Encounter Of The Spooky Kind — Encounter Of The Spooky Kind( Blu Ray)

From the early ’80s Encounter Of The Spooky Kind is a true and wacky cross-breed, that you only find in Asian cinema. The film blends horror, comedy, fantasy, and kung-fu fighting- and does so in an often energetic and crazed manner. It is also a highly influential film, as it invented a genre- Jiangshi, which went onto be hugely popular with the likes of Mr Vampire. Here on Eureka Entertainment is a new Blu Ray release of the film- bringing together a lovely new 2k scan of the film, and a new commentary track.

Released in the year 1980 Encounter of the Spooky Kind( aka Gui da gui, Encounters of the Spooky Kind, Ghost Against Ghost)  was a Hong Kong made film. It was directed/ co-written by Sammo Kam-Bo Hung, who is known more as an actor with nearing two hundred credits to his name, though he also directed thirty-five features too. The film is very competently staged and scoped- with Hung blending the different genres in an often-dizzying manner, especially when they all collide together.
 
The film kicks off with two ash-filled urns arguing with each other in the dark- then along comes to the slight tubby Bold Cheung (Sammo Kam-Bo Hung)- skulls hands appear from the urns reaching for Cheung, then two zombie spirits appear- with one ripping his trouser leg, and bitting a lump of flesh from the panicking Cheung. He awakes still panicking in bed with his wife, who is simply called Cheung's wife (Suet-Mei Leung). Cheung is a bumbling-if- well-meaning fellow, who works for the tricky and devious Master Tam(Huang Ha). In time Cheung finds out his wife is having an affair with Tam, and he’s far from pleased- wanting to tell all about this. So to try and silence him for good Tam hires occult master Priest Chin Hoi (Lung Chan) to get rid of him- and this is where a large part of the film spends its time. First Cheung is convinced, not once, but twice to stay in a haunted temple- within the temple, is a seemingly dead coffin bound man, who is re-animated via magic. And as we move on more creepy and Kung Fu fighting dead/undead things are sent to battle with poor Cheung- with the film amping towards a grand battling occult master fight carried out on stilted boxes.
 
The first half or so of the film very much focuses on the more comedy & horror side of things- with lots of silly bumbling, comic misunderstandings, and slap-stick on the amusing side of things. And half rotten face ghosts, long-armed demons, and creepy lumbering-to-suddenly Kung-Fu ghouls on the creepy side of things.  As we move on we get more Kung Fu fighting action taking place- but this still has a good sprinkling of humour, horror, fantasy, and blends of the three.
 
Acting/ performance wise Kam-Bo Hung is great as the bumbling Cheung, and when needs to be is pretty spectacular with his Kung Fu moves. Other worthy mentions are the bumboo bong smoking occult priest Tsui (Fat Chung), and Huang Ha as the evil plotting Master Tam, who also has a couple of bumbling helpers. The martial art elements of the film are carried out in an often impressively acrobatic manner, the horror elements( certainly at the start) are chilling effective, and the humour/ laughs flow well through the whole film. All in all Encounter of the Spooky Kind is a most entertaining genre crossbreed.
 
 
Moving onto this new Blu  Ray, and we get a wonderful new 2k scan of the film. It’s full of wonderful balanced-yet-bold colours, great general picture definition, and all found great print. We get three different audio options: Cantonese audio (original mono presentation), Rare alternate Cantonese soundtrack, and Optional English dubbed audio. Moving onto the extras- and we get a great new commentary from Asian film expert Frank Djeng- he goes from giving actor bios, discussing the film influenced on western horror including a scene that was recreated in Evil Dead 2. He talks about Cantonese slang used in the film- it's meaning & clever word/humour in the dialogue. He discusses the films setting in the chang Dynasty, and the films period detail. He chats about the legends and lore portrayed in the film, comments on-screen action, and much, much more. A well worth a play track!.  We get an archive interview with director/ co-writer/ lead actor Sammo Kam-Bo Hung, this is in English, it runs around twelve-minute mark- and it’s more of a general interview, with Hung talking about how he got into Kung Fu fighting, working with Jackie Chan, and going onto to been a director- it’s also worth a play too. Though it would have been nice to have a bit more focus on the film at hand. Lastly, on the disc, we get a collection of stills/promotional material and an original trailer. 
 

All in all, this is a great release of this classic/ genre-defining film- with a wonderful new print, a most enjoyable/ worthy commentary, track, and all-round classy presentation.  A pretty unmissable release really- if you enjoy horror/ comedy crossbreeds, and/ or Kung Fu fighting films with a fantasy learnings.