Lethal Panther

This film begins with an agent for the CIA by the name of "Betty Lee" (Sibelle Hu) investigating a counterfeit operation in the United States and discovering that it originates somewhere in the Philippines. The scene then shifts to Japan where an attractive woman named "Amy" (Yoko Miyamoto) is in the process of seducing a high-ranking mob boss and then assassinates him while he is sleeping in bed. Around the same time, another beautiful assassin by the name of "Ilene" (Maria Jo) is equally busy killing a number of mobsters who are in the process of conducting a business meeting in Hong Kong. What essentially follows is that, unknown to each other, both assassins have been hired to kill a man by the name of "Charles Wong" (Chung Lam) who controls both the drug trade and the same counterfeiting ring that Betty Lee is currently investigating. But what neither Amy nor her unknown fellow assassin Ilene realize is that once their target has been eliminated their orders will be to kill one another so that there will be nobody left to identify the person who ordered the hit on Charles Wong. Now rather than reveal any more I will just say that this was a confusing low-budget action film which featured plenty of shooting and acrobatics but was rather weak in both character development and dialogue. To be sure both Yoko Miyamoto and Maria Jo were pleasing to the eye but the constant action became rather tedious at times. That being said, while this wasn't necessarily a bad film for the most part, it could have used a certain amount of fine-tuning here and there and for that reason I have rated it accordingly. Slightly below average.

The movie is about two female assassins who got the job to kill each other.

This movie is typical Southeast Asia's movie from 90s which use to have lots of violence, killings, gang wars, double crossing, Erotic scenes but lacks good plot and script.

The characters have done the required hard work and some what did justice to their job.

Plot and script is the weakest part of the movie and so as the screenplay.

The movie has nothing to watch for apart from some erotic scenes.

A routine girls 'n' guns Hong Kong action flick from the 80s, Godfrey Ho's Deadly China Dolls has all of the right ingredients: sexy female assassins, machine gun toting bad guys, and faceless goons in suits and sunglasses ripe for the killing. Unfortunately, the unremarkable story and Ho's sub-par direction (think John Woo, but with barely a fraction of the panache and originality) mean that the film is, for the most part, rather tedious. However, the inclusion of several scenes of gratuitous nudity, some bloody battles, and the occasional martial arts moment makes it just about watchable for fans of bullets and babes mayhem.

The messy story revolves around the greedy nephew of a crime lord, who has his uncle bumped off so that he can take over the business. There are several silly plot threads which include his wish to also bump off the stepson of his dead uncle, and eliminate the assassins he hired (in order to tie up loose ends). Meanwhile, a cop (Sibelle Hu), is out to arrest any or all of the bad guys.

Ho litters his film with splattery squib spurting gunfights in which nearly everyone gets shot at least ten times, pausing occasionally to include a sleazy sex scene (featuring full frontal female nudity) to spice things up, but the result is a so-so addition to the genre which adds nothing new.

My respects go out to the actors and actresses for their commitment to the hard physical and mental work they put into this 1990 movie. The movie is beyond doubt, an intense action based work of filmography. Criticism comes to mind for the need of more suspense, or of a greater hidden complexity of the story line. If movies are about portraits, landscapes, and persona, then these attributes could have become more developed. I especially send my best wishes to Yoko Miyamoto, to Maria Jo, and to Sibelle Hui for their courage to reflect upon these persona. Also, my best wishes go out to them for their future work in filmography.

(1990) Lethal Panther/ Deadly China Dolls (In Chinese with English subtitles) ACTION

Co-produced and directed by Godfrey Ho, also called "Deadly China Dolls" in the UK actioner starring Sibelle Hue in a very low budget female version of John Woo's "The Killer" using a Philippine cast with so-called 'killers' pitting against one another. And Sibelle Hue as a CIA operative hardly doing nothing but talk with the main "killer" a little. Besides the bad acting, the action is also quite bad whereas the action scenes don't connect like theirs no rhythm or flow with many ridiculous shooting move stances.