Chinese Hopping Vampires in The Fragrant Harbour of Horror Forum

0 Points

Forum Jump

Chinese Hopping Vampires

Author	Comment
Atomic Mystery Monster	Chinese Hopping Vampires	Lead	[-]
Registered User Posts: 957 (12/13/06 17:04:56) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Tags : None Remove this ad For those of you not in the know, this thread was created in as a result of a discussion in this thread. That being said, feel free to post film listings, movie reviews, or anything else that involves Chinese hopping vampires. Here are some titles that got legitmate DVD releases in the USA: EXORCIST MASTER (I think) ENCOUNTERS OF THE SPOOKY KIND MR. VAMPIRE THE NEW MR. VAMPIRE SHAOLIN VS. EVIL DEAD (There's a sequel coming soon!) TSUI HARK'S VAMPIRE HUNTERS (cut and somewhat reedited in the US version) And if you don't mind searching for old VHS tapes: DUEL OF THE MASTERS (has a hopping vampire segment and lots of kung fu craziness) THE JITTERS- An American-made Chinese hopping vampire movie! Although this preview for the movie GOD OF VAMPIRES makes it seem like THE JITTERS won't be the last one. Misc: CRAZY SAFARI A Chinese hopping vampire boxing puppet! THE TWINS EFFECT (aka THE VAMPIRE EFFECT) doesn't have any hopping vampires, but it does have a brief scene where Jackie Chan fights a vampire.
Howling Beast	Re: Chinese Hopping Vampires	#1	[-]
Registered User Posts: 5697 (12/14/06 20:56:09) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I wasn't that big of a fan of ENCOUNTERS OF A SPOOKY KIND, though I did like the hopping vampire in it. MR. VAMPIRE is probably the best. I despised MR. VAMPIRE 2, with it's idiotic family of vampires (especially the little kid vampire), but found MR. VAMPIRE 3 to be fun. I haven't seen any of the other MR. VAMPIRE films yet. Brant
Atomic Mystery Monster	Re: Chinese Hopping Vampires	#2	[-]
Registered User Posts: 957 (12/15/06 13:16:50) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	*Quote:* MR. VAMPIRE is probably the best. I despised MR. VAMPIRE 2, with it's idiotic family of vampires (especially the little kid vampire), but found MR. VAMPIRE 3 to be fun. I haven't seen any of the other MR. VAMPIRE films yet. I really need to see stuff from the MR. VAMPIRE series; I've only seen the preview for MR. VAMPIRE, which made me realize that ROBO VAMPIRE copied several scenes from it. I once heard a rumor that they did some direct-to-video MR. VAMPIRE sequels that were never released in English-speaking countries, but I don't know if that's true or not
Howling Beast	Re: Chinese Hopping Vampires	#3	[-]
Registered User Posts: 5697 (12/15/06 21:23:32) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	*Quote:* I once heard a rumor that they did some direct-to-video MR. VAMPIRE sequels that were never released in English-speaking countries, but I don't know if that's true or not This may be true. I know there was a NEW MR. VAMPIRE, which I believe was also titled MR. VAMPIRE 4. There are probably others. Brant
Atomic Mystery Monster	Re: Chinese Hopping Vampires	#4	[-]
Registered User Posts: 957 (12/17/06 20:10:51) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	*Quote:* This may be true. I know there was a NEW MR. VAMPIRE, which I believe was also titled MR. VAMPIRE 4. There are probably others. According to the reviews for the Region 1 DVD of NEW MR. VAMPIRE, the image is cropped, so that one was probably released in theaters.
Atomic Mystery Monster	VAMPIRE KIDS (1991)	#5	[-]
Registered User Posts: 957 (02/12/07 18:49:55) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	VAMPIRE KIDS is rather bizarre horror/comedy (with more comedy than horror). The premise is that a tour group gets stranded on a deserted island that has an abandoned WWII Japanese outpost on it (and Chinese hopping vampires). Said outpost has a vampirized Japanese general emtombed in a wall, who gets partially free when one of the castaways takes a diamond that was being used to seal in the vampire's power. For reasons that are never really delved into, the general is able to control a bunch of little hopping vampires and sends them out in order to get blood for him so he can get enough power to break free from the wall. Their first attempt fails because a bunch of the castaways ate "poisonous tomatoes" that made them temporarily blind and insane with rage, leading to a bizarre sequence in which they chase and beat the hell out of the vampire kids. The other attempts fail mostly because none of the kids want to suck any blood (The poorly translated subtitles weren't any help in explaining why). Mainwhile, the general manages to get some blood... If you feel like importing a DVD of this, keep in mind that the movie focuses on the on the castaways and comedy than it does on the hopping vampires. I know there are people out there who can't stand bizarre Hong Kong comedies and I suspect that if you fall into that category, then you'll hate this movie. I'm a bit of a special case since I get more humor out of the fact that certain jokes were attempted (Like, say, a woman with big breasts getting dropped face-first on the beach and leaving two giant holes in the ground when she gets picked up), rather than finding humor in the joke itself. It's far from being a masterpiece, but it might be worth your while if you can find a copy that doesn't cost much. The widescreen (probably non anamorphic) DVD by Mei Ah looks pretty good; judging by the print quality, I'm guessing that this was a direct port of the transfer used for Mei Ah's laserdisc of the movie. You get your choice of Cantonese or Mandarin soundtracks, subtitles (I think they were "Traditional", "Simplified", "English", and "None"), and a "databank" that includes a film synopsis (the same one that's on the DVD case) and a credits list. I should point out that the English subtitles aren't translated well and sometimes lapse into "Engrish" or "flubtitles".
