Angel Terminators (1990) Review

“Angel Terminators” International DVD Cover

Director: Wai Lit
Producer: Georges Lai
Cast: Sharon Yeung Pan Pan, Kenneth Tsang, Carrie Ng, Michiko Nishiwaki, Alan Chui Chung San, Kara Hui Ying Hung, Cheng Yuen Man, Dick Wei
Running Time: 91 min.

By HKFanatic

Here’s a full admission: I love “girls with guns” movies. Back in the late 80’s and 90’s, this sub-genre of Hong Kong action cinema saw women like Moon Lee and Cynthia Khan kicking and shooting their way to stardom. These ladies always gave just as good as their male counterparts such as Chow Yun-fat and Jackie Chan, and probably had to try even harder to prove themselves in the male-driven field of action cinema.

Ever since watching She Shoots Straight, perhaps the pinnacle of the genre, I’ve been dying to see more “girls with guns” flicks. Unfortunately, these films are still criminally rare in the United States. If you’re lucky, Netflix might still have a few of them in circulation near you, although they’ll undoubtedly arrive on an out-of-print Full Screen DVD from Tai Seng (remember them?). Given such slim pickings, I was more or less forced to rent Angel Terminators, a film that is by no means considered a standout of the genre.

Considering the high production values showcased in Hong Kong movies like Hard Boiled or just about any Jackie Chan film, it’s easy to forget that there were still plenty of shoestring productions made on the island during its 90’s heyday. Angel Terminators is the kind of under-funded action film that relies on stuntman putting themselves in harm’s way in order to make up for its obviously low budget. The script is a bit slapdash and hard to follow, with our villain (Kenneth Tsang of The Killer and Police Story 3: Supercop, among countless other films) getting more screentime than the protagonists and a disconcerting number of scenes in which women are urinated on. Yes, it happens more than once. But if you can get past the bad lighting, jumbled storyline, and misogynistic streak, then Angel Terminators has some amazing action scenes, which once again prove that nobody does it better than Hong Kong.

The opening scenes tease us with the presence of the amazingly talented and lovely Kara Hui, a veteran of Shaw Brothers films like My Young Auntie. Don’t get too attached, though, as Kara promptly disappears from the film until the climax. That’s strike one against the movie, as far as I’m concerned. In her stead is actress Pan Pan Yeung, who certainly knows how to throw a kick but is slightly lacking in screen presence. Either that, or her performance was hampered by the terrible 80’s-style haircut she was saddled with.

Yeung was trained in martial arts since the age of six, so she is definitely a woman of action, but there’s a depressing subplot which involves the bad guys getting her hooked on heroin. It’s another example of the film’s sadistic heart that has its female characters tortured and humiliated, when we the audience just want to see them stand up and kick ass. Fortunately, the ending makes up for it when Kara Hui and Yeung team up against the legendary Dick Wei. The two women manage to make him look like a wimp, even though we’ve seen the talented fighter give Yuen Baio and Sammo Hung a run for their money.

Remember that scene in The Dark Knight when Batman lands on top of a van and all the windows shatter upon impact? There’s a scene like that in The Angel Terminators, except it’s just Pan Pan Yueng landing on a car, which is hilarious since you know she’s probably light as a feather. There’s another scene where Yueng is literally dangling from the window of a moving car while firing away at the bad guys. Crazy moments like this make Angel Terminators worth watching for fans of “girls with guns” flicks. The film flirts with Category III-style exploitation, but thankfully never follows that road to its end (except for all the golden showers). If you just want to see some amazing fight scenes and stunts from 90’s-era Hong Kong, and you don’t mind a cruddy DVD picture, then you could have a worse time of it than renting this film.

HKFanatic’s Rating: 6.5/10