March this year brought the return of Grady Hendrix’s wonderful writing on Asian cinema to the web, in the form of the rebirth of his blog Kaiju Shakedown at the Film Comment website. Grady is one of the founders of the New York Asian Film Festival, and he brings a depth of knowledge and a sharpness of wit to his writing on cinema, particularly Hong Kong cinema, that I’m thoroughly jealous of.
Some choice bits from the new Kaiju Shakedown (read them all, though!):
Jackie Chan’s Trash — everyone’s favourite action hero has, from time to time, made the occasional stinker of a film. Grady has watched them all, so you don’t have to! (I didn’t manage to avoid The Medallion back in the day, and I’m still recovering from the trauma.)
Jeff Lau — a bio of HK’s influential writer-producer-director and his films with everyone from Stephen Chow to Wong Kar Wai.
Lau Kar-leung — a bio and conversation with film scholar David Bordwell of the late, great action director, still the director of most of my favourite Shaw Brothers pictures.