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Yellow asterisk: funny (maybe). White asterisk: expanded format. Blue asterisk: not mine. No asterisk: it probably sucks.

A Chinese Torture Chamber Story (1995)

"Mun ching sap daai huk ying" is a classic Hong Kong Category 3 film featuring a former Miss Asia, Yvonne Yung Hung. She studied dance as a child, only to injure her back. She moved on to a successful modeling career, then won the Miss Asia pageant, then in 1993 decided to try Category 3 films, an unpopular decision with her upscale parents. She has gone on to many roles in both Category 3 and mainstream films, as well as a recording career. A Chinese Torture Chamber Story is the film that catapulted her to stardom because her ability to portray a victim made her perfectly suited for this role.

The films opens with voice-over, describing the torture and punishment that were a part of the Quing dynasty court procedure, where they tortured confessions out of the accused, and then dispatched them in inventive ways. The narration is played seriously and, I am told, is hilarious to those who speak Cantonese. The entire film is a send-up of Qing dynasty court procedure, Taoist sexual practices and Confucian moralizing. Cut to a courtroom, where Little Cabbage (Yung Hung) is accused of murdering her husband and committing incest with Young Scholar, a wealthy prince. The facts of the case are that someone prescribed an aphrodisiac for her husband, who already had an enormous cock, and it exploded, killing him. More about that later.

The judge decides to loosen her tongue before questioning, and commands his men to "beat her ass 20 times," which they do gleefully right in the courtroom. She still claims she is being framed, and is innocent of both murder and adultery. The young scholar also proclaims his innocence. Little by little, in flashback sequences, interspersed with courtroom torture, we learn the story. The young scholar is married to over-sexed Ching Mai, and requires inventive marital aids to satisfy her. He is attracted to Little Cabbage's small feet, and brings her into his household. When her parents are killed by robbers, he takes responsibility for her, and wisher to marry her as a concubine. She asks that he wait for her one year of filial piety (mourning) to pass before taking her. Meanwhile, the wife is not thrilled at her presence, even less so when Little Cabbage spies on her having sex with the judge's son.

Ching Mai waits until The Young Scholar is away on business, and marries Little Cabbage off to a poor man with a gargantuan penis, thinking that he will kill her with it. Afraid of him, Little Cabbage cowers on their wedding night, until he realizes that intercourse is probably not possible given his size, and we have a tender homage to the pottery wheel scene in Ghost, complete with Unchained Melody playing on traditional Chinese Instruments, while she masturbates him. Meanwhile, the young scholar is having adventures on his own, in the persons of two "Sex Fu" masters, our old hero Elvis Tsui and Julie Lee Wah-yuet, who fly through the air having sex, much like the fight scenes in Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon. Elvis finally satisfies her with a combination of "Invincible Mouth," "Oral Attack," "Invincible Wheel" and "Wonder Screw."

The two befriend the young scholar, a friendship that later helps his sister save him and Little Cabbage. The judge's son is not yet through with his dirty work. He decides to become invisible, and then screw Little Cabbage. When he tries, her husband defends her honor against the invisible attacker, which includes slipping between the two and getting a mouthful for his trouble. Thus Little Cabbage, who is accused of adultery, is still a virgin. The judge, in trying to protect his son, employs everything he can think of to extract confessions, including finger torture, pulling out of fingernails, bamboo under the fingernails, and many more.

This film has a little less in the way of nudity than many of the Category 3 films, but includes ,. ,

IMDb readers say 6.0, and, as the film had a limited US release, there are a few reviews linked, all positive. It is my understanding that the dialogue is superb in the original Cantonese. The subtitles can't come close to giving us that experience, but they do add their own unique humor, such as a women shouting at the height of passion, "It is so comfortable, it is so comfortable." Remember that this is a comedy, lest you take the torture, which will make you wince, too seriously. If you are going to see one Hong Kong Category 3 film, this is a very good choice.

 

breasts and buns from Yvonne Yung Hung

full frontal from Julie Lee Wah-yuet

breasts and buns from Ching Mai

breasts and buns from an unknown who plays the sister of the young scholar.

Brainscan returns with a few more video clips from "Satin Smoke".

The final Satin-Smokee is Hefmag model and B-movie actress Shannon Leahy. She sports a pair of robo-hooters that must have taken a year to get used to.

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The new painting of Bill Clinton at the Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery was not greeted warmly.  Unlike other dignified presidential poses, it shows Clinton standing in profile, his jacket pulled back and his left hand on his hip, looking toward viewers with an odd half-scowl.  Some people said he looks like a guy hitting on women at a nightclub.  And the artist left off his wedding ring.  The curator said Clinton appears "intense" and has a "warm gaze" as if to "greet an unseen visitor."  But an anonymous former Clinton aide told the New York Post, "I don't get the whole hands-on-the-hip thing. I don't know what it's supposed to convey."


*  He added, "And why isn't he wearing any pants?"



Three teenage thugs in Palm Beach, Florida, were arrested for allegedly robbing David Copperfield and two women on the street after his show.  They pulled guns and stole personal items and over $700 cash from the women, but Copperfield said he used a magician's trick on them: he turned his pockets inside out to show they were empty, even though they actually contained a wallet, passport and cell phone. 

*  And...an elephant!



Pinup model Cindy Margolis, who billed herself as the "most downloaded woman" on the Internet, has finally agreed to pose nude for Playboy on her 40th birthday.  She said she always refused because "in the past, it would have been for gratuitous reasons," but at 40, it's empowering.  She said, "Thank goodness for 'Desperate Housewives.'  You're not dead just because you are married and have children...It will be fun to go up against the 20-year-olds and show them that they don't have anything on me."

*  Why is it only empowering to pose nude once you've waited so long that nobody wants to see it anymore?

 

Tony Snow of Fox News will be named the new White House press secretary and mouthpiece for the Bush Administration

* Finally, a man with years of experience at the job!