The Island, 1985.
Directed by Po-Chih Leong.
Starring John Sham, Timothy Zao, Hoi-Lun Au, Lap Ban Chan, Lung Chan, Jing Chen, and Billy Sau Yat Ching.
SYNOPSIS:
A teacher and six students take a trip to a remote island, and fall foul of the three insane brothers who live there and are looking for a new wife.
You know how The Texas Chain Saw Massacre is regarded as one of the most revered horror movies ever made? And you also know that by all the Chainsaw movies after the original (except for the remake) have gone even more demented and leaned towards a comedic take on the material? Well, imagine that but set in Hong Kong and minus the chainsaw – ladies and gentlemen, Eureka Video presents The Island.
Originally released in 1985 and directed by Po-Chih Leong, The Island begins with brothers Tai Fat (Lung Chan), Yee Fat (Jing Chen) and the slow-witted Sam Fat (Billy Sau Yat Ching) presenting a reluctant bride for Sam to their elderly mother. Deciding their kidnapped victim wasn’t good enough for her boys, the old crone demands a virgin bride for Sam before promptly dying.
Determined to fulfil their beloved mother’s wishes, the boys get lucky when teacher Mr. Cheung (John Sham) brings a group of students to their remote island, a group that includes Phyllis (Hoi-Lun Au). Cheung is unaware that anyone lives on the island but the brothers are hospitable at first, giving the group food and drinks from their store, but their increasingly strange behaviour starts to worry the teacher, and when Tai Fat – the eldest and most dangerous of the three – demands that Cheung gives them Phyllis to be Sam’s new bride, things escalate to where the students end up in a battle for survival against the demented trio who will stop at nothing to fulfil their mother’s dying wish.
So basically, The Island takes all of those familiar tropes from 1970s American horror movies like The Texas Chain Saw Massacre, The Hills Have Eyes and The Last House on the Left, and executes them with a Hong Kong twist, which may sound like a brilliant idea on paper but the results are mixed. The tonal shifts from humour to horror are very jarring, from students laughing at childish words like ‘nipple’ and ‘dickhead’ to the brothers’ original bride being orally raped by Yee Fat in a scene obviously inspired by The Last House on the Left (although Yee Fat has no trouble running a few moments later, which is very odd), and the first half does begin to test your patience as you know the brothers are all demented and you know where it is all heading, but Po-Chih Leong seems to want to tease you one way and then the other.
It all gets a little frustrating as not a lot really happens until around the hour mark and then The Island settles down into the groove that you wanted from the start, as the Fat brothers go full backwoods hillbilly – or the Hong Kong equivalent – and start picking off the students as Mr. Cheung tries to protect them, despite some of them trying to be heroes. Cheung as a character is a bit of a bumbling idiot, which is overdone in the first hour so he can look more heroic when he becomes the students’ only hope of survival, but it is the Fat brothers who are more interesting to spend time with.
Tai Fat is the head of the family and switches from personable to broody at the drop of a hat (the Cook), whilst Yee Fat is the first brother the students meet and is overfriendly to the point of being aggressive (the hitchhiker) whilst Sam Fat is a man-child who portrays an innocence but can be deadly if pushed (Leatherface), so the parts are all in place – just swap the barbecue rest stop of TCM for the brothers’ fizzy drinks shop for the final homage – and the actors give great performances, but those tonal inconsistencies and the blandness of the younger characters means the movie never has the same sense of threat or danger as the movies that inspired it.
Looking pristine and featuring some superb location photography, The Island is an enjoyable enough survival horror movie that has obvious influences but relies a bit too much on their familiarity without expanding on them or offering up anything that is better. The final 30 minutes is a blast, as Mr. Cheung and the surviving students take on the three brothers with axes, knives and fireworks, but getting there is a drawn out and muddled process. Stick with it, however, and it does pay off, albeit in a more comical rather than graphic fashion.
Flickering Myth Rating – Film: ★ ★ / Movie: ★ ★ ★
Chris Ward
