Dung fong tuk ying

This Hong Kong action film is set shortly after the end of the Vietnam War. The American forces have left behind large stockpiles of weapons and want them destroyed before the Vietcong get their hands on them. To this end an entirely deniable group of convicts of Chinese ancestry is recruited and parachuted into Vietnam where they meet with a trio of female Cambodian guerrillas and two Vietnamese men they have been asked to rescue. As they head towards the target they encounter several groups of Vietcong. It will be a tough mission for them and not all of them will survive.

This might not be the best film concerned with the Vietnam War but it is still rather fun. There are plenty of nods to other films; the plot is clearly inspired by 'The Dirty Dozen' and one scene is from 'The Deer Hunter'... this isn't a problem though. There is plenty of action; this includes shooting, explosions and lots of impressive martial arts. There is also a degree of humour, although this doesn't get in the way of the drama. The acting is solid; most obviously from Sammo Hung, who also directed. Other notable performances come from Haing S. Ngor as mad uncle Lung Yeung and Joyce Godenzi as the leader of the Cambodian guerrillas. Overall I'd certainly recommend this to fans of martial arts action and war films.

These comments are based on watching the film in Cantonese with English subtitles.

In the early 90s, after reading a glowing review of the film in a fanzine, I shelled out mucho dinero for a pirated un-subtitled VHS copy of Eastern Condors. And even though I didn't have a clue what was being said, the movie blew me away with its OTT gung-ho action, bullet-riddled battle scenes and unbelievable martial arts madness.

These days the film is available on DVD remastered, fully restored and subtitled, so fans of fantastic fight action have no excuse for not checking out this marvellous movie.

Director and star Sammo Hung takes the basic plot of The Dirty Dozen (a group of criminals take part in a dangerous mission with the promise of freedom if they succeed), adds a touch of The Deer Hunter and Rambo, and throws in a ton of amazing kung fu to deliver one of the best Hong Kong flicks of the 80s.

Joining Sammo on his dangerous mission (into Vietnam, to destroy a hidden US munitions dump) are the brilliant Yuen Baio (as a Vietnamese profiteer dealing in smuggled goods), Oscar winner Haing S. Ngor, Lam Ching Ying, Yuen Woo-ping, Corey Yuen, Charlie Chin, and Sammo's real-life wife, the gorgeous Joyce Godenzi. Playing nasty bad-guys out to foil the mission are Billy Chow and the fantastic Yuen Wah. With a line up like that, and Hung calling the shots, excellence is almost guaranteed.

From the moment our 'heroes' parachute into a Vietcong infested jungle, Eastern Condors is non stop brutal action and unmissable fare for those who enjoy their war films violent and unfettered by serious political comment. The bad guys are pure evil (Wah's sniggering fan-waving general is as despicable as they come) and deserve to die. End of story.

And die they do: blasted by machine guns, knifed to death in guerrilla attacks, hacked by machetes, and even killed by imaginative use of jungle flora! In a blistering finale in an underground, missile laden bunker, the surviving good-guys take on the enemy in a vicious showdown that will leave you breathless. Yuen Baio and Sammo take the spotlight in the final fight against Wah and Chow, and the result is some of the best martial arts action ever committed to film. Baio's acrobatic skills are well showcased, whilst Hung, who slimmed down in order to be able to perform more incredible stunts, is on particularly fine form.

Only the occasional 'silly' moment (such as the death of a stuttering character who dies when he fails to reach twenty before opening his parachute), and the rather strange nutter played by Haing S. Ngor (I'm still not sure what the point of his character was) stop me from giving this top marks.

But 9/10 is nothing to be sniffed at, and any fan of the genre should definitely check this one out.

Eastern Condors has few equals in the action genre. Directed and starring Sammo Hung, Sammo turns the action to eleven in this hybrid of modern action and kung fu. Also appearing is Yuen Biao and Yuen Wah as the ever reliable villain. E.C. is Hong Kong's answer to The Dirty Dozen where a group of Chinese/American criminals go on a suicide mission to destroy a missile ammunition dump left behind by Marines in Vietnam. The tone is lighter than John Woo's Bullet In The Head, but is taken serious enough to care about the characters, move along the story and sell the abundant and insane action scenes. There is enough bonebreaking martial arts, crazy stunts, as well as a barrage of machine gunfire and explosions to please the most jaded of action fans. Overall, Eastern Condors more than delivers and I always enjoy re watching this action classic.

This movie is awesome, it's another one that takes my breathe away every time I see it! The action just flows, Sammo has never looked fitter, even as a kid he wasn't this slim! Yuen Biao shows why at one time no one could touch him in the acrobatic action. Again, I'm a little biased with this film as the first time I saw it was my first experience of Hong Kong action on the Big Screen (happy days at the Scala, Kings Cross, Thank you Rick Baker et al). From the very start, when the late, great Lam Ching Ying (RIP, he went too early) scales the Flag Pole to the final slow zoom out hillside shot this film will hold you to your seat (unless you hate action). It's an action film fan treat all the way. SEE THIS MOVIE NOW! (preferably in subtitled form as some humour gets lost in translation!!)

If you only know Sammo Hung for his more happy-go-lucky roles, then Eastern Condors will be a massive shock to the system, going as far as to tread into John Woo's territory of heroic bloodshed. Taking the idea of The Dirty Dozen but setting it in Vietnam, Sammo got serious with this one, even cutting his trademark hair and slimming right down. There are no mincing words about how brutally violent Eastern Condors gets... Hands get chopped off, Vietcong kids play Russian Roulette and people are shot point blank with no hesitation, in the wrong hands it's distasteful stuff, but Sammo treats it all with sincerity, marking this film out as one of his finest accomplishments as an actor, martial artist and director.

Although the majority of the action is hyper-intense gun fights occasionally punctuated by a familiar moment seen in Western war films like The Deer Hunter or the Rambo franchise, there is a spectacular final bout of full-contact fisticuffs for the patient ones among you. The cast is populated by plenty of familiar names and faces, although I do wish they got a bit more characterisation outside of their nicknames and who plays them, they all commit often coming away bloody and bruised from the hyper-dangerous stunt work. For better or worse, Eastern Condors has a gritty edge that makes it truly stand out amongst Sammo's filmography often feeling like what Heroes Shed No Tears had originally wanted to be, it's an absolute must-see!