Dead Target (1991)

From roughly 1987 to 1992, dozens of low budget and exploitive action flicks were produced in Hong Kong and shot in Thailand. One of the more ambitious and outright bizarre among this low-rent pack is DEAD TARGET. Kung fu actor Chin Siu-ho of MR. VAMPIRE fame stars along with second-string action babe Sharon Kwok and television actor Poon Chi-man. In notable supporting roles are a couple of bad-acting gweilos, an army of sadistic elephants and lots and lots of transsexuals and transvestites.

This film is awful and nutty in so many ways, but it at least features dozens of impressive locations all over Thailand, gratuitous violence and enough unwarranted and over-the-top explosions to make Jerry Bruckheimer mad with envy. It starts out with a flashback years prior as Chinese military officer Poon Chi-man stops smugglers, led by gweilo number one, from stealing an invaluable crown of jewels. Flash forward to the present and an aged Poon is kidnapped by Gweilo One who is still after the same crown.

Enter Poon’s daughter as played by a spunky Sharon Kwok who possesses half of a map leading to the crown. The smugglers lure her to Thailand, but Interpol-agent-in-disguise Chin Siu-ho steps in to save her. After kung fu brawling and dodging bullets while exchanging not-so-witty repartee, they part and Sharon finds herself on the run from smugglers through Bangkok’s bustling nightlife. This is where things start to get truly strange.

Hoping to outwit her pursuers, Sharon holes up with a troupe of performing transsexuals and transvestites and ends up fumbling through their floor show before wandering into a massage parlor where she is roped into being put on display for ogling male patrons. Chin happens along with Gweilo One and selects her. Soon, she’s on the run again in nothing but a bath towel.

From here, the film turns into an Asian equivalent of Jewel of the Nile where Chin battles with a Thai agent in a cattle railcar and all our heroes dive out of a moving train and into a river. Sharon and Poon rescue a baby elephant, who just like Lassie, runs off as the smugglers appear out of nowhere and returns with an army of elephants and their riders who proceed to trample and gore bodies, and in one case strip a luckless smuggler naked with snout and tusk and lash the man’s genitals. Okay, maybe it’s not just like Lassie. Next comes the obligatory native villagers with bow and arrow who engage the returning smugglers and their arsenal of assault rifles, grenades and oddly enough, pre-placed explosives that blow up anywhere the camera is pointing. Eventually our heroes reunite, make a grab for the crown and battle those tenacious smugglers for the last time.

I have already pointed out most of the highlights, but here are a few more for your amusement. Watch through the magic of editing how our heroes hole up in a railcar at night, get smoked out by the baddies and emerge moments later in broad daylight. Finally, the untold struggle of transgender life is revealed with real heart in a moment where they share, with graphic representation, their losing battle against aging into wrinkled old men with breast implants and razor burn. Another hit is the two transsexual kung fu fighters that Chin locks horns with, figuratively speaking.

Chin isn’t exactly an A-list kung fu star, but even he is wasted on this screwball adventure film that features very little martial arts. Most of what is presented is choreographed in the late-’80s Corey Yuen mold, but with inferior editing and camera work. The director is much more focused on the excessive use of endless firecracker bursts for bullet ricochets and the explosives. Sharon once again proves to be weak on action and acting. Her “flirtations” with Chin are embarrassingly bad.

Somewhere in the generic title of Dead Target there is a joke about the state of the film itself. In many ways, it’s bad enough to be laughed at and admired for its stupidity, but it still feels like time slows to a crawl while trying to get through the whole thing in a single sitting. Personally, I had to watch it in small doses, while regularly returning to better Hong Kong movies to remind myself that rainbows and happiness do exist. Dead Target is rather insane at times, even by Hong Kong standards and for that reason alone, it should interest at least a few intrepid viewers.