Yong zhe wu ju

"Dreadnaught" is a consistently entertaining flick about Mousy (Yuen Biao), a hapless and clumsy coward who stumbles his way into plenty of trouble. While trying to collect a debt, he inadvertently runs afoul of a homicidal lunatic called White Tiger, and spends the rest of the movie being stalked by this freak. The flick is a very early attempt at a kung-fu/horror hybrid, with White Tiger sporting spooky Chinese opera-style make-up and frighteningly leaping into frame time and again. Of course, once he sneaks up on folks he karate chops them rather than stabs them. Still, the guy who plays White Tiger is genuinely creepy, and you really feel this guy's menacing presence. Yuen Biao is great as the goofy Mousy, tripping and falling his way in and out of danger. The fight scenes are excellent, played about half for laughs and half seriously. Add in Kwan Tak-Hing in his classic role as Wong Fei-Hung, and a couple of gross scenes involving ripping heads off chickens and cockroaches, and you've got the makings of a very intriguing kung-fu flick. If you're a fan of the slap-happy style of fighting perfected by Biao, Sammo Hung and Jackie Chan, and you like old school kung-fu stories, this one should be right up your alley.