User reviews

As if Jodorowsky met Coffin Joe in Hong Kong and decided to collaborate on a supernatural martial-arts action film. Filled to the brim with visual overload, mystical drama, Buddhist symoblism and dark supernatural atmosphere, this film follows the life of a boxer embroiled in a vengeful feud sparked by the brutal, nearly fatal beating of his brother in a sparring match. He is overwhelmed one night by a vision, an omen as it were, which ultimately leads him towards the realization of his own destiny that takes him along a path of spirituality and a quest for the power and inner peace that may free his lineage from an ages old curse. This scenario is used as a launching point for what is surely one of the most bizarre, chaotic & excessive Hong Kong flicks ever made. Most of the movies effects are obviously low budget but the rather excellent filmwork and audaciously gonzo, over-the-top nature of the imagery far than makes up for any budgetary restrictions. The indelibly weird vibe that permeates the film is, in fact, partially due to it's low-fidelity nature. Those familiar with the "Chinese Ghost Story" and similar fare will be familiar with the themes conjured up by these supernatural Hong Kong action flicks and may know what to expect. But those who are not should get ready for a pretty wild trip down a road full of wild twists of logic that lead through glowing supernatural vistas, magical terrorist attacks, flying eyeball creatures, and wild clashes with demonic entities and manifestations of all sorts. A crazy little nugget of a film that could even be an accidental masterpiece. At the very least, a unique cinematic experience that's probably like nothing else you've ever seen. Virtually impossible to track down and not, as far as I know, offically available. In spite of this, fans of offbeat & mondo cinema should do whatever they can to track this gem down.

I reckon that if I were to ever try and compile a Top Ten list of the craziest Hong Kong films ever made, it's almost a dead cert that The Boxer's Omen would be in there somewhere: the film is bats••t bonkers from start to finish. I doubt that a mere written description of the weirdness on display could ever do the film justice, but here's my best shot....

Chan Hung is a Hong Kong boxer who travels to Thailand to avenge his brother, who was crippled in a fight with unscrupulous opponent Mr. Bu-bo (played by martial arts movie legend Bolo Yeung, who rarely fights fair in his films). After agreeing to a boxing match against Bu-bo in three months time, Chan visits a Buddhist temple where he is drawn into a battle with an evil wizard who has used his dark powers to prevent the local abbot from achieving immortality.

The supernatural skirmish that ensues sees the wicked magician using some bizarre techniques to try and gain the upper hand against Chan, including summoning killer bats from the eye sockets of crocodile skulls (which also come alive), using rat blood to bring a skeletal bat back to life, cutting off a chicken's head to perform a spell, conjuring up a flying alien head from a gloopy mess of puke, and ultimately removing his own noggin from his shoulders to launch a last-ditch attack. It's all for nowt, though, 'cos the wizard loses the fight when sunlight makes his head dissolve.

After all of that, the film gets REALLY strange.

A triumphant Chan arrives home to find his girlfriend in the shower and joins her for some soapy fun; unfortunately, this spot of impromptu sex saps him of his powers, which isn't great news for the guy when three more evil wizards start to cause him trouble. They use a dead crocodile to give birth to a naked witch that blinds Chan during his bout with Bu-bo and who attacks him while he is in Nepal trying to find a relic that can end the evil once and for all. There's also something about an extract from a 1000 year-old fungus smeared with honey that can make him invincible. Oh, and the witch has her skin pulled off by a dead lama and gives birth to the three wizards (wrapped in cellophane?!?!) who then sacrifice themselves to create an army of miniature one-eyed dinosaurs with crazy hair (I'm sure I've missed a lot of other equally insane stuff out, but that should be more than enough to give you an idea of just how bizarre the film is).

The special effects used to realise all of this are undeniably cheap and unconvincing, but their shonkiness only adds to the fun. I rate The Boxer's Omen 8/10 purely for being such a relentlessly absurd—and, as a result, hugely entertaining—piece of Asian excess.

A late Shaw oddity that has elements of a classic Shaw occult film but with qualities that are very un-Shaw like.

The plot is about a Hong Kong gangster discovering a supernatural connection with a deceased Thai monk after the monk's spirit saves him from an ambush from a rival gang. Ignoring the spirit's pleas, the gangster goes home to his beautiful (and frequently naked) girlfriend. The gangster then goes to Thailand to challenge a cheating Thai kickboxer who gravely hurt his best friend in a match. After disgorging a live Moray eel in a hotel, the gangster decides that it's a good time to find the temple that the monk resided in. The gangster learns that he was a twin brother to the dead monk in a previous life and therefore their lives are forever intertwined! The monk was about to achieve immortality but a crazy Thai dark warlock poisoned his eyes with spiders and the monk died. The gangster's life is at risk if he can't defeat the warlock and break the poison spider spell.

That's enough description. I can't begin to list the strangeness that occurs in this film. Lots of rubber animals, vomit eating wizards, talking corpses, a flying alien head that hatches from a giant pink slime egg, lots of butcher shop offal, maggots, bats, Buddhist monks and breasts pressed against windows, all in the same movie! The photography is very good at points sometimes much better than other Shaw films but then we are plunged into a typical Shaw scene of garish colored lights. The art direction is very, very good. The pacing is uneven but the weirdness keeps your attention. At one point the film stops to spend a few minutes showing crocodiles with no dialog and no warning. It's not so bad since you are actively trying to figure out what you are watching. The vomit eating and chewed food sharing scenes might be over the top for some people.

