Kung-fu, kaiju, and cosmic chaos – Shawstyle
With their fourth entry in their Shawscope series Arrow has finally decided to get weird — dusting off some of the stranger entries into other sub-genres, not just Kung-Fu, to offer up a more unique array of films this time around.
First up is Shaw’s singular foray into Tokasatusu and Hong Kong’s first super hero film – Chinese Superman or Super Inframan. Run Run Shaw was looking to hop onto the Japanese Tokasatusu boom after seeing the popularity of Kamen Rider and Ultraman in the 70s with a fever dream – combining the two biggest properties at the time into China’s own cinematic superhero. Now this was also a time where these heroes dominated television and Run Run was looking to craft a big screen adventure that would launch their hybrid.
To do this he promoted Shaw cinematographer Shan Hua and commissioned a script by the writer of the 36th Chamber Kuang Ni. For the designs, Run Run brought over Michio Mikami from Japan, who was responsible for the design of Kamen Rider (Which you can see in the blue print on the wall of the chamber where Inframan is created.), to design their rogues gallery of monsters. There was a miscommunication and the design for Inframan’s head was already completed and Mikami simply was tasked with the body and the monsters. After Mikami turned in his designs, he promptly returned to Japan, soured on the experience to leave Shaw to realize his creatures.
Super Inframan is the story of a group of evil super humans who were buried beneath the earth and awakened after 10 million years, who are bent on destroying the humanity now inhabiting it. Basically copying the origin story for Kamen Rider verbatim, Inframan was a motorcycling badass who is turned into a transforming kung-fu fighting android, this time by the peace loving Professor Chang of Science Headquarters. He is tasked with defeating the go-go boots wearing Princess Dragon Mom, her mutants and their skull-faced Shocker-esque henchman army.
While the film delivers the kinetic Tokasatusu action you’d expect, what makes this unholy hybrid so beloved decades after it bombed in its home country, is its sheer audacity and unstoppable spirit. This is assisted by the gorgeously garish production design and Michio Mikami’s monsters, which were elaborated upon, for better or worse by Shaw’s team. This culminates into a knock-off that not only feels right at home in the Tokasatusu sub-genre, but has its own unique flavor thanks to its Japanese sub-genre through a Chinese lens creation.
Arrow’s reputation with these Shaw releases thus far carries on with Inframan, the image is clear, crisp and bright. Of all the extras, Frank Djeng’s commentary once again delivers, with his most his take on the tragic events that transpired to cut the theatrical run of Inframan to a single week in Hong Kong and removed Kamen Rider from the small screen as well.
DISC ONE – SUPER INFRAMAN
• Newly restored lossless Mandarin, Cantonese and English mono audio
• Newly translated English subtitles, plus optional hard-of-hearing subtitles for the English dub
• Option to view the film in its US theatrical version, Infra-man, with lossless “Stereo-Infra-Sound” surround audio
• Brand new commentary by martial arts cinema experts Frank Djeng & Erik Ko
• Shaws’ Little Dragon, a newly filmed interview with co-star Bruce Le
• Super Ultra Infra Action!, a brand new video essay on Shaws’ tokusatsu films written and narrated by Steven Sloss
• Theatrical trailers, TV spots and radio spots
As a Tokasatusu fan it’s always a treat to check in with Super Inframan, this is one of those titles that only gets better/weirder with every watch. Not to mention watching this a second time for the commentary on this one definitely delivered some great, new to me context as well. While Inframan himself is not the most engaging of protagonists or heroes, the monsters and go-go boot clad baddies definitely make this one work for me. Even though you have this giant studio like Shaw behind it, it still has this very hand-made, DIY quality to it that’s as charming as it is slightly off putting. Talk about a strong start to a box set, this is definitely a title a lot of folks have been waiting for since the only previous release is 88 Films region locked disc, so I can’t wait for what’s next.
