally rendered asteroid or pit wits against a pixelated GameBoy console? If so, the following sentence is one that will evoke a range of reactions. Ready? Brace yourselves. “Rape Games Officially Banned in Japan.” There. So how many of you out there are scratching your heads and saying ‘Wait a second. They weren’t before?’

And here’s where it gets interesting for western audiences because the answer is no. And technically they aren’t now. Website kotaku.com - amongst others - recently reported the fact that Japan’s Ethics Organisation of Computer Software had arranged a meeting including members of adult entertainment companies after the outrage noted by the West when a game title called Rapelay was discovered beyond the borders of its native Japan. The title, which involves goals such as the forced sexual assault of a twelve year old girl, is completely legal there (as is, technically, child pornography itself) but would possibly face likely prosecution if sold or made in this country (the UK). This ban isn’t binding nor wholly recognised in law, but is seen as a voluntary action agreed by over...

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DVDs, books, manga and games galore in our ever growing multimedia round up of all that’s good to consume!

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