What can you say about Fantasy Mission Force? Often considered one of the worst movies of all time, Fantasy Mission Force stars Jimmy Wang Yu, Brigitte Lin, and Jackie Chan (against his will). If you’ve heard of this movie, you probably already know that Jackie Chan owed Jimmy Wang Yu a favor and had to appear in this movie. But all you really need to know about this movie is that it’s a Taiwanese action comedy directed by Chu Yen Ping. That automatically means that this is going to be a lame comedy that tries too hard, but it has some pretty decent action and a catchy theme song. But despite being a piece of crap, Taiwanese action comedies (Chu Yen Ping films no less) are usually still entertaining nonetheless. Fantasy Mission Force is certainly a memorable film, but is it any good? No. But more importantly, is it entertaining?
Captain Don Wen (Jimmy Wang Yu) is appointed to organize a group of mercenaries to rescue government officials that are being held hostage by the Japanese. The mercenaries in question are a group of criminals and they will be given their freedom as well as some reward money after they complete their mission. In order to do so, they must battle Amazon women, ghosts, and Nazi’s. If that sounds stupid, that’s only because it is.
Captain Don Wen (Jimmy Wang Yu) is appointed to organize a group of mercenaries to rescue government officials that are being held hostage by the Japanese. The mercenaries in question are a group of criminals and they will be given their freedom as well as some reward money after they complete their mission. In order to do so, they must battle Amazon women, ghosts, and Nazi’s. If that sounds stupid, that’s only because it is.
I’ll start off this review by saying that I don’t hate this movie. If anything, I really think this is an entertaining film. I’ve probably seen it about three times. But still, I can certainly tell why a lot of people really don’t like this movie. First off, they might be disappointed that the actor that they paid $2 to see is barely in it. That actor being Jackie Chan. Besides a few short fight scenes, Jackie Chan has about 20 minutes of screentime. But literally every single DVD cover of this movie is focused on him. But how else are the distributors going to attract you to their terrible home video releases? Most versions of this movie are in fullscreen, English-dubbed, and have horrendous VHS quality.
The story in this movie is also ridiculous. It follows the generic Dirty Dozen story, except with Chinese Scotsmen and zero plausibility. This movie just doesn’t make any sense at all and doesn’t have any focus or any logical storyline. There are many scenes that just come out of nowhere. A few of these scenes are only there to give Jackie Chan a random fight scene or to fill in the 90 minute runtime. Since this movie is so random, you completely forget any of the characters’ motives.
The story in this movie is also ridiculous. It follows the generic Dirty Dozen story, except with Chinese Scotsmen and zero plausibility. This movie just doesn’t make any sense at all and doesn’t have any focus or any logical storyline. There are many scenes that just come out of nowhere. A few of these scenes are only there to give Jackie Chan a random fight scene or to fill in the 90 minute runtime. Since this movie is so random, you completely forget any of the characters’ motives.
But even with an abundance historical inaccuracies and nothing making any sense, I still think Fantasy Mission Force is an extremely entertaining movie thanks the brief bits of fun action, the unintentional hilarity, its unpredictability, and for the occasional star power from Jackie Chan. None of the flaws in this movie are really notable because it’s more than likely that the filmmakers weren’t trying to make a good movie. They just wanted to make a stupid little movie. And if that was their intentions, then they’ve succeeded.
The filmmakers never go out of their way to hide away flaws. If anything, it almost seems like they’re trying to embrace them. While watching this movie, you shouldn’t be asking yourself if it’s good or bad. You should be asking yourself if it’s entertaining. And in my opinion, yes, it is entertaining. Even when the film gets really weird, I remind myself that this is a Chu Yen Ping film and that I shouldn’t ever take it seriously. And if you don’t take this movie seriously, you might start to laugh at everything going on.
The filmmakers never go out of their way to hide away flaws. If anything, it almost seems like they’re trying to embrace them. While watching this movie, you shouldn’t be asking yourself if it’s good or bad. You should be asking yourself if it’s entertaining. And in my opinion, yes, it is entertaining. Even when the film gets really weird, I remind myself that this is a Chu Yen Ping film and that I shouldn’t ever take it seriously. And if you don’t take this movie seriously, you might start to laugh at everything going on.
Despite some pretty major issues and the migraine-inducing video quality, I still think Fantasy Mission Force is a fun movie. It sports some fun action scenes from time to time and since it’s so bonkers, it’s completely unpredictable. It’s such a strange film that it’s almost hard not to watch. Fantasy Mission Force is nothing to be proud of and it’s definitely a piece of crap, but I think it still provides plenty of nutty entertainment in true Taiwanese-fashion. But if you like good movies, then avoid this movie like the plague!
*If you want to buy this movie, I'd recommend either the German or Japanese Blu-ray releases. This movie has never looked better and the video quality is probably better than this movie deserves.
Images from HK Cinemagic, HKMDb, and Silver Emulsion
*If you want to buy this movie, I'd recommend either the German or Japanese Blu-ray releases. This movie has never looked better and the video quality is probably better than this movie deserves.
Images from HK Cinemagic, HKMDb, and Silver Emulsion