I want to know something about Hong Kong zombie movies

Before the 1980s, the development of horror and ghost films in Hong Kong was slow, and the quantity and quality of films were far inferior to comedy, song and dance, martial arts, kung fu and other genre films. As for zombie movies, they are even more of a forgotten genre. The occasional ones such as "Zombie Revenge" are just crude imitations of Western zombie movies and have not aroused much response. However, in 1974, Shaw Brothers Film Company cooperated with a British company to film "Seven Golden Corpses", which combined Western vampire zombies and the legend of "Xiangxi Corpse Driving", which attracted much attention at the time. The film was directed by a British man, and Liu Jialiang served as action designer. Co-starring David Chiang, Lau Kar-wing and others, it can be regarded as the first zombie film that combines earth and foreign countries. However, it is a pity that although Shaw Brothers Company's promotional campaign for the film was strong, the film's weird style and mixed content were unacceptable to the audience, and it ultimately failed miserably at the box office. As a result, in the next ten years, few people in Hong Kong dared to watch zombie movies again!

In the early 1980s, "Crazy Robbery", "Crashing into the Righteous", "The Bad List", "Mountain Dog" and "Aura" were filmed by new wave directors such as Xu Anhua, Yu Yunhang and Yu Rentai. Horror and ghost movies such as "Man" use advanced shooting techniques and personalized creative concepts to create an unprecedented atmosphere of terror, which refreshed the local audience and received rave reviews and enthusiastic response. At the same time, Sammo Hung's "" which combines kung fu comedy and ghost elements The "Ghost Fighting Ghost" series pioneered the trend of "psychic kung fu movies", which was a box office hit and extremely popular. At this point, Hong Kong's horror ghost movies have truly become popular, and their momentum continues to this day.

The success of the low-cost "psychic kung fu movie" made Sammo Hung and his Baohe Company taste the sweetness. After "Ghosts Fighting Ghosts", "People Scare People" and "People Scare Ghosts", Sammo Hung began to try to integrate zombie themes into "psychic kung fu movies". However, at that time Sammo Hung and others obviously had no confidence in the zombies of local folklore. They wanted to attract the attention of Hong Kong audiences through the "vampire zombies" that were popular in Europe and America in the 1970s. Therefore, they specially hired British zombie film masters to design zombie shapes and scary scenes - but later Sammo Hung, Lam Ching-ying and others passed by After careful research, I found that the idea of ??Western vampire zombies could not be integrated with their spiritual kung fu, so I gave up this approach and turned to the local area to deeply explore folk customs and strive to make the film style consistent with the "Ghost Fighting Ghost" series. In the same vein of "Kung Fu. Comedy. Fantasy", he finally completed the groundbreaking classic "Mr. Zombie" among Hong Kong zombie films in 1985.

“Hong Kong’s zombie movies are just resurrected kung fu movies.” ——Hong Kong film critic Mr. Wu Hao’s words really hit the nail on the head. Take "Mr. Zombie" as an example. The background of the early Republic of China, the master-disciple relationship, and the fighting plot that were most common in Kung Fu movies at that time were directly applied by the screenwriter into the film. The specific details about "Zombies" and "Maoshan Technique" are extremely Folk colors, and the folk legendary techniques of using glutinous rice, ink thread, peach wood swords, and yellow paper charms to control zombies were all absorbed by "Mr. Zombie" and used by "Nine Uncles" Lin Zhengying with extremely professional "Maoshan" techniques. . The zombie's shape and movement characteristics also draw inspiration from folklore: wearing the official uniform of the Qing Dynasty, with hands stretched out, feet together like a sparrow, jumping around like a sparrow, and using human breathing to identify the direction (in the same way, people can avoid zombies by closing their breath. This is This is also the most impressive aspect of "Mr. Zombie" that impressed the audience. Therefore, the film was also called "Stop Breathing" when it was released in Taiwan). But even so, the zombies in the film have sharp fangs and claws, and the people who suck blood and turn into zombies after being bitten are still inspired by Western vampire and zombie movies. In addition, not all the "supernatural monsters" in "Mr. Zombie" are "zombies". There is also a plot where a female ghost played by Wang Xiaofeng is obsessed with a man. In fact, there are also zombies in "Mr. Zombie" and subsequent similar films. Ghosts and spirits appear outside, and to a certain extent, Hong Kong's zombie films should belong to the category of "psychic kung fu" films pioneered by Sammo Hung, but they can be independent chapters.

"Mr. Zombie" was released at the end of 1985. Audiences flocked to it and it grossed 20 million at the box office. It ranked fifth among the top ten grossing films of the year and caused a huge sensation.

