Human Lanterns (Sun Chung, 1982)

Region 1 Image Entertainment (USA)
NTSC, 2.35:1 16x9 enhanced
99 minutes
Audio: DD 2.0 mono Mandarin Chinese
Subtitles: Optional English, Spanish
Extras: Shaw’s Baby Doll; The Skin Peel Scene (alternate take); Production Stills Gallery; trailers

Released: 10 June 2008
transparent keepcase

Human Lanterns is an odd mish-mash of the martial-arts, slasher-horror, and serial-killer genres. The story begins with two rich and powerful noblemen who bicker in public about who will win the lantern festival competition. Both noblemen are idiots as neither one makes his own lantern (they just pay professional craftsmen for the actual work). One of the noblemen commissions a former martial-arts rival to create an exceptional lantern, and the rival kidnaps women who are near and dear to the two noblemen in order to use their skins for his masterpiece.

The movie is not particularly scary or even gross. The villain’s histrionics are rather silly, and the martial-arts choreography is second rate. Moreover, the characters’ moralizing is trite and out-of-place. Made during the early 1980s, Human Lanterns came long after the Shaw brothers’ heyday.

Video:
The 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen image looks very clean, and the colors are very vivid. The picture is generally sharp and detailed, though scenes shot with soft focus are understandably weaker than scenes shot with “normal” focus.

Audio:
The DD 2.0 mono Mandarin Chinese audio track is surprisingly robust compared to other pre-1985 mixes. The sound isn’t muffled, though some loud music (such as the opening Shaw Brothers fanfare) can be harsh.

Optional English and Spanish subtitles support the audio.

Extras:
“Shaw’s Baby Doll: An Interview With Shawn Yin Yin” and “The Skin Peel Scene (alternate take)” are self-explanatory.

You also get a Production Stills gallery as well as a huge selection of trailers for this and other movies.

--Miscellaneous--
An insert booklet advertises other DVDs.