1987’s resplendent Hong Kong action epic Eastern Condors is equal parts novelty act and war movie enthusiast comfort food. This underrated effort from star and director Sammo Hung is familiar, but also an outlier. While this story set during the waning days of the Vietnam War is obviously indebted to the likes of The Deer Hunter and The Dirty Dozen (sometimes bordering on similarities that would draw lawsuits under normal circumstances), it’s also a Chinese adjacent production that criticizes Communism, while still reserving plenty of skepticism towards the American cause in the region. A lot of this is silly, over-the-top fun in Hung’s trademark style of action and chaos (newly restored for the Criterion Collection), but there’s just enough originality and thought in Eastern Condors to make it feel refreshing, especially under the circumstances in which it was made.
Hung sets Eastern Condors in 1976, with Viet Cong troops fully gaining the upper hand over Americans and attempting to grow their sphere of influence across the region. Two million pounds of abandoned American explosives are in danger of falling into the “wrong” hands, and the U.S. government turns to twelve Chinese defectors with criminal records and negligible combat experience to go in and neutralize the problem. Each of the men is promised U.S. citizenship, full pardons for their crimes, and $200,000 in cash upon completion of the mission, but none of them are briefed on the task at hand upon agreement, and it’s quite obviously a suicide mission. The team is ill equipped from the start, and the mission is only called off by superiors just as it is beginning. Already behind enemy lines and desperate to win their freedom, the rag tag bunch of troops forge on the best they can.
It’s notable that Eastern Condors was made during a time when Hong Kong was under British rule, but filmmakers still had to make movies capable of crossover appeal with mainland audiences. The tone of Eastern Condors is pleasingly complicated. No one is in the right, no one is in the wrong, and the everyday people fighting for survival are caught in the middle of both sides political and militaristic posturing. Every member of the Condor squad (including a trio of badass, female Cambodian fighters who act as guides and back-up) is portrayed as an everyday person with a fair set of skills caught up in an situation where there are no winners, and put into opposition against a privileged, unhinged, merciless, and perpetually giggling villain (a brilliant Yuen Wah).
The team members (including notable Hong Kong heavyweights Corey Yuen and Yuen Woo-ping) are largely cliches and caricatures – in fitting with the film’s overall crowd pleasing nature and melodramatic approach- but they’re played with enthusiasm and great physical dexterity by members of Hung’s venerable and renowned stunt team. The most notable cast member who wasn’t a member of Hung’s team is Oscar winner Dr. Haing S. Ngor (The Killing Fields), who fits in like a glove as an unhinged American informant who has been virtually left for dead and needs to be protected by the Condors. Ngor has a great showing, there are plenty of surprisingly good roles for women by 80s action movie standards, and Hung (looking rather svelte because he dropped a lot of weight to play a soldier) gives one of his best performances. But sometimes their best efforts are hampered by a need for crowd rousing conventions. A bit with a character who has a terminal stutter isn’t funny, but is thankfully brief. And a sequence that’s almost a straight up reenactment of the harrowing Russian Roulette scene from The Deer Hunter is in poor taste.
But Eastern Condors is also pure cinematic spectacle, even though it forgoes a lot of the comedic elements Hung is best known for as a performer and filmmaker. Every skyline is stunning, and this is a disarmingly sharp looking motion picture (made even better by the new digital transfer). People sweat by the bucketload, and setbacks are approached in such an over the top manner that they become darkly comedic, both intentionally and otherwise. The environments (mostly shot in and around the Philippines) are utilized smartly and fittingly for a film that largely relies on guerrilla warfare techniques. There are insane acts of heroism and tearful confessions made before characters die. There’s a mole in the group. Team members question the mission and demand answers of their tight lipped superiors. Etcetera, etcetera. And it all builds to a grand finale that’s as beautiful as it is brutal, boasting the kind of clockwork choreography that Hung and his team excel at. (The recently released Criterion disc also includes a stage show promotional appearance made by the cast that’s a good bit of fun and further showcases their astounding abilities.) And a lot of the more violent outbursts – including people getting torn apart by heavy artillery at close range – look to have inspired more modern filmmakers. (It’s hard not to watch this and get some echos of what Sylvester Stallone was going for with his ultra-gory Rambo rebooting.)
From its delightfully 1980s opening set along dusky, wintery roads and all the way up until its final volley of bombast, Eastern Condors hits a genre movie sweet spot, but it also takes a place alongside other films of the era that looked back upon the Vietnam war with a great deal of regret. The tone isn’t entirely sombre throughout Eastern Condors, but it also can’t be viewed as disposable entertainment. Hung and his collaborators want to give the viewer an exciting and thoughtful time, with a not so subtle message that there are no winners in a war, only survivors.
Eastern Condors is now available on Blu-Ray from The Criterion Collection.
