Customer Reviews

Eastern Condors

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

While it's not flawless, this Fox DVD edition of EASTERN CONDORS is clearly the best we've ever seen of this 1987 Hong Kong action classic. Sammo Hung, the star and director, had graduated from old school kung fu films to contemporary stunt-filled action comedies with his Peking Opera classmates, Jackie Chan and Yuen Biao, and then a new direction (minus Jackie) with his all-star action comedy, MILLIONAIRES' EXPRESS in 1986. EASTERN CONDORS borrows liberally from THE DIRTY DOZEN (1967) and THE DEER HUNTER (1978), while injecting massive doses of kung fu, acrobatics, gunfire, black humor and tragedy into its tale of Asian and Asian-American military prisoners ("the Condors") sent on a dangerous mission into Vietnam in 1976, a year after the American withdrawal.

The Condors' mission in Vietnam is to find and destroy an underground cache of American weapons to keep it out of Vietnamese hands. When they get to Vietnam they hook up with a trio of female Cambodian guerrillas (led by fighting femme Joyce Godenzi) who act as guides, but have an ulterior motive of their own. The group also picks up a local Cantonese-speaking black market dealer who's expert in kung fu (Yuen Biao). Thanks to a spy in the group, the Vietnamese army follows the Condors' every move.

The nonstop action is quite cleverly staged, although some of it is a bit far-fetched. The characters and their relationships are generally quite interesting and we tend to feel sadness and grief when a member of the group dies (or is seriously wounded or maimed). Partly filmed in Canada, with outdoors action shot in the Philippines, the film offers a spectacular climax staged in an underground weapons complex designed and built to resemble the sets Ken Adam built for so many James Bond films.

The film's expert cinematography is finally given a transfer that allows us to appreciate it in widescreen with 16:9 enhancement. However, both the English-dubbed and Cantonese language tracks are slightly but noticeably out of sync. The English dub is pretty awful. The subtitles for the Cantonese track are not the original ones we saw in earlier editions of the film. They're "dub-titles," transcriptions of the English dub dialogue which is far less interesting and dramatic than accurate translations of the original dialogue. So don't discard your earlier copies.

well, another great sammo flick!!! i think you'll love this hong kong remake of the dirty dozen, its filled with a great cast including yuen biao, yuen wah, and joyce godenzi!!! the gun battles are great and watch for the scene in the vietnam jungle when sammo and yuen biao take out a platoon of men one at a time, the last 10 minutes are classic with yuen biao facing yuen wah, and sammo facing billy chow, and then sammo facing yuen wah!! a great classic movie in its own right!!! order this one!!!! if not its your own loss!!! *L*

As mentioned already, this film is loosely based on the classic American war film The Dirty Dozen, except there's only 10 (i think) individuals and it's a half martial arts (MA), half war movie. Sammo actually lost a lot of weight for this role and he and Yuen Biao were just awesome in this movie. The story is simple, the best prison inmates are given a chance to earn money and freedom should they accomplish a secret mission. They will not know anything about their mission or where they are going until they are at the goal. Sammo is one of the inmates alongside director Yuen Kwai and choreographer Yuen Wo Ping. The latter 2 provide some comedy to the film. The Dirty Pack soon realize that they're in Vietnam to destroy nuclear weapons that the Viet Cong have yet to know about. The premise here is if the Viet Cong find out about it, they'll use it. The rest of the film displays some really cool acrobatic warfare tactics. There is also shooting involved as expected in a war film. Yuen Biao and Sammo showcase some very awesome moves; I'm talking wicked and fast attacks. I must mention that this is the kind of film that builds up to be better; the beginning is not all that impressive, but later on into the movie is great MA. The end fight is as should be the best...wow and ouch...This must be seen because some of the greatest fighters are here doing some great stuff. Yuen Wah is the leader of the Viet Cong platoon out to get the Dirty Pack, and he shows some of his awesome kicking abilities, this guy is so agile and fast. The well known Thai-boxer Billy Chow (the superpowerful general from Fist of Legend) also has a part as once again a bad guy. He has an extremely brutal fight with Sammo that'll make you cringe. Chow and Wah are very highly overlooked. Biao does some crazy moves in the final fight as well...this just has to be seen...this last fight alone surpasses the worth of purchase. I only have 2 complaints: I wanted to see more, the fights here are all classic and awesome, but short. One hard hit and it was over...don't get me wrong, this looks very realistic, but I just wanted to see more of it. Also, Lam Ching Ying did not do any MA at all, and this guy is [amazing], you gotta see him in Prodigal Son. All in all, a very rare and classic HK martial arts/war film. The best version of dvd comes from the Hong Kong Legends distributors. You'll need an all-region dvd player to play their region 2 PAL dvds though, but they are known for remastering video and sound and providing awesome extras in their rereleased HK films. If you can't have the privelege of the dvd player, then stick with the Fox version above because the DTS track rocks. At least check this film out if you don't intend to buy, it's one of a kind. Check out my other MA reviews too, thanks for reading.

