FILM DIARY: The Last Blood (Jing Wong, 1991)

Sold in many countries as a sequel to John Woo’s HARD BOILED (in the UK, as HARD BOILED 2; and in Germany, where Woo’s earlier JUST HEROES was released as HARD BOILED 2, as HARD BOILED 3), Jing Wong’s THE LAST BLOOD was actually made a year before HARD BOILED. Whilst not on a par with the Woo picture, THE LAST BLOOD has some incredibly-staged action sequences that are punctuated by some outrageous humour – mostly involving Eric Tsang’s character Fatty.

Set against a backdrop of the Gulf War, footage of which is seen playing on television screens throughout the film, THE LAST BLOOD’s focus is on terrorism, the Japanese Red Army attempting to assassinate the visiting Daka Lama. The terrorists are depicted in sleeper cells: in an early scene, the lover of one of these terrorists, unaware that he is part of a terrorist cell, returns home to find her home occupied by his compatriots. In response, her lover turns on her and cruelly and dispassionately murders her.

The sharply-filmed action is offset by some wacky humour, including a slack handful of in-jokes that poke fun at the screen personae of Andy Lau – who here plays triad Brother Bee – and Alan Tam – playing Interpol agent Lui Tai. That said, despite much of the film’s levity and the panto villain shtick of the film’s antagonist, Kama Kura (Chin Ho) – the leader of the Japanese Red Army cell who sports a RED HEAT-era Arnold Schwarzenegger-esque flat top haircut – THE LAST BLOOD also skirts with the taboo. In one notable scene, the terrorists up the ante by shooting a wheelchair-bound father and his young son.

Viewing Notes. Watched via the German HDMV DVD release, which contains an anamorphic presentation (1.85:1) that, unlike the Mega Star DVD, is progressive rather than interlaced. The HDMV also contains the original Cantonese mono mix. (The audio on the Mega Star DVD release is a new 5.1 sound mix which contains rerecorded foley effects.)