RED TO KILL (Hong Kong; 1994)
D: Billy Tang Hin-shing
Lest anyone think his RUN AND KILL licked the bottom of the exploitation barrel, director Tang soon after excreted this astonishingly tasteless Category III endurance test that makes the earlier work look like I HAVE A DATE WITH SPRING! After her father dies, mentally-challenged young Lily Chung is moved into an apartment complex where one floor is a government-subsidized rehab center for like-minded cases. Bad enough she and her new friends must endure the accusatory remarks of the “normal” residents (reflecting prevailing attitudes toward Hong Kong’s disabled as second-class citizens), but also the depraved advances of workshop co-ordinator Ben Ng, who’s also a ripped ‘n ragin’ serial rapist and necrophile of the wackiest sort. When he brutally rapes her after her pretty red dress and undies drive him nuts (the after-effect of a childhood trauma, don’tcha know), then walks free at the subsequent trial because she’s declared an unfit witness (!), social worker Money Lo decides it time to punch this bad boy’s tickets, but gets more than she bargained for when her deliberately slutty come-ons rocket him right off the deep end. Perhaps that tablesaw might ease the negotiations! Excessive to say the least, and balanced with a strange sentimentalism, but those who expect no subtlety (or deep characterizations) will probably find much bad taste to savour. Most of the cast assay retardation by tilting their heads, jutting out their lower jaws and rolling their eyeballs, while Ben Ng, thespian extraordinaire of Category III psychos, never misses an opportunity to stick his bare ass front and center before going beaters on a mannequin or pouring ice down the front of his thong. And while Chung does little to further the plight of the developmentally disabled in Asian societies, she does spend much of this jawdropper in the altogether. Waaaahhh!
