Vampire vs. Vampire

Lam Ching Ying plays yet another Taoist priest (this time with a monobrow) in yet another Chinese vampire film. There's the expected hopping vampire in the form of a little kid who chirps like a chick, but this one also chucks in a whole load of other supernatural nonsense, including a female palm tree ghost, evil bats that terrorise some nuns, the spirit of a dead woman who possesses the priest's apprentices, and a Western Dracula-style bloodsucker who is revived by a stupid army captain. All of this is presented in such a chaotic fashion that it proves hard to follow. And if, like me, you struggle with Chinese comedy, the film's constant silly humour goes to make this even more of a chore to sit through.

From the opening scene in which a toothy, slimy monster oozes from a jar, to the ending in which two frogs with glowing Chinese symbols on their skin hop out of some quicksand, I was totally perplexed and not very amused.

3/10. Watch Mr. Vampire instead.

Lam Ching-Ying is one of the coolest Hong Kong action actors ever!

But most of you don't seem to realize that. This film has some great action scenes and it's funny too! Go get it!

Lam Ching Ying, famous for his "Vampire Buster" roles, stars as the One-Eyebrow Priest in this movie. He discovers that the water supply in his village is infected with bats and must seek the source of the flying creatures. It leads to an old church, where its two practicing priests disappeared years ago. The corpse of one of the priest is recovered and, unfortunately, changes into a vampire.

This film is non-stop fun as Lam Ching Ying and his disciples battle paranormal creatures including ghosts and zombies one after the other. His bag full of magic spells you've come to recognize in Hong Kong vampire movies are seen in this film along with some good Kung-Fu action, dry humor and toe-tapping music. The special effects, especially with the bat sequence, are realistic and well done.

The hopping Chinese vampires are absent in this film, except for the little child vampire, which I think adds a touch of lightheartedness and blends in well with the cast. The main antagonist of the film is a Western Dracula-type vampire, creepy and hair-raising that gives this film full of suspense.

If you are a fan of Hong Kong horror movies in general, definitely give this film a look.

Grade A

Chinese exorcist One-Eyebrow Priest (Lam Ching-ying) leads a peaceful life with two disciples Ah Ho (Chin Siu-ho) and Ah Fong (David Lui) in a small town together with a mischievous miniature jiangshi. While finding new water sources one day, the priest encounters a European vampire in the nearby church who is aided by a dead countess. Although the priest manages to get rid of the countess, his Chinese exorcism fails on the European vampire.

The title refers to the interaction between a jiangshi child, a creature from Chinese "hopping" corpse fiction, and a British vampire based on Western vampire fiction. The latter one is quite a formidable and scary foe, and appears in the last 28 minutes. That's when the film preps up, otherwise the rest has pace issues, isn't as focused as the first four official Mr Vampire films. Even the humour is flat, however there's good imaginative scenes, especially featuring the baby vampire. Some of the action scenes such as the crossing the dodgy bridge are well done.

I stumbled upon the 1989 Hong Kong horror comedy "Yi Mei Dao Ren" (aka "Vampire vs. Vampire") by random chance here in 2024. And I had never actually seen the movie before. And given my love of the Hong Kong cinema, of course I opted to sit down and watch it.

The storyline in this 1989 vampire movie was a bit too much on the downright silly side for my liking. There was a bit too much childish and stupid comedy in the movie, especially with the child vampire. And it sort of reflected poorly on the overall impression of "Yi Mei Dao Ren", making it a subpar movie in comparison to the many other vampire movies that Ching-Ying Lam also starred in.

Writers Kam Cheong Chan, Chi-Leung Shum and Mei-Yee Sze didn't really impress me with the script they conjured up for this movie. And it was a weak foray into the Jiangshi (Chinese hopping vampire) subgenre of movies.

The character gallery in the movie was okay. Though the child vampire grew very tiring to watch and listen to.

Nice to see the likes of Ching-Ying Lam, Sandra Kwan Yue Ng and Siu-Ho Chin on the cast list. The acting performances in the movie were okay, despite the fact that the script was a dumpster fire.

"Yi Mei Dao Ren" was a very difficult movie to sit through, and I found very little entertainment or enjoyment throughout the course of the 88 minutes that the movie ran for. And this is definitely not a movie that I will be returning to watch a second time.

My rating of director Ching-Ying Lam's 1989 movie "Yi Mei Dao Ren" lands on a four out of ten stars.