KISS AND KILL: Fu Manchu and beyond representation: Part I

This post represents the 20th anniversary of this blog. When I started it in June. 2006 I had just relocated from an apartment in the city to a 125 year old house in a rural area. I had just finished a series of interviews with Jess Franco and wanted to have a place where I could regularly discuss his filmography, or rather my evolving perception of his massive output. I want to express my thanks and appreciation to my followers and their valuded feedback in the comments section. Hopefully we'll have another 20 years here if the internet still exists in the age of AI and I can make it to the age of 95.

The exotic universe of Fu Manchu holds a continuing fascination in the Franco multiverse. Wether it's the films, both Franco's and other director's approach to the character, or Franco's own deep dedication to representing the exoticism of that world, which spans a 50 year period, from 1967 to his 21st century digital period. But we have to loop back to his youthful obsession with the 1930s, 40s and 50s serials, films, magazines, novels and images based on the works of Sax Rohmer. The director himself speaks of his delight with that world and the formats in which is was presented to the public. He has talked about how happy he was while directing his first Fu Manchu film in late 1967 for producer Harry Alan Towers, who wrote the script for the project.* After the paradigm shift which the success of his 1967 NECRONOMICON (Succubus) had imposed on him he had found a way to become a commerical director making an entertainment for an international audience, rather than having to continue to make comprosed films within the barriers of Francisco Franco censorship which had imprisoned him for the first years of his career.

I remember seeing THE FACE OF FU MANCHU in a downtown movie theater in 1965. Colorful and action-packed to my 13 year old eyes, it impressed me on the big screen. It had been imported to America by SEVEN ARTS. It was a Harry Alan Towers-German co-production and the first of 5 films starring a famous UK actor as Fu Manchu which would be made over a period of 4 years. It was capably directed by Don Sharp. The mold had been set. For a variety of reasons by the time Franco got his hands of the directing reins the series ran out of some its commercial steam and exotic ambience. The were two export edits of this 4th iteration, THE BLOOD OF FU MANCHU 93 minutes and KISS AND KILL, which was re-edited and shortened. I first saw this on a VHS tape circa 1989 via the 1988 American Video Corp. prerecord.

I actually perfer this reedited version which at least moves with a certain dispatch and doesn't seem to sag as much in the middle. The new opening scene commences with a high angle shot of the Brazilian jungle, which seems shot from an airplane and may be stock footage. It then proceeds to shots of Gotz George cutting his way with a machete through the thick jungle foilage.This seems more in the RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK universe with Harrison Ford cutting his way through the jungles. Inspired, consciously or unconsciously, by RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK for this 1988 video release or was the opening of that mega-hit, showing the hero cut his way through the thick jungle inspired by BLOOD....? I doubt it. Speilberg and George Lucas likely had better things to do..

This American Video 1988 VHS lists a 91 minute runtime on the back cover  (it's actually shorter than THE BLOOD OF FU MANCHU version and plays much more efficiently with a new opening scene featuring Gotz George leading an expedition toward Fu Manchu's hidden jungle city, which actually looks more like a large cave. Credited to Peter Welbeck, producer Harry Alan Towers, this first Franco-Towers collaboration is somewhat more coherent, but less colorful than the Franco-Towers THE CASTLE OF FU MANCHU (1969).

The back copy on the Kiss and Kill VHS (Rated PG) reads like a promo for a 1970s kung fu epic: " The great Christopher Lee explodes in this kung-fu classic! Playing a Japanese (?!) mercenary, he's intent on righting  the evils that roam the land [actually, he's playing the Chinese super villain Fu Manchu!] He's in top form, fighting off his enemies with lots of sizzling high energy, high-kickin' action! As one of the most exciting films of its genre, KISS AND KILL will keep you on the edge of your seat!" But even trimmed by 10 or so minutes it's somewhat of a slog and won't keep anyone on the edge of their seat. And there is no high kicking kung fu fighting in any version which I've seen. Immediately beyond BLOOD.... lay two more Rohmer installations. And "installations" is an appropraiate term for THE GIRL FROM RIO and THE CASTLE OF FU MANCHU. And there would be returns to Rohmerland in the 1980s. But first let's look at the sources of this pop culture madness.

*Franco himself mentions the Republic serial as a primary inspiration, noting that anything which elongated that unique atmosphere was delightful for him on the interview with him on the Blue Underground Blueray .

BANGKOK, CITA CON LA MUERTE (Jess Franco. 1985)

Bangkok, Cita con la Muerte Director: “Cliffor Brawm” sic (Jess Franco)/ Director of Photography: Juan Cozar./ Produced by Golden Films Internacional S.A. in Alicante, Valencia, Macao and Bangkok, Thailand. Now that this Franco oriental adventure has been released on Blu-ray by Severin Films, a fresh look is possible.

