Movies: Burning Paradise

Before Ringo Lam ended up in Hollywood grinding out sleepwalker, Van Damme’d action titles like Maximum Risk and Replicant, he was one of Hong Kong’s better action directors; his City on Fire was one of the many sources Quentin Tarantino freely lifted from for Reservoir Dogs. Burning Paradise, from 1994, had cult status amongst bootleggers due to its near-total lack of availability. Legendary Shaolin hero Fong Sai-yuk (Willie Chi) escapes from the destruction of his temple only to be captured by the insane Manchu general Crimson, who presides over a massive underground complex known as Red Lotus Temple. Imagine a Hong Kong take on the craziness of the second Indiana Jones movie and you're close: there's deathtraps, wire-fu fights, and an antagonist whose hobbies include human mummification and action painting. It’s the kind of cheerfully bonkers moviemaking that Hong Kong more or less gave up on when the clock ticked 1997.