Bewitched (1981)

Best movie of this year hands down!

Truly Dreadful Film

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

Following the discovery of a dead body, a police detective who helped solve the case finds that the spirit who caused the murderer to embark on his killing spree has now possessed him and turns to a devout priest to before the necessary rituals in order to protect himself.There was quite a lot to like with this one. One of the many positives of this one is the fact that there's such a deranged and wild atmosphere present in this one due to the black magic cursing involved. The way the spells are enacted in here are quite intense and often creepy, being that they're carried about in the one room where all the different black magic relics are shown from the skulls, black candles, strange jars lining the walls and the different pots and containers featuring all the ingredients to make their spells come to life. The way they include all the different objects here, from the silver bells on the strings of the ceramic boxes to carving out the writing with the special tree-branch and the special altar where they reside over during all the special ranting and enacting their spells, all combine together to give this one a rather creepy and frightening atmosphere which is what makes the film work as it does. This as well carries over into the rather fun curses that actually get played out here, from the black marks on the body that continually spread across them to the different artifacts turning into animals and other objects being turned into lethal and rather dangerous elements to attack their victim that it becomes all the more effective even before adding in the requisite vomiting up worms and maggots that is included in here. Once it finally gets to the spectacular spiritual battle between the two sorcerers at the end, there's just such an insanely wild and fun time here with the frenetic action enabling the two sides to engage in the battles against each other as we get to see the dueling priests throughout here fire some truly outrageous spells at each other. Cursing pictures in order to cause painful sores to appear on the body, causing their equipment to crumble into dust at the merest touch, bringing objects in the room to attack the other and other activities, there's such a wild and crazy assortment of black magic featured here that the film becomes a highly visceral experience on that alone. Even the other finale, from his battle to get free and how he reacts while under that control, makes this one quite fun and rather fun. What makes all this sorcery at the end work is the fact that the build-up exploring what happened to him here, from his relationship with the girl that's quite fun and innocent to the strained way he interacts with his daughter amid the slow-building realization of his curse, the set-up to this one manages to work quite nicely and gives this one the burgeoning storyline necessary to really fuel the rest of this one rather nicely. The only thing that doesn't really work here is the fact that there's the second affliction in the final moments rather than built up so that it really makes a rather strange inclusion. Otherwise, there's not much to dislike here.Rated Unrated/R: Graphic Violence, Full Nudity and Language.

The sub-genre of Hong Kong horror films enjoyed its heyday in the late '70s and early '80s, one of my favourite eras for cinema in general. The emphasis on these films, whose titles ranged from BLACK MAGIC to THE BOXER'S OMEN, was on gory black magic rituals and the effects of said rituals on the unfortunate victims. Imagine people spewing insects, suffering from bursting pustules and generally becoming possessed, and you'll have the general idea. BEWITCHED is the archetypal Hong Kong black magic flick, a well made effort full of originality. That's the main draw for the Western viewer.My only real problem with this movie is the pacing in the first half. To be honest, after an arresting maggoty-corpse opening, it's slow, more of a police procedural than anything else. A suspect in custody ends up telling what seems to be his life story, a mini narrative that takes forty minutes to play out. There's some gratuitous slow-motion beach nudity thrown in, in an obvious effort to sustain the viewer's interest, but the main question will be "where's the magic?". Well, the good news is that the second half of this film is where it gets good.It's packed full of evil rituals, fights of wizardry and the participation of real-life wizard Hussin Bin Abu Hassan playing a very scary villain. Possessed people eat raw meat and kill one another, knives levitate to stab their victims and there are some extremely nasty moments, like when the bad guy drinks from a vat of foetuses. Seemingly, directors always liked to throw in one extended magic fight into these films. The one here is pretty nifty, incorporating some great effects (a little bat-creature is my favourite), flashing lights, weird bloodshed and a generally spooky atmosphere.Melvin Wong, whose career seems to have been based on policeman roles, does well in the film and the rest of the cast are enjoyable too. I especially liked the virtuous monk, whose presence at an airport at the film's climax makes for an unforgettable showdown. Fun is also to be had from the random deaths, like when a chauffeur is dragged under a car, his face torn off. The film is really memorable, though, for those queasy moments that go far beyond the boundaries of good taste. One such moment sees the black magician examining the rotting corpse of a pregnant woman before drawing black oil from her nostrils – one of the most nauseating moments in the whole flick. There are more, though, especially the various spells that come up subtitled on the screen. The worst is probably the 'worm spell', which is pretty self-explanatory and, genuinely, the stuff of nightmares. Director Kwei Chih-Hung really knows his stuff and creates a frightening atmosphere of dread throughout the movie, what with the ominous music and the 'what the hell's going on?' storyline. This is raw, visceral terror on a level with HOSTEL.