In May of the following year, Baohe Company struck again and filmed "Zombie Reincarnation". The film carried forward the glimpse of the corpse-eating plot in "Mr. Zombie". The folklore of "Zombie Hunting in Western Hunan" has been improved and turned into a spectacle on the screen: deep in the mountains and wilderness, Master Maoshan rang a bell in front of him to guide the way, and behind him jumped a bunch of zombies with yellow paper talismans on their heads. The scene was strange and novel, which shocked the audience. To suffer. The "zombie rebirth" is the biggest gimmick of the film: the driven zombies are transformed into terrifying zombies by magic. Maoshan's master and apprentice are panicked and in a hurry. It is exciting and funny, showing the black comedy style, and naturally achieved good box office results. At the same time, it was precisely because "Zombie Resurrection" continued the success of "Mr. Zombie" that Hong Kong and Taiwan film companies found it profitable and set off a craze for zombie movies. In the second half of 1986 alone, nearly 10 follow-up films were released, among which the more famous ones include "Zombie" directed by Yuan Heping, "Maoshan Academy" directed by Huang Ying, etc. Strictly speaking, although the storylines of these films have changed, none of them have jumped out of the Maoshan magic-fighting zombie routine set by "Mr. Zombie" and "Zombie Reincarnation", although some funny and scary scenes are borrowed from Western vampire zombie films. , but overall it is still a reflection of traditional Chinese folk customs. ——In contrast, another zombie film "Zombie Family" released by the Hung Family Ban's Baohe Pictures in the same year actively stole bridges from foreign films. It was not only unique among Hong Kong zombie films at the time, but also successfully entered Japan. market and received a warm welcome. .

The biggest difference between "Zombie Family" and Hong Kong zombie movies of the same period is that the zombies have feelings. Zombies were originally described as monsters without human consciousness, but the three zombies in the film are parents. The relationship with his son is naturally affectionate. The little zombie fell into the world by mistake, and developed deep friendships with several children. They played some warm and interesting tricks. They were obviously copied from the alien story "E.T" by Spielberg. Although they only borrowed the surface, the zombies also had some influence. A little bit of family and friendship. However, it is a bloodthirsty walking dead after all, and the last highlight scene of the zombies wreaking havoc in a bustling city borrowed plots from Japanese monster movies. Hong Kong audiences found it bizarre and interesting, but Japanese audiences were familiar with it. In addition, the little zombies with super powers fit the cultural taste of Fuso, which made "Zombie Family" an unexpected success in Japan. Afterwards, there was a short-lived "zombie craze". I am afraid this is something that Hong Kong filmmakers did not expect. .

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In 1987, when the zombie theme was at its peak, Baohe Pictures, which led the trend of zombie movies, had tasted the sweetness of "zombie" several times. Instead of continuing to grab the market, he made a movie called "Mr. Phantom". While the film plays a lot about kung fu, magic, ghosts and ghosts, it does not have anything to do with zombies. It only touches on another type of folklore called "walking corpses" in which living people are controlled by warlocks. However, even so, the costumes of the troublemakers played by Lu Fang and the children in the film still resemble the Qing Dynasty zombies that Japanese audiences love. In addition, several comedies of the same period, such as "Girls Chasing 2" and "Lucky Star", all included funny scenes of pretending to be zombies to scare people. It seems that the influence of the "zombie" craze at that time was not limited to similar films.

Also in 1987, Deng Guangrong's "Shadow Heroes" film company produced a new type of zombie film that was completely different from the Maoshan Taoist spellcasting pioneered by Baohe Company: "The Ghost Mission". The film was written and directed by two young filmmakers who were little-known at the time. One of them is Wong Kar-wai. He originally worked as a screenwriter for Chen Xunqi, but he was not very successful. He was fired by New Art City because the script writing was too slow. Another person named Liu Zhenwei was not originally engaged in movies. He worked in a financial company in his early years. Later, the company started to engage in movies and established "Century" Film Company, and he became the company's production manager. After supervising several "New Wave" directorial works such as "The Fierce List", "Escape from Western Camp" and "Youth on Fire", he became more and more interested in movies. He actually gave up his career as a production manager and became a film director.

Although the two collaborated on "The Ghost Story", which was the most popular "zombie" theme at the time, it did not become a follow-up film. Instead, it relied on the popular partner comedy mode to match the horror of various Chinese and Western ghost films. The funny plot, a thrilling comedy filmed as a fashion version of a battle between police and zombies, is very different from the Maoshan zombie movies with Lin Zhengying's background in the early Republic of China. The "zombie" in the film is no longer an old man from the Qing Dynasty, but a Japanese colonel who committed suicide in Hong Kong during the Anti-Japanese War. He also imitates the image of a Western red-eyed vampire wearing a black hood. As for the initial methods used by the police to deal with zombies in the film, It is a Western method of treating vampires such as driving wooden stakes into the heart of zombies and using garlic to ward off evil spirits.

After the release of "The Evil Dead", the audience felt fresh about this kind of "combining local and foreign" zombie movies, and the box office naturally easily exceeded 10 million. Liu and Wang have tasted this sweetness, how can they give up? In 1988, they co-wrote again and continued to create the costume zombie comedy "Ghost Academy" with the original cast of "Ghost Academy". It staged a crazy show of a police ghost-hunting team fighting zombies and monsters. The film continued to borrow bridges from Western genre films. , and at the same time boldly innovates, such as the method of using water and electricity to destroy zombies, which is not only not found in local Maoshan techniques, but also not seen in Western vampire zombie movies. ——In comparison, "Uncle Zombie", which was released in the same year as this film, still embodies localized folk legends. In the previous "Baohe" zombie films, the ringing of bells to drive away corpses, master-disciple fights, and sect differences were common The pranks, the Maoshan magic battle against Qing Dynasty zombies, etc. were all adopted by "Uncle Zombie" and filmed in a fun and entertaining way, once again continuing the box office myth of Baohe Company producing zombie movies. It's a pity that it is the last sight of the "Maoshan zombie movie" with completely local folk custom interest in Hong Kong.