mantisfist6

Tom Hardy stars in this 3 hour, 4 part 'mini-series' as Freddy. A sociopathic, violent and sadistic young man recently out of prison. Starting off in 1984, the film charts Freddy's up's (and subsequent downs) in two further timeframes (1988, and 1994). The plot revolves around the family unit surrounding Freddy.. His wife and 3 kids, as well as his best mate, who ends up marrying Freddy's wife's younger sister. Add to this the 'shadowy' character of Ozzie, the old and grizzled big boss, still in prison but still calling the shots... And you get a somewhat compelling storyline. The acting is great, across the board. However, there are some major problems. The first is that this could easily have been cut down into a 2 hour long film. Too many scenes go on for too long, too many just seem to revolve around establishing shots, and the sheer number of extended takes of people dancing to music gets annoying very quickly. Add to this some very poor production values, you can tell this is made on a relatively small budget. A woeful musical score, that doesn't include any recognisable songs from the era it's set. The worst part though is that the series doesn't know what it wants to be. Drama? Thriller? Psychological character study? Comedy? Tragedy? It seems to want to blend in too many different genres, and contradicts itself in terms of stylisations. It doesn't help that the underlying plot points disappear, when the 'elephant in the room' plot thread comes into play in the last act. And to top it all off, the ending was a massive cop-out that had me asking questions the narrative posed, but never answered.

This is truly an inspirational film for those who want to know what makes a good kung fu film. Nonsensical plot, bad dubbing, hilarious villains, sound effects which are so overused in every other kung fu film you should be able to mimic them perfectly by now.

As the other review captures the plot well I will simply add my own personal views on this film.

As someone who collects kung fu films, i disagree with the notion the film is from 1981. It must have been made far earlier than that. The actors used, the stilted choreography and even those doing the dubbing are from the early 70's. It's funny how you can age a film by knowing who was doing the dubbing at various points in the history of kung fu films!! As a sad note, when i was younger my friends an I took 'kung fu names' to use when we were out together. Mine was Snowywhite, and to this day friends will see me and shout 'evening Snowy' across a crowded bar. Still puts a smile on my face, even after nearly 16 years!