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Interviews

The Multi-talented Man of Action: An Interview with Jino Kang by Kent Hill

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Jino Kang, the gentle-spoken son of a Hapkido Grand Master, grew up in South Korea during the 60’s, a time when the influence of the Western world was just beginning to emerge. The Kang family immigrated to California in 70’s.

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Jino adapted quickly to a new language and culture, all the while following the traditions of his father. He opened his Martial Arts school in the 80’s (http://hapkidousa.com/http://hapkidousa.com/). Jino holds a seventh degree black belt in Hapkido and continues to teach in San Francisco.  He was inducted in to Master’s Hall of Fame in 2009.

Although Martial Arts is in Jino’s blood, he had another passion – filmmaking. He began by making movies with his friends in Junior High School, his early screen heroes were Kurosawa and his frequent leading man Toshiro Mifune. Studying at the College of Marin, Jino elevated his skills and appreciation for the craft of making movies.

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In 90’s, Jino starred in, directed and produced his first feature film, “Blade Warrior”, shot in glorious 16mm. Jino has since shot, produced, and acted in Fist 2 Fist aka Hand 2 Hand.  Fist 2 Fist won numerous awards and critically acclaimed as “belongs in the top end of the scale of Martial Arts films”. His new film, Fist 2 Fist 2: Weapon of Choice won “Action Film of the Year” at Action on Film International Film Festival in 2014. He is currently at work on new films including a short subject action series, Kid Fury, starring one of his pupils Timothy Mah.

His balletic style and approach to action cinema set him apart from the multitude of entries in the genre. I believe should he continue to embrace this as he grows in his ambition, we shall someday soon no doubt witness an action/martial arts spectacle the likes of which this world has never seen.

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Film Review

A Nightmare On Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors

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Although billed as pure horror, A Nightmare On Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors strays into fantasy as well and is a pure blast of fantastically diabolical special effects when it’s working in either genre. Around the middle of the franchise marks the place where Freddy Krueger began to turn into more of a cartoonish wise-guy from his original mainly silent phantom, but he’s still pretty foreboding here, as Robert Englund puts energetic work into both his funny and frightening sides. The cool thing about this flick is it’s ‘Goonies’ style aesthetic; several youngsters, committed to a mental facility for their insomniac ‘delusions’, do dream battle with Freddy, and it’s one of the few instances in a slasher film where victims get to fight back in some capacity, and as a unit. Patricia Arquette is wonderful as Kristen, leader of the pack and a fiercely vulnerable spirit, while a young Laurence Fishburne plays the kindly head nurse. It’s also a treat to see Heather Langenkamp return as brave Nancy Thompson, still out for Freddy’s head. The effects are dazzling, from Freddy’s remodelled syringe needle glove in one scene, to a giant pac-man version of his head attempting to eat a live person whole in another, it’s just imagination run wild in dreamland. The kills are still sufficiently gory too, if punctuated by his now classic growling one liners (“Bitch!”). It’s safe to say this is the best in the franchise barring the first film, it’s quite a bit of fun. Oh, and for a good hearty laugh, nothing beats the Dick Cavett/Zsa Zsa Gabor cameo featuring a priceless interruption from Freddy. 
-Nate Hill

Film Review

Black Christmas: A Review By Nate Hill

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Before John Carpenter’s Halloween, there was Black Christmas, and no it’s not a Tyler Perry holiday special. It’s a slick little slasher set in a 1970’s sorority house during Christmas break, when many of the girls have gone home. Suddenly mysterious phone calls start to plague the ones still there, and one by one a murderous, unseen prowler starts to murder them. The phone calls themselves aren’t overly threatening, but instead sound like the nonsensical babbling of someone who is a couple reindeer short of a sleigh, making them all the scarier. I remember watching this years ago and being far more creeped out at the phone calls rather than the actual murders. That is a perfect example of using atmosphere to get under your audience’s skin rather than straight up gore, and a testament to the fright films of the 70’s and 80’s, which really seemed to have all the atmosphere vs. gore dials in the right positions. This positively drips with tension and ambience. The silences in between screams are almost deafening in their vacuous anticipation of terror to come, and strange as it sounds, there’s actually a nice Christmas-y feeling in places where the fear hasn’t yet struck, despite it being a horror movie. Olivia Hussey plays Jess, the main target of the killer with appropriate wide eyed intensity, Margot Kidder is briefly seen as the house mother, and horror regular John Saxon shows up as a suspicious Police Chief as well. I’d say this one achieves a state of suspense and atmosphere that can step up to the same plate as Halloween any day, it’s just a little overlooked I suppose. The house they are in is the perfect setting, a sprawling Yuletide manor of creaky hallways, desolated basements, dark, dingy attic space and an uneasy thrum of awaiting gloom that gives the words Silent Night a new meaning. The poor girls just never know when a shrill telephone ring will slice through the eerie corridors, forcing them to answer it and hear an unnerving voice warble out “It’s me, Billy” on the other end. 
PS: avoid the remake at all costs. It takes everything that was creepy and restrained about this classic and turns it into a disgusting nightmare.