Usually, I only talk about Filipino films here but in case you're not aware of this I thought I'd better GIVE YOU the GRAND news that the ultra violent Shaw Brothers movie HONG KONG GODFATHER is finally going to be released on DVD! For the first time ever!! Anywhere!!! This is indeed such a brilliant piece of news that I have to lie down and calm down every time I think about it (okay maybe not quite, hahaha).The only way to watch this movie has so far been via a cut print from a video tape (or possibly a VCD or LD) that had been dubbed into Mandarin (I have no idea as to where it was released; in Taiwan probably) or via PamMedia's bootleg DVD sourced from that release. As I'm sure you know, the video company Celestial has restored and put out tons and tons of Shaw Brothers films for the past 5-6 years in Hong Kong but unfortunately they didn't think HONG KONG GODFATER needed to be released. And to add insult to injury the rights for a US release had originally been bought by the then rejuvenated American video label BFI (they used to be a crappy bootleg company called Brentwood) but due to the financial crisis BFI kicked the bucket and cancelled their upcoming releases!
But lo and behold another company, Funimation Entertainment, has now bought the rights for the films BFI were going to release! Very good news indeed. Most of the films are old-skool kung fu flicks which is cool enough if you're a fan of those but I'm much more a fan of modern day HK films from the 80s, and needless to say I'm looking forward to HONG KONG GODFATER quite a bit. There's a couple of clips from the old Mandarin tape on YouTube and I'm posting them here. Do check them out! They are totally wild and very gory.
Release date is April 27, 2010.
- And finally, here's a promotion trailer from Funimation about their upcoming titles. If you watch it all the way to the end you'll see a brief clip from HK GODFATHER.
The PanMedia bootleg (and the cover text stating it's "uncut" is a blatant lie!).
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