The story of a few chinese fellows that the american goverment releases from prison in order to send them to a cetain-death mission in vietnam due to mistake in retreat from there. Samo hung, Yuen biao and yuen wah give wonderfull fightscenes,in a true Hong kong matial arts\action clasic.

If looking from the war side, I'd say go and rent Bullet in the Head (a great war movie by John Woo). But if you want to see good fight scenes, this movie is for you. One of Hung's best works, includes great appearances from Yuen Biao, Yuen Wah, and Dr. Haing S. Ngor. However, I still don't understand why Joyce Godenzi was in it. I bet because she was Hung's girlfriend. Anyway, I think that the usual version is cut short because, after seeing an Asian preview, I noticed that there are supposedly more scenes in the American prison. But despite all of these negative factors, the movie is just great to watch. If you are a true fan of Asian cinema, you won't be dissapointed.

DIRTY DOZEN MEETS KUNG-FU. THIS EPIC FILM WILL HAVE ACTION FANS CRAVING FOR MORE. MARTIAL ARTS MAESTRO SAMMO HUNG IS AT HIS BEST IN THIS CLASSIC. IF YOU HAVE NOT SEEN IT YET, YOU BETTER, YOU DO NOT KNOW WHAT YOU ARE MISSING!!! ONE OF THE ALL TIME GREATEST FINAL FIGHTS EVER PUT ON FILM, PERIOD!!!!! 5 STARS ALL THE WAY. OTHER SAMMO FLICKS WORTH SEEING ARE: DRAGONS FOREVER & WHEELS ON MEALS, BOTH WITH JACKIE CHAN. BUY EASTERN CONDORS NOW!!!!!!

Even though the film starts relatively slowly (as most Samo Hung films do) once this movie gets going it really never stops until the ultra-violence filled finale!

The martial arts action is top-notch as you'd expect, incorporating a huge slice of gory violence with it. Samo's films have always had a harder edge to the action compared to Jackie Chan's films and the adult orientated action in this movie really shines through.

I can't reccomend it enough. Not only is it a great martial arts film. It's a great war film too.

See it, buy it!!!

Sammo Hung ("Heart of Dragon") directs and stars as a Chinese prisoner in U.S. custody who, along with 9 other inmates, gets a chance at a full pardon by participating in an epic military endeavor to act as decoys in the destruction of a munitions dump unintentionally left in Vietnam by the Americans. When the U.S. commando team ordered to do the actual wiping out of the weapons are themselves wiped out in a plane accident, it's up to Sammo and company to complete the task. Led by Lieutenant Lam (Lam Ching Ying, "Prodigal Son"), their mission is essentially suicide. They receive much needed feminine help from 3 brutal Cambodian guerrillas.