BANGKOK, CITA CON LA MUERTE is fascinating to the serious Jess Franco student but may not engage interest as a serious action film with cut rate Jess Franco-style martial arts interludes included. The formulaic plot combines drug running, Thai pirates (led by Lina Romay), karate fighting, kidnapping, comic relief and tourist footage which on first viewing looks cribbed from an unknown source. [The DoP of this film, Juan Soler Cozar, kindly informed me that he was actually sent to Bangkok to shoot some street footage, and that it does appear in the film. I was very surprised that they went to the expense and trouble to do this, especially considering the production’s obvious micro-budget]

The yacht-going daughter of a millionaire is kidnapped by pirates, led by Aminia Lina Romay). Her father (Eduardo Fajardo) hires a bumbling private eye named Panama Joe (Bork Gordon) to locate her. The daughter’s boyfriend (Jose Llamas) is also on the kidnappers’ trail. Panama Joe discovers the crooks are led by a drug smuggler (Antonio Mayans), who is in turn being double crossed by Queen Amania (Lina Romay). The detective roams around the faux Asian locations, tries to play both sides against the other, while uncovering deeper layers of corruption and double dealing. BANGKOK is dialogue and plot heavy to no good end, and Gordon’s imitation Inspector Columbo ramblings just do not spark enough interest. The characters are shown talking in cartoon dialog balloons during the opening credits, but Franco unaccountably drops this unusual device immediately and never picks it up again. What’s left is a C-minus adventure with some comic relief and sloppily staged karate stand-offs, in which the participants miss each other by miles. Then again, given the budget and assumed rushed shooting schedule this could be understandable. It also could indicate the director's disdain for those perfectly choreographed martial arts films of Chuck Norris, Jackie Chan, Sonny Chiba, etc. Gordon (Christian Bork) just seems like a disheveled guy who has wandered in. He's actually a German comedian/television actor, who adds some comic relief. Like the karate stuff, comedy-parody needs timing. The lines and martial arts blows rarely connect. Actually, I managed to find some amusement in the martial arts showdowns where the fighters miss contact with each other by such obvious distances that it looks like children playing at karate fighting. This is all likely due to a crushing schedule/lack of budget. Nonetheless the colorful cinematography frames the locations with skill and makes the ALicante locations seem like Southeast Asia, at least for 90 minutes.

An action packed, amusing mix of Kung Fu fighting, faux Asian aesthetics, modern day pirates, BANGKOK, DATE WITH DEATH (1985) mixes comic book-style imagery with crime film elements, genre parody and a adventure plot with a not-so-happy ending. Franco has tried this before, notably in the delightful LOS BLUES CALLE POP…. (1983) and La sombra del judoka contra el doctor Wong (1985). Franco's love of comic book villains, scenariios and imagery is probably best illustrated by his 1967 Eurospy blowout, LUCKY, THE INSCRUTABLE.

Lina Romay has a few touching moments as the pirate leader, but she may have been miscast in an Asian role, and her familiarity as Lina Romay distracts from her performance. This distance would recur in her performance as a daughter of Fu Manchu in Franco's 1986 Esclavas del Crimen, another faux oriental mash-up in which he Asian make-up was even more exaggerated. Though she was still up to performing in comedic mode for the series of hardcore films Franco would direct in the 1985-86 period. She would be less of a presence in his larger bugeted productions of Franco's 1987-1990. She would return in his late 1990s video period in harsher persona such as the huntress in Franco's TENDER FLESH, a quasi remake of this 1973 COUNTESS PERVERSE. Her most amusing scene here is when she dances around in a tight swimsuit accompanied by a mechanical band ( a wondrous installation manufactured in Belgium) She was beginning to move beyond the sex symbol stage but was still a formidable actress who Franco woulld use in character roles. Veteran character actor Eduardo Fajardo (DJANGO) turns in a professional but unexceptional performance as the millionaire with a hidden agenda.

The movie benefits from its luminous cinematography and occasionally hectic energy but needs a more interesting focal point. The Far Eastern locations, represented via the aforementioned footage and Alicante scenery are given an atmospheric boost by Pablo Villa’s (Franco and Daniel White) brassy score, some of which recalls music heard in Franco’s earlier FU MANCHU AND THE KISS OF DEATH/KISS AND KILL (1967). Some library cues are also mixed in the soundscape.** Given the negatives I’m at the stage where I can still engage with and enjoy even an understandably flawed genre mashup such as this one. It’s obvious that Jess Franco took it seriously enough to attempt to deliver a multi-faceted entertainment package under impossible circumstances. As he told me when I interviewed him about his Golden Films Internacional period, these productions were “poor” (his words) i.e. made at very low coast, with few resources to spare and rushed out to theaters or hidden away in the offices of producer Emilio Larraga to be lost forever. I had some fun watching it for the first time on a typically blurry VSOM video due, but had no idea where one could see it in decent quality. Now that it's on a sparkling new Blu-ray, it can be given its due. It survies as an example of Franco’s 1980s exotica. *Thanks again to Juan Cozar for additional information on the production of this film. ** Thanks to Stuart Lindsay (C) Robert Monell [2026]