Not to be confused with that other action sequel, INDIANA JONES AND THE TEMPLE OF DOOM (1984), this one reprises many of the elements that made the original CLEOPATRA JONES (1973) so mundane, while upping the ante by moving the action from Los Angeles to Hong Kong, adding a fighting female
sidekick, and offering dialogue twice as stupid.
When two of her undercover agents get caught up in a failed drug coup and disappear in Hong Kong, Cleopatra Jones flies in to sort things out. Joined by local female private eye Mi Ling (Tanny) and assorted cohorts, Cleo seeks out the instigator of the coup, but he has been spirited away by the
Dragon Lady (Stella Stevens), who also holds Cleo's men hostage.
After Cleo eludes assassins in a car chase, she and her helpers travel to the island of Macao and the casino owned by the Dragon Lady. There Cleo is captured, but Mi Ling and her friends free her, leading to a free-for-all in the casino as screaming innocents run for cover. In the end, Cleo kills
the Dragon Lady, and Mi Ling is revealed to be a covert government operative also.
Although the language has been cleaned up a bit from its predecessor and the bland Stella Stevens is a pale imitation of the scenery-chewing Shelley Winters, everything else seems to have been magnified. The lesbian druglord villain from part one has been replaced by an incestuous lesbian
druglord, seen lip-locked with her adopted daughter on a bed surrounded by naked girls. The original had virtually no background music; this time a woefully inappropriate score has been added by Dominic Frontiere (HANG 'EM HIGH, INCUBUS, COLOR OF NIGHT), who feels a (weak) car chase through
Kowloon calls for a brassy bluegrass score. Joe Simon's soulful theme from the original has been supplanted by a schmaltzy EZ-listening song, "Playing With Fire," with lyrics supplied by Kenny Kerner and Richie Wise, producers of the first album by Kiss. It's tempting to think the same duo
supplied Tamara Dobson with the gallons of fluorescent eye shadow she wears smeared from her forehead practically to her chin through the film, but Dobson is credited with her own ridiculous makeup. Add to this her fashion-nightmare costumes and six-foot-plus height towering above the Chinese
cast, and instead of the last movie's statuesque supermodel you have the unflattering picture of a lanky clown or anorexic drag queen.
Striving to branch out of the Asian market, Shaw Brothers studio head Sir Run Run Shaw had already formed recent alliances with studios in various Western countries including the United Kingdom (DRACULA AND THE SEVEN GOLDEN VAMPIRES, 1974) and Italy (BLOOD MONEY, also 1974). Warner Bros. took
full advantage of the exotic locale, setting scenes against Hong Kong's colorful night markets and overcrowded streets, in the dingy walled city of Kowloon and junk-filled waters surrounding the floating restaurants of Aberdeen, and offering a (weak) motorcycle pursuit down the steep staircase of
Ladder Street. Sir Run Run supplied talent in the form of Tanny (an actress who appeared in several Shaw Brothers horror offerings, including the BLACK MAGIC series and HUMAN SKIN LANTERNS), and Lin Chen Chi (co-star with Tanny and a young Danny Lee in Shaw's THE BATTLE WIZARD). Unfortunately,
either the actresses poor command of English or the outdated Shaw equipment and techniques (their films were all shot silent, with voices looped in later) resulted in all their dialogue being overdubbed, along with a large portion of the Western actors lines, giving the whole film some of the
cheesy flavor of a typical chopsocky.
On the positive side, Shaw Brothers also supplied the skilled fight directors and stuntmen who had made their martial arts films legendary, notably Tang Chia, choreographer of countless Shaw Brothers classics. Thus, despite the blatant lack of fighting ability of the Western leads, the film has
some genuinely exciting sequences. Dobson and Stevens both look slow and awkward in close-up, then suddenly acquire athletic skill (and curiously male torsos) in long shots and cutaways. Certain action scenes, like the Dragon Lady's pirate attack on the renegade's floating drug factory, and
particularly the knock-down, drag-out melee ending, with Cleo's gang bursting in on motorcycles and racing up and down the stairs blowing people away with machine guns, bodies tumbling by the dozens over the balcony as the scenery comes crashing down, are actually surprisingly rousing. (Graphic
violence, nudity, sexual situations, profanity.) leave a comment