The ensemble cast consists largely of old-schoolers who seemed to accompany Mr. Hung on his many projects of the 80s, such as "Shanghai Express" and "My Lucky Stars". For our heroes the fighting roles are delegated mostly to Sammo and Yuen Biao ("Knockabout") but the Vietnamese offer a steady diet of top-notch fu experts like Dick Wei ("Project A"), Yasuaki Kurata ("Legend of a Fighter"), Billy Chow ("Fist of Legend"), and look fast for the great Philip Ko Fei ("8 Diagram Pole Fighter"). Yuen Wah ("Supercop") as the nerdy, creepy Vietnamese general, succeeds in the type of role that character-actor Dean Shek ("Warriors Two") repeatedly failed at throughout the 70s. At least from my western perspective.

If my rating was based solely on the fisticuffs, this would only receive a 3. The fighting is top-notch (when not in slow motion) but the vast majority of the action is gun and stunt-based. All the brawls of any notable length occur in the last 10 minutes of the film and they still ain't all that long. The gunfights and stunts are exciting but often try a little too hard to impress, especially the numerous takes of one guy shooting 4 or 5 dudes, who all collapse at the same time despite standing side by side, several feet apart.

If you can look past those flaws, this is still a fun movie, and while most of the film is relatively light and breezy considering the heavy subject matter, it is extremely violent and occasionally very bleak. Bearing that in mind, it is still recommended.

As with many of Sammo's great titles, this is a Golden Harvest production, remastered and released by 20th Century Fox, with a terrific widescreen picture and no special features, except a few cool trailers. Languages available in an English dub or Cantonese, with or without English subtitles.

1987

This movie is awesome. It's a total throw back to 80s Vietnam war movies. This movie takes place after the Vietnam War though, a group of Asian prisoners are sent in as commandos to take out an ammo supply left behind by American Forces when they pulled out of the country.

Leading the group is the awesome Mr. "Lam Ching-ying " known from the "Mr. Vampire" movies and the legendary "Sammo Hung." Yuen Biao also tags along in his greatest role EVER! As a weird emo haired martial artist in the jungles of Vietnam.

The movie mixes in the classic martial arts action we've come to expect from Sammo Hung and Yuen Biao with some pretty cool gunfights. This film is very reminiscent of the Rambo sequels. You get that gritty 80s action feel with the melodrama turned up high. The ending fight scene to this movie alone is worth the price. Yuen Wah vs. Yuen Biao and Sammo Hung is a pleasure to watch. It's brutal, fast, and easy on the eyes.

This movie deserves more recognition and like all of Sammo Hungs stuff, it's greatly underrated here in the West.

But the fight scenes as a whole are awesome. this is possible my favorite yuen biao performance as he plays the pretty boy who is a bad boy. A bit out of place, but he is is top top top form. Add in Sammo(he stars and directs in this), Billy Chow, Yuen Wah, lam Ching Ying, Yasaiki Kuratu, Woo-ping, Phillip Ko...
Not all these guys fight, but most do, and you WILL be happy. I thought that there also was too much gun play with people gruesomely being shot in the head. But then the guns get intersting and it is certainly not your average 1980's extremely low budget movie. They put some freaking time into this thing.
So the movie is a true classic of the genre(not the war one) and it is truly an epic experience for people like me who are both old chool kung fu fans and love movies like Platoon. Platoon happens to be my favorite movie ever so I certainly can't compare it to that, but beats the holy hell out of ANY war movie in terms of INSANE stunts and hand to hand combat. And Sammo also has a very nice scene with a machetti, but then it gets even better when he gets hold of the heavy duty machine gun. It was just such a brilliant mix of war and kung fu. There will never be another movie like this. And tell me if the 3 guerilla women are not you're new favorite characteres. I know I will certainly be checking out Joyce Godenzi's works:)

The picture quality is PERFECTO without a blemish on the print. Best Fox release I have seen yet. Also it has dual languages in 5.1 sound, you gotta love that.