New Kids in Town (a.k.a.
New Killers in Town)
Director: Lau Ga-yung
Year: 1990
Hong Kong
Duration: 85 minutes
Rating: 6.5
Due to the presence of Moon
Lee and Sophia Crawford this film has usually been thrown into the Girls
with Guns bucket, but it is in fact much more a generic action film with
lots of punches and kicks thrown by both genders. It has a solid cast of
B-action players who made their living with films like this – the aforementioned
Moon and Sophia plus Chin Siu-ho, Karel Wong and Eddie Mahler – not to mention
the presence of a legend – Lau Kar Leung who also takes on the action choreography
chores. The action is up to the good standards of these types of films though
often they felt somewhat abbreviated. On the plus side - one of the action
scenes is rather impressive for its location (on the steps of the often pictured
St. Paul’s in Macau) and the final fight between Lau and Maher displays some
of Lau’s vaunted pole fighting ability and it is a pleasure to watch the
master at work.
It has an underlying theme that spilled into many Hong Kong films in the
run up to the Handover in 1997 – an implied suggestion that Hong Kong was
vastly superior to Mainland China – but also in this case more dangerous.
Two martial art brothers come to Hong Kong to live with their uncle (Lau
Kar Leung) and their cousin Siu Fung (Moon Lee). Shing (Chin Siu-ho) is the
quiet serious sort while his brother Ho (Lee Ga-sing) wants to party and
says “tell Cherie Chung I am coming”. They both love Hong Kong till the trouble
begins. It doesn’t take long and is over of all things a roller skating contest.
Yeung (Karel Wong) is the right hand man to the boss played by Eddie Maher
with other underlings being Sophia Crawford and Cheung Kwok-leung. Maher
who I believe is of mixed Asian/Caucasian parentage must have gotten tired
of always being called a half breed or something worse in his roles, but
that is again what he is referred to a few times in this film. Anyway, Yeung
has a roller skating protégé under his eye and between his
sheets and he wants to fix things so that she will win the next contest.
Her only competition is Mimi, good friend to Siu Fung and by extension friends
also to Shing and Ho. In a fracas in a disco Mimi’s hand is intentionally
hurt and so Siu Fung has to stand in for her at the contest and we know from
one of her earlier films (Nocturnal Demon) that Moon is a hell of a roller
skater. This turns out to be closer to roller derby than roller skating as
both girls with hockey stick in hand go after one another with Siu Fung's
opponent ending up badly injured (or perhaps dead?).
This really pisses off Yeung who had earlier set an elderly man in a wheelchair
on fire just because he could and he declares all out war on Siu Fung and
her friends. Don’t villains have better things to do like extortion, drug
dealing and pimping? I guess it was the slow season and the film happily
descends into a series of fights – and an impressive jump off one of those
very high bridges in Macau – the Taipa Bridge perhaps? For all of this, Lau
Kar Leung is conveniently off in Singapore visiting relatives but he gets
back to find out that his daughter is being held captive by Maher and his
gang. This does not please him. This was an enjoyable B action film that
needed just a bit more Moon in motion to have pushed it higher. The film
also puts Crawford to poor use only giving her a brief scuffle with Moon.
