Highly Overrated But Still Good

Good movie, but best of all time? Hardly . . .

Funny, strange, confrontational and subversive, this is one of the most interesting experiences you'll have at the cinema this year.

After playing with our expectations, this turns out to be a very different sort of film.

Actually I enjoyed this movie. This film is no gorefest, it's quite mild. Apparently when they imported they decided to market it as a cross between martial arts schlock and horror schlock, which would certainly be enjoyable in its own way, but that's not what it is, so it's not surprising many were disappointed.I found it enjoyable for the authentic cultural touches...combatting evil and undead with a Taoist slant rather than crosses is quite interesting.The abrupt ending with what must be scenes from part II rolled in a small box next to the credits was certainly clumsy and disconcerting though.

Ah, where to begin.... As another reviewer stated, this movie has a lot of promise. I mean, Kung Fu vs. Zombies, how could you go wrong? Suffice to say, this movie goes very, VERY wrong but in a completely different direction than I had anticipated.I thought I was in for your standard cheesy kung fu flick with some zombie action thrown in. What I got was an incoherent (but admittedly well-shot and choreographed) mishmash of scenes that seem to have no real connection to one another, ambling along until it just.... ends. It's hard to sum everything up, but here we go.Gordon Liu is REEALLY hamming it up as a Taoist priest who seems to spend his time walking around town followed by a pack of hopping (yes, HOPPING, like a bunny rabbit) vampires under his control. He's accompanied by his bumbling (but well-meaning) assistant and the token annoying kid. They're periodically attacked by "zombies," who really just kind of grab you and shake you around, not eat your brains or anything. Liu's "occupation" as it were seems to be to bring the souls of the zombies to reincarnation.However, there's also an evil priest in town who just wants to destroy the zombies. Dressed in sparkly black attire and with an anime "bad guy" haircut, I think they wanted to say "menacing" but this dude comes off more as just a shade of "fruity." Such a fine line.... Anyway, periodically Gordon Liu and the Evil Priest meet up every once in a while, gesticulating kung-fu action moves and casting "spells" at each other with names like "ten storms attack master go!!" and whatnot. All in all, the fight scenes have the tone of bottom-of-the-barrel anime such as Dragonball Z or Pokemon.Anyway, before the credits roll you will see (SPLOILERS, but if you really care you need to be sterilized):** Gordon Liu using the "urine of a virgin" in order to protect himself from zombies (who knew?)** The evil priest demanding all the "virgin boys" of a village in order to turn them into his brainwashed slaves** The annoying kid (who's a boy) accidentally "eat" a spirit, become "pregnant" and then "give birth" (don't ask how) to another pasty-faced kid in an outhouseAll this and more! Seriously though, it was the best laugh I've had in a long time. The only reason it gets a 2 and not a 1 is because, for some reason, all of the camera-work, choreography and technical details are remarkably good. Never before has such a well-shot movie coincided with such a COMPLETE lack of anything resembling continuity. It's as if they took a Hong Kong filming crew, and told them "zombies! Kung Fu! just wing it..." The result? Shaolin vs. Evil Dead.

Throw a low-budget movie together with some Chinese vampires, likable kung-fu master, psychedelic special-effects, a good-looking babe and some funny sidekicks and what do you get? If you're lucky, you end up with a classic like Mr. Vampire. If you're not lucky, you end up with Shaolin vs. Evil Dead.It isn't that the movie is a low-budget piece of garbage that is totally convoluted and incomprehensible (far from it) the problem is that it suffers from the medium budget mediocrity of most straight to video or made for TV fantasy movies. Although it contains all of the aforementioned fun ingredients (kung-fu, zombies, babe etc.), it just doesn't contain enough of these elements in enough exciting or outlandish ways to be considered anything close to a cult classic. (So don't expect anything as funny as a Stephen Chow movie or as over the top as the real Evil Dead movies: both of those are in a class all their own.) With that being said, I can say that I was fairly entertained for 90 minutes (it's always a treat to see Gordon Liu) and it makes for good Saturday Matinée popcorn movie fare: moving fast, and keeping up the comic book imagery. It is a fairly sincere attempt by the small cast and offers good character development if there ever is a part two.And yes, the cut to the credits is ridiculously abrupt for no apparent reason. (Couldn't they have at least finished the current scene?) but other than this goof (which seems to be making many enemies of the film) it *does* come pretty close to delivering what it promises on the cover. It is after all named "Shaolin vs. Evil Dead".

Shaolin Vs. Evil Dead is a horribly drab film about a monk who goes around putting souls at rest. There is also an ex-student of his who goes around capturing the souls into purgatory.WARNING: It's filmed like an old TV special (maybe it was straight to video) and despite what the box says, there is very little fighting in the film.Nearly everything that the DVD says in the plot synopsis only happens IN THE CREDITS of the film in a TINY screen on the top left. So you won't be seeing the five-element formation... hahaha and also it's not a gore-fest as it claims to be. In fact... I don't recall any blood. There were some worms... and some hopping vampires (sweet... that's why I gave this film higher than a 1) Avoid this film at all costs, unless you wanna get drunk and laugh at the horrendous dubbing with friends. (I watched the first hour subbed but it was so horrid that we switched to dubbed for the end... and no I wasn't under the influence of alcohol when watching it.)