Mark Hodgson	Re: MR VAMPIRE homage	#6	[-]
Registered User Posts: 62 (03/06/07 00:44:14) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	The original Mr Vampire get's a huge homage in a recent ghost story from Thailand called DORM. Set at a boy's school in the eighties, they have a 'movie night' and watch Mr Vampire - they actually use completely recreated footage with Thai actors dressed up like the original, but I had to go back to the original to check it out. The sequence is also cleverly used for a pivotal plot twist... The recreated footage is on the Dorm special edition Thai DVD set.
Studio Z	Re: Chinese Hopping Vampires	#7	[-]
Registered User Posts: 169 (04/11/07 10:23:18) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Remove this ad Here's a slightly killjoyish (but still interesting) theory behind the legend. Kind of kills the arcane mystery, reducing the dead to human sedan chairs, but still, it's interesting; transporting the dead in a sort of...err...train approach. Hmm. www.spi.com.sg/forum/view...php?t=6559 And my wife says I subscribe to boring 'boards...
Studio Z	Re: Chinese Hopping Vampires	#8	[-]
Registered User Posts: 169 (04/11/07 11:15:50) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	And, on "homages," the supernatural comedy MY COUSIN THE GHOST includes a sequence in which the lead (who is completely unaware that he's dead) turns watching MR. VAMPIRE on TV into a recreation of the bicycle sequence inside his apartment. With somewhat Clouseau-ish results.
Howling Beast	Re: Chinese Hopping Vampires	#9	[-]
Registered User Posts: 5697 (04/11/07 12:41:11) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	I can't access that link, but I think maybe you are talking about what it says on Wikipedia as well: *Quote:* It came from the mythical folklore practice of "Traveling a Corpse over a Thousand Li" (sr), where traveling companion or family members who could not afford wagons or have very little money would hire Tao priests to transport corpses of their friends/family members who died far away from home over long distances by teaching them to hop on their own feet back to their hometown for proper burial. Some people speculate that Jiang Shis were originally smugglers in disguise who wanted to scare off law enforcement officers. Kind of interesting how these ideas come about. Brant
Studio Z	Re: Chinese Hopping Vampires	#10	[-]
Registered User Posts: 169 (04/11/07 12:58:10) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	The article sums it up that it's possible to transport multiple corpses by standing them in a line and running long poles under their outstretched arms, then placing a (hopefully willing) carrier in front and another in back, to do the actual moving. It's more a practical issue than a metaphysical (i.e., fun) one. My fault, my browsers are all automatically set to log me into Singapore Paranormal Investigators whenever I go to the website, so it didn't occur to me that general purpose access would be limited. The newspaper feature's in Chinese, anyway.
Howling Beast	Re: Chinese Hopping Vampires	#11	[-]
Registered User Posts: 5697 (04/11/07 20:47:56) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Thanks for the explanation. I like the hopping vampire films/stories. It doesn't seem like there are a lot of films representing these creatures, or at least not a lot of films well known to the west. Brant
Studio Z	Re: Chinese Hopping Vampires	#12	[-]
Registered User Posts: 169 (05/25/07 12:43:13) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Another member reposted the newsapaper feature on the SPI site. Here's a transltion: Translation in English In the Hong Kong drama, "Mr zombie", a 'miao shan' Taoist priest conducts ritual in the middle of the night and then leading a group of corpses to jump up and down all the way back to their hometown. In a Taiwan website, a simple picture illustration was posted to show how corpses were transported from one place to another in the olden days. The corpses' arms will be tied on the bamboo poles from their wrists to their armpits. The two undertakers will each take one end of the poles, lift the poles up and carry the corpses tied onto the poles and walk to their destination. The road that they walk on are usually uneven, adding on that the poles swayed when the undertakers are walking, the corpses appeared to be jumping up and down like zombies. A web user used a simple picture illustration to unveil the secrets of walking zombies. In the 'Hu Nan' province, many people are poor thus they went to other provinces to work. When they pass away, undertakers will transport their corpses back to their hometown for burial. How they transport the corpses back became a mystery. The roads are narrow and uneven. If one people carry one corpse, or two people carrying one corpse, it is not only a waste of time, it is also very tiring. Therefore, someone thought of a way to carry the corpses on bamboo poles, just like how salted fish are tied to a pole to dry and sun. With this method, two undertakers carrying a couple of corpses on the bamboo poles are now made easier and more convienient especially when they have to cross over mountains and hills.
NossB	Re: Chinese Hopping Vampires	#13	[-]
Registered User Posts: 76 (02/06/08 16:40:03) Reply Quote More My Recent Posts	Remove this ad Vampire vs Vampire is a good addition to the Jiang Shi genre, however it doesn't hold a torch to the original Mr Vampire.

<< Previous Topic Next Topic >>

Add Reply

Yuku free message boards

Chinese Hopping Vampires

Chinese Hopping Vampires