Genre: Comedy

‘The Legend Of The Owl’ is a positively insane, yet gloriously inventive production that boasts more hits than misses.

‘The Lion Roars’ is slickly produced, well performed by its beloved leading couple and not without its moments of amusement.

This engrossing team prove to be adept at the rigorous fight scenes and the subtle comedy that further lifts the film above the norm.

Slick, sick exploitation ‘Machine Girl’ is absurd Japanese cinema at its best. About as subtle as a kick in the balls it is nevertheless well designed, gore soaked, action packed and surprisingly funny entertainment.

‘The Magic Hour’ is a fun comedy, though not the classic it promises to be. It still has an enormous amount to recommend it though and is a good starting point for those looking into Japanese comedy.

The veteran comedian is constantly watchable when he’s on the screen and his reaction to the circumstances he finds himself in is simply priceless.

There’s little room for Chow’s trademark “fast speak” here, and it’s definitely more ‘Three Stooges’ than ‘Monty Python’.

Despite the potential of being a great otaku rom-com and having two good actors playing the brothers, two hours worth of minor incident and low-key humour quickly outstay their welcome.

With a predictable script and some seriously under-par performances, it was never really going to amount to much more than a set of average fight sequences.

Though containing enough reasons to warrant a viewing, ‘The Master’ is still not as polished as the better films being made by the studio at the time.

The main problem with ‘The Medallion’ is it looks just like a Hollywood film with a modest budget. In fact it’s not even as good as his Hollywood films, including ‘The Tuxedo’.

‘The Mermaid’ has the feel-good factor and is probably as good a rom-com as you’re likely to see this year. Yet that somehow doesn’t seem enough from a film-maker like Chow.