To be honest Escape from Brothel is a bit of a schizophrenic hoot
that I enjoyed quite a bit. It jumps around from sex exploitation film
to slapstick comedy to melodrama to sadistic violence to brutal action
like a freewheeling pinball with no rhythm or reason. One minute a transvestite
peeper in the women’s locker room, the next hung up like a piece of meat
and being strangled. You try not to think about it too much and just go
along with the ride. Director Johnny Wang is best known as an action actor,
showing up in loads of Shaw Brother films, almost always as the heavy,
but I notice in looking at his small filmography as a director that he
was behind two other low budget action films that I quite enjoyed – Widow
Warriors and The Innocent Interloper. So even though Escape from Brothel
is known primarily as a Cat III bump and grind show, the action is very
solid and very rough. As is the sex now that I think about it.
Pauline Chan doesn’t even get through the opening credits before
she has to show her money makers to the audience and the same goes for
her co-actress Murakami Rena who stares at her nude reflection in a mirror
in the same way I look through a window at an Indian buffet – with pure
delight. Hung (Pauline) and Ann (Rena) are practitioners of the noble art
of making a man happy – in other words prostitutes. They work for Mama
Suzi (veteran actress Pak Yan) who introduces them to Mr. Chou (Stuart
Ong) one night as an airline hostess and a secretary who need a little
spare cash. He happily obliges and takes them both for the Charlie Sheen
like price of HKD 50,000. He brings along a sex book so that he doesn’t
forget what to do – sort of like Sarah Palin having to write “Energy” on
her hand so she won’t forget what she is supposed to say – a cheat sheet
of sorts. Among his bag of tricks is the “Pushing 2 Carts” position followed
by “Graceful Ladies Sitting Like Buddha” and finally “Hero Raising Arms
to Drum” Exhausting work for all. Later when he realizes that the two girls
are just ordinary low paid working girls, he reaps his revenge by having
the two girls work each other over with a baseball bat – internally if
you get my drift.
Hung has a boyfriend Sam (Alex Fong) back in the Mainland who has
no idea what she is doing – but this changes when he is tricked by some
friends to sneak into Hong Kong and participate in a phony robbery/insurance
scam. Everything goes wrong though with a foreigner being killed and Sam
on the run – not just from the cops but also from Billy Ho (Billy Chow)
who set the whole thing up and now wants to clean up the entire mess. We
were earlier introduced to Billy in one of Hong Kong’s more infamous action
scenes. He is in bed with Sophia Crawford (one of the gwielo action actresses
who came to HK in the 80’s and 90’s for work) when her “husband” and a
friend come in and demand payment. Not from Billy Chow – one of the really
terrific underrated action figures of this period – he demolishes the two
men and then has to deal with a nude leg kicking Sophia. I wish I had been
a fly on the wall for that scene. Sam shows up at Hung’s apartment and
hides in the closet only to realize very quickly what his girlfriend does
for a living – in the most graphic of ways – but Billy tracks him down
leading to a simply splendid furious final fifteen minutes of pounding,
gutting, burning, falling and more pounding. Good to the last drop.
My rating for this film: 7.0