I enjoyed the film but I also realize that this might not be a shared reaction. You are warned.

I've seen a lot of freaky Asian cinema - and many of the strange horror/black magic stuff from the Phillipines and Indonesia makes your jaw drop but I must say, BOXER'S OMEN (or MO)has to be one of the weirdest if not THE weirdest films I've ever seen. There is a plot but it almost doesn't matter - just the mind-blowing action sequences are enough for you and your like-minded friends to enjoy. Demon bats, spiders, eels emerge from people's mouths, strange insects burrowing into people's openings, alligator's being cut open so a corpse can be laid inside to bring the dead soul back, man oh man. Now most of the effects are really cheesy and laughable but hey - this is almost 25 years ago! Then again, some of the effects are very EFFECTive - enough to make you gasp, while as I said, many will make you howl with laughter. Produced by The Shaw Brothers, who have made legendary kung-fu movies and such horrid big gorilla movies like Mighty Peking Man totally deliver the goods with this fun trainwreck of a movie - it's like David Lynch meets John Waters meets the Mystic Of Bali. The new DVD release is great - the print is spotless.

This one's definitely one to see, just to say you've seen it. That's not to say you won't get something out of it, but it's weird… it's tremendously weird! It starts off predictably enough, with a revenge flick set-up, but soon goes off on superbly bizarre tangents involving flying heads, automaton Buddhas and tons of maggots and oodles of vomit. It seems that anything to do with magic also involves maggots and vomit.

A word of warning to people - like me - who like to try to psycho-analyse weird films, books etc.; don't try. Your head will hurt. The best thing to do when watching this, is just to let it wash over you.

Unless you have spent your life watching Asian horror films I doubt you've seen anything like this. This is one of the most mind blowing or mind bending films ever made. You will marvel at the bizarre twists and turns this film takes, not to mention the on the cheap monsters, full frontal nudity and magical confrontations.

The plot has a young Chinese man seeking revenge on a Thai boxer who attacked his brother after a fight and broke his neck. Heading to Thailand he ends up falling in with a band of monks who need the young man to help fight an evil wizard who has killed their leader just as he was about to achieve immortality. It seems the monk (who's disembodied spirit keeps appearing to the boxer) and the boxer were twins in a past life and have some connection so that what happens to one will happen to the other (a spiritual Corsican Brothers sort of thing) so the only one who can fight the evil is the boxer who agrees to become a monk so that he can save the spirit of his twin and his own life. What follows are a series of would be gross out sequences as the boxer fights the evil wizard, takes on the Thai boxer who paralyzed his brother and so much more. Wow.

Good looking, but with special effects that are a bit silly (when they aren't employing real animal offal) this is a movie that will make you laugh at and with it even as its bending your mind. This is a one of a kind movie that mixes up a variety of genres into a truly unique blend (you may have seen similar things before but not all in one movie). It's a serious story but with the presence of mind not to take itself too seriously. Clearly it knows the effects are less than stellar and it uses that to its advantage by playing those scenes a bit light hearted as if to say "we know they're cheap, just go with us". And you will want to go with it since the film's anything can happen attitude makes this a one of a kind viewing experience.

See this movie. If you like action films or horror films I'd give this film a try. Those looking for unique cinematic experiences need to put this on their must see list

I have to give this film a high rating just for the fact that it is so utterly insane, disgusting but at times brilliant. When I was in the USA last year, I went into a cool little Indy Music and DVD shop looking for a Martial Arts movie to watch that night. This little gem jumped off the shelf into my hands. Watching it that night, I actually found myself so horrified with some of the scenes, I was looking around the room to see if anyone else might be watching me watching the movie. You see, I was visiting family and didn't want to be categorised as the strange chap from London who watches films where wizards eat chickens testicles. To me, it had the spirit of Jodorowsky with some absolutely amazing scenes of transcendence by Buddhist meditation that still look awesome with today's technology. Not many movies like this. Really glad i found it.

The Shaw Brothers were famous for producing slightly hysterical, often hallucinatory, over-the-top karate films with frequent mystical overtones. "The Boxer's Omen" is no exception, except that it throws in quite a bit of full-frontal female nudity and a copious amount of vomiting in addition to all the usual SB stuff. A gangster is bewitched by an evil wizard, but he has someone who can help him: a Buddhist monk who has been poisoned by the same evil wizard! But in order to receive that help, the gangster must give up his wanton ways and become a monk himself.... I quite like most of the Shaw Brothers movies that I've seen, but this one seemed a bit.... much, somehow. Perhaps it was the grossness factor (recycled vomit, anyone?), perhaps it was, at 107 minutes, just a little bit too long (I mean, how many times can you show recycled vomit, after all?); in any event, I ended up feeling, not uplifted by the zaniness of the show, but rather just vaguely disgusted.

A shady Chinese boxer gets caught up in a web of fate, buddhism and black magic when he's in Thailand to avenge his brother who was crippled in a dirty fight with a thai boxer. It turns out in a past life he was the twin brother of a enlightened buddhist monk, who is now preserved in a state between life and death after being poison-spelled by a powerful black magician who wanted to stop him to reach full enlightenment and eternal life. Only the power of Buddah stops the semi-dead monk's body from decomposing, and since their fates are linked from previous lives, when