Goh yeung yee sang

Dr.Lamb's narrative structure bears more than a passing similarity to that of another infamous category III shocker, The Untold Story. Both deal with 'true-life murders', both show the police investigation and apprehension of the murderer, the subsequent interrogation (ie. beating) of the prisoner, and the retelling of the crimes in shocking flashbacks. And both have seemingly out of place comedic moments.

But where The Untold Story was unashamedly OTT sleaze and gore, Dr. Lamb is a more stylish affair. The cinematography is beautiful (maximum use is made of creative lighting with many scenes swathed in blue and red), the acting is great (Simon Yam and Danny Lee give solid performances and even the actresses playing corpses are convincing) and the direction is well handled by both star Lee and Billy Tang.

Simon Yam play serial killer Lam Gor-Yu, who prowls the streets at night in his taxi, looking for 'bad' women (mostly foul mouthed drunks) to strangle, dismember and then photograph. After he takes some of his more 'risqué' snapshots to the equivalent of his local Boots Chemists, he is arrested by the police, who wish to know the truth behind the disappearance of several women who they suspect Lam of reducing to a pile of spare parts.

30 minutes into the film, and Lam confesses all, finally giving fans of Cat III horror what they were waiting for – well almost...

I know that Dr.Lamb has suffered at the hands of the censors, and that the Winson Entertainment DVD I saw is missing some seconds of strong gore, but I was surprised at how relatively bloodless this film was, especially considering that it is often mentioned in the same breath as The Untold Story and crazy shocker The Ebola Syndrome. Blood is sprayed around during the first dismemberment and we get the odd severed breast thrown in (quite literally during one 'funny' moment!), but I had been hoping for a higher 'yuck' factor.

As if to make up for the lack of gore, we get a fair amount of unsavoury action in the form of Lam's predilection for messing with the bodies of his victims, prior to cutting them up. Lam poses them for photos, uses them like puppets, and in the case of the final victim, he 'marries' her and then humps her corpse for a solid 40 minutes in front of a video camera.

For me, Dr. Lamb's mix of classy production and lurid subject matter is its main stumbling point; is this meant to be a serious study of a psychotic killer or an exploitative sleazefest? The film ends up being an uncomfortable mix of the two – too much sleaze for those wanting a stylish thriller and not enough sleaze (and gore) for those wanting a memorable slice of extreme cinema.

In August,1983 a photo lab technician complained to his manager about disturbing photos of a mutilated female body on a customer's roll of film.This was the second time the manager had noticed this particular customer's unusual photos and this time he called the police.The photo was of a severed human breast.This was approximately the 700th such photo his store had processed for this customer.The cops took the customer,Lam Go-wan into custody and after sweating him for two days he confessed to murdering the woman in the photographs.Then he kept on confessing...In 1992,Danny Lee and Kent Cheng Jat-si teamed up to film the true crime biopic of Lam Go-wan,Hong Kong's first and maybe only serial killer."Dr.Lamb" is an excellent III Cat. shocker that offers some gruesome imagery including cold-blooded murder,necrophilia,dismemberment and breast mutilation.I own uncut DVD-R composite with English subtitles that has all the scenes of sexual violence intact,so if you want to see this uncensored try to find ultra-rare Spanish Manga Video release.Simon Yam's performance as the Taxi Cab Killer is truly haunting and out-of-control.One thing that I found pretty impressive were the actresses that played the murder victims,they had to lay around as corpses while the serial killer mutilated them.So if you want to see a chillingly horrific piece of horror give "Dr.Lamb" a look.9 out of 10.

The 'crime confessional' story device used here was much imitated over the next few years but this was the one that started the cycle. A taxi driving serial killer is caught and then, as he details his litany of crimes, the bulk of the movie plays out in flashback.

Most of the crimes take place at night and in the rain, and the reflected glare of wet windows lends everything an eerie Vaseline sheen of ickiness which accentuates the horror. The killer revels in the gory details of his crimes and the movie wallows right along with him, making a spectacle of every flying blood spatter. This is a gruesome exploitation movie and not for the timid, but quite compelling for its type.

Watch at your own risk.

As with many other viewers who commented here, I have to report a little baffled by the film's ungodly reputation as a virulent, nasty shocker. I was likely treated to the cut Hong Kong version but it's easy to spot out the trimmings: various scenes of our titular serial killer dissecting with a scalpel his deceased victims. We see a breast being surgically removed and stored in a jar. Incisions across different body parts. There is repeated strangulation and a tame bout of necrophilia as depraved closure. Presumably these are extended in the uncut version for added effect.

The point remains however: this is nothing like say The Untold Story if that's what you're looking for. Simon Yam exudes a petulant insanity that veers closer to clingy and pathetic than Anthony Wong's brutal monstrousness. And a lot of the film, given Danny Lee's daft involvement, is another awkwardly comedic policier about unorthodox cops matching the killer in senseless violence.

So if you are in it for brutality's sake, you will know where to find it elsewhere. But if you have cinematic stakes in the films you watch and moreover have been developing an aesthetically preoccupied eye, you may be strangely fulfilled.

Our killer is a night shift taxi driver and every night seems to rain hard, which means we get a lot of latenight city blues played on nocturnal asphalt.

The kills are a treat to watch: inside the car parked nowhere and every glass panel drenched with rain and illuminating flashes from faraway neon, hands and bodies convulsing as though a sexual sauna is going on.

And back in the killer's apartment, rays of light piercing through calligraphy painted on a blue wall.

And once the last victim makes a getaway, a frantic chase through pouring rain across a park like straight from a giallo.

Everything that has to do with violence and dying is sensual blues, purely stylized in a way that is erotic to watch. In film terms, this will remind you of the rain-soaked/ neon-bled yakuza films of Takashi Ishii in Japan. A bit of 80's Mann and Wong Kar Wai, minus too much urbane poetry.

So as far as gruesome nastiness goes, this is Category II at best. Watch as a stylized crime flick.

Billy Tang, Danny Lee, Simon Yam, Kent Cheng. But this movie is not as good as its successors. It takes time for art! The story is based on a real case, which is definitely shocking. Even with this, this film is not as good as Run and Kill, which was released a year later, with these four people. Not to mention The Untold Story of Danny Lee's company.

What is the reason? This film reveals the truth of the story at the beginning, so we are left to appreciate the crime scenes. However, Simon Yam's acting was not quite attractive then. I was only impressed by his round eyes.

Also, I should mention there are comedy elements in this film.