Codename: Cobra

Now, I can't claim to have been particularly impressed with the 1991 movie "Hak Mau" (aka "Black Cat"), and I do believe that I've only seen this 1992 sequel titled "Hak Mau II: Chi Saat Yip Lai Hing" (aka "Black Cat 2") once before. But truthfully, I have entirely forgotten about it. And thus, I opted to sit down and revisit it here in 2024.

The storyline in the movie, as written by James Fung, Gam-Ching Sin and Ivy Lee, was pretty straightforward. It made for some mindless entertainment, where you just lean back in the seat, munch on the snacks and watch the action on the screen and try not to cringe too hard at the script and plot in the movie.

The movie is just riddled with plot holes and things that make little sense. For example, a squad of trained American soldiers apparantly have the aim of stormtroopers in "Star Wars", as they hit nothing they shoot at. And the Chinese henchmen just easily gunned down the soldiers as if they were no threat.

The version of the movie that I sat down to watch had the American, Arabs and Russians dubbed into speaking Cantonese. It was just cringeworthy to witness. I absolutely loathe dubbing in movies, as it serves no purpose whatsoever. Even in America, everyone were speaking Cantonese. It was absolutely ridiculous.

The only cast members that I am familiar with in this movie are Robin Shou and Jade Leung. And despite some rather questionable dubbing, then the acting performances in the movie were fair.

The sound of the majority of assault rifles and submachine guns shooting throughout the course of the movie are just hilarious. They sounded like weapons at a laser tag game. And even better yet, the weapons didn't even have silencers attached to them.

The sheer amount of action, throughout the course of the 91 minutes that the movie ran for, makes "Hak Mau II: Chi Saat Yip Lai Hing" a bit more watchable than its predecessor. But the dubbing was a mood killer, making it hard to sit through the movie.

My rating of director Stephen Shin's 1992 movie "Hak Mau II: Chi Saat Yip Lai Hing" lands on a four out of ten stars.

"Black Cat II" is an uneven sequel to the modest 1991 Hong Kong hit. Jade Leung returns in the title role: she looks good, plays the emotionless assassin perfectly and is in good physical shape, but much of her fighting and stuntwork appear to be wire-enhanced, which (for me at least) spoils the effect. Robin Shou is quite a handsome guy in his own right, but the script doesn't give him much to do - he has only two brief fight scenes. The plot of the movie is uninteresting and often laughable. For example, the Black Cat (who is more or less like a cyborg here) accidentally kills an innocent woman in front of many witnesses, but we only see the event referenced once on the news - nobody seems to mind that she isn't arrested after that. There are also some sci-fi elements here: the villains take strange radioactive pills that enhance their physical powers, and the Black Cat can sense this radioactivity from miles away. At one (low) point, the film even demonstrates that her mind and hands really ARE quicker than a bullet! And, like another reviewer said, the dubbing of EVERYONE (including Americans and Russians) into Chinese pretty much destroys the credibility of the movie. (**)

Black Cat 2: The Assassination of Boris Yeltsin (1992) chronicles the further exploits of the C.I.A. assassin the Black Cat. Jade Leung reprises her role whilst Stephen Shin is also back behind the camera. Action star Robin Shou co-stars as the Black Cat's new partner. The Black Cat is wheeled into action as she has a new assignment. She has to travel to Russia and protect their new leader from a devious assassination plot. The new program inserted into the Black Cat is supposed to be new and improved. Sadly, she's just a cypher now who as no emotions and only cares about one thing, finishing her assignment. Her lack of feelings even scares Robin Shou as he tries to befriend her. Can the two protect the Russian president or will they fail miserably and leave the former Soviet country in chaos?

A passable sequel to the first film. Jade Leung is very creepy as the Black Cat. Robin Shou gets a chance to show off his skills. The movie's plot is very dated but it's an entertaining movie that doesn't fail to deliver the goods.

Recommended for fans of the first film.

Dickson Phoon's D&B movies made series of good movies in the '90s. D&B and Media Asia was definitely a player back then. You could always count on quality entertainment from these two companies that brought something different from the well established Golden Harvest, and too old school Shaw Brothers. Loss of these two companies were definitely a loss not only for Hong Kong, but for the entire world. This movie, like other D&B's creation is high quality, and has smartness to its production.

Huk Mao or Hei Mao (Black Cat) returns this time to stab and kill Boris Yeltsin. Huk Mao is definitely a Chinese version of MK ULTRA super soldier.

It would be a real gas if Dickson Phoon was an Illuminati, and all the writers worked for him getting information from the "source", and Jade Leung really is a victim of Project Monarch (for what MK Ultra, and Project Monarch is, just Google these two terms and you'll get much information about the mind control and the super soldier program).

In any case, Dickson, if you're reading this, consider bringing D&B back on line again, and give us another dose of high quality entertainment. Us fans of D&B movies will all appreciate that.

Black Cat 2, although a sequel from Black Cat 1, took quite a different turn in terms of the plot and the role of the main character in the film. In this sequel, Erica, the high-tech CIA agent, was once again activated by the government, this time to help track the killers of the Russian president. The film started with a scene where a group of doctors were performing a surgery to Erica. Then, it switched to a scene where Robin and his colleagues were protecting a Russian witness, then attacked by the terrorists, mixed with a good chasing scene on the snowy mountain, with exciting ski and snowboarding skills. Robin, another CIA agent, was assigned to partner up with Erica on this task to track down the killers. Unwillingly at first, Robin throughout the film, slowly developed sympathy to her and protested on the many experiments performed to her merely as a machine. Unfortunately, Jade Leung's performance as Erica in this sequel was not as convincing as expected. On the other hand, Robin Shou delivered a good, solid performance as Robin. Somehow, his strong character had overshadowed Erica's supposedly main role here. The ending was not conclusive. The scenes took place in USA and USSR. Sometimes it was funny to picture the film dubbed in Cantonese, especially during the conversation among the American officials.