The first film of Kwei Chih-Hung I ever saw was the indescribable Mo (Boxer's Omen) so working backwards I just had the chance to watch his previous outing into the world of Thai black magic. A policeman investigating the horrid death of a five-year old girl is led to Thailand where he encounters black magic and eventually a series of horrible curses are placed on him to prevent his solving the mystery. That description makes the film sound reasonable if not a bit boring but believe me it's not boring! We are witness to lots of sights including, a six inch nail being pulled from the corpse of a five year old girl, an extended spell battle between a monk and a sorcerer, a séance with floating skulls and twigs that write plus exploding bats. We also learn many useful things such as how to extract oil from the rotting corpse of a pregnant woman, or that eating maggots gives you super evil powers, or that if you discover a loved one is eating raw pork liver at night, all may not be well. All this commotion is because a callous Hong Kong tourist didn't come back to his Thai lover by a certain date. She happily causes the death of several people and is willing to kill more so her ex-lover dies a protracted death. And strangely she somehow convinces a black magic priest to go along with this despite the pain and danger he goes thru when a Buddhist priest volunteers to fight back. It's quite an experience but it falls apart by the final third and the ending looks like they ran over budget and Mona Fong said, "You have one night to finish this film and send those Thai actors back!". So they shot the ending in a HK airport terminal. Regardless, the film looks quite good at times with interesting art direction and photography. There's a bit of nudity when the Thai girlfriend goes for a slow motion swim, but most of the film is just silly looking but gross effects.Fun but "Mo" is more fun.

A detective investigates the death of a little girl by her father. The man claims he was under the influence of a wizard's spell. He recounts the story to the detective who, through a series of bizarre events, travels to Thailand to learn the secrets of the supposed black magic rituals. He ends up learning more than he bargained for. After his return to Hong Kong, he learns in a most painful way that he has multiple spells placed on him by a powerful wizard learned in the black arts. A monk proficient in white magic, who has battled the evil wizard before, travels to Hong Kong for a final showdown.Kuei Chi Hung's excellent horror tale is a spooky character piece punctuated by some gruesome scenes of gore and two elaborately staged duels between a monk and the evil wizard. Kuei was inarguably the best HK director for horror films. He was an acolyte of Chang Cheh and his gritty crime thriller, THE DELINQUINT (1974) was a precursor to his later grim output.Ai Fei is the swaggering tourist on vacation in Thailand who meets up with a beautiful Thai girl. Feigning interest in her, he manages to steal her virginity before heading back to Hong Kong. Before he leaves, the girl gives him a necklace to remind him of his return a year later. Only he has no intention of returning. One night, an oily liquid seeps from the necklace beginning a terrible revenge exacted on the lying and cheating man. He murders his own daughter in a vicious, brutal scene where he bashes her over the head with a pipe. This entire piece is told in flashback to the detective (Wong) after Fei's character is condemned to hang. Hanging would be a blessing as his body begins to sprout many pimple-like sores that ooze a greenish pus. At one point, he is completely wrapped in gauze, his stomach swelled like a balloon. He then pukes up hundreds of maggots before stabbing himself repeatedly in the gut.When the detective goes to Thailand to learn about the black arts, he invites trouble on himself and he, too is cursed after the monk does battle with the wizard who barely manages to escape the monk's powers. The wizard follows the detective back to Hong Kong where he places a series of nasty spells on him and his wife. Ultimately, the monk traces the wizard to Hong Kong to save the detective.There are two duels of magic in the film. The first one is a staggering 10 minute sequence pulled off admirably by director Kuei. It's filled with creative back and forth exchanges of various magical counter moves including a nasty one in which the wizard drinks blood from a giant vase containing dozens of unborn babies and viscera.Melvin Wong turns in a good performance here as the detective. He usually appears in martial arts films and seldom ever got a big role but he does here. He studied law in America before joining Shaw Brothers and he spoke fluent English.Also of note is in the credits it is apparent that Kuei researched black magic arts for the production as well as a credit for 'the participation of noted sorcerer Hussein Bin Abu Hassan'! He would be the villain whose body erupts in a spectacular display of melting goo and abusive bladder effects the likes of which were seen in the American horror film, THE BEAST WITHIN (1982).Director Kuei was an unusual and odd director. He had some interesting, sometimes brutal quirks. He would often go to extremes to get the right reaction for a scene. Extremes that often matched the subject matter. Chang Cheh remarked that Kuei once demanded his actors eat rotten food to elicit the proper response for the scene. He also refused to allow an actor to go to the emergency room after a failed motorcycle stunt until he caught the accident on camera! Kuei, regardless of his methods, was an extremely talented director who failed to capitalize on his success by emigrating to America after Shaw Brothers closed film production in the mid 80s to focus on television programming.The film was a hit in HK and two years later Kuei returned to black magic territory to direct a sequel entitled THE BOXER'S OMEN (1983) or MO, which means 'Demon' in Chinese. The difference between the two films is that BEWITCHED contains much character and story development but also contains a lot of gruesome bits that would be pushed to the max in the sequel. The story takes a back seat in the sequel to the elaborately staged magic duels and scenes of totally outrageous gore. There are also evocative and surreal sets unlike anything seen in any HK horror picture. BEWITCHED is the better movie in terms of film-making prowess and story but BOXER'S OMEN is best for its ballsy attitude to shock with one gross-out scene after another.The poster for BEWITCHED is OTT and promises nutty thrills. Actually, everything on the poster is in the movie, but not in quite the manner presented on its advertising. What's funny is that the sequels poster masks the zany, totally freakish and often psychedelically insane movie it promotes. In between BEWITCHED and its sequel, Kuei would direct an elusive and rare horror flick, CURSE OF EVIL (1982). A recommended and highly enjoyable horror romp for different reasons than its more outlandish sequel.