Version: English dub.
What's that? A sequel to one of Jackie Chan's earliest hits, 'Snake in the Eagle's Shadow'? I'm not so easily fooled. A very cheap DVD, with Jackie Chan on the cover of a movie I'd never heard of? I've seen enough of these movies to know that, generally, these are movies that were made before Jackie was even famous in Hong Kong, and in which he usually appears as a minor character.
My "Cheap Hong Kong cash-in" sense was tingling, and it was quickly justified. Aside from a short montage of the first movie at the start of this, and one of the fight scenes from the first randomly inserted into this one, the only link between original and sequel was the main character using Jackie's Snake & Cat style from the first. and making no other reference to the first film.
Ah Fu was a very rich and famous fighter was working for a security company when he suddenly became not-so-rich by giving away all his money to some needy thieves. While trying to find more work, Ah Fu meets an old man whose name I never quite caught. Old Man is a thief, and a master of kung-fu whenever his mustache is pulled. Together they form a Kung-Fu Odd Couple, looking for work and defending good kung-fu schools from bad kung-fu schools.
Like the majority of 70s kung-fu movies, 'Snake in the Eagle's Shadow II' tries incredibly hard to insert fight-scenes at every possible opportunity, in order to prevent any logical development of plot or characters. So while the lack of story the hilariously bad dub will confuse the hell out of you, take solace in the fact that it will only be a few seconds before the characters start fighting again. Awesome. Of course, the fights in this aren't even close to the level of the original Jackie Chan film, there are a hell of a lot more. They aren't always fast and furious, but the film occasionally features some impressive acrobatics.
'Snake in the Eagle's Shadow II' - laughably bad attempt at emulating Jackie Chan. If you're a kung-fu fan, you should check it out if you have time and brain cells to spare - 4/10
Awesome count: Strangely, the word 'awesome' was only used once in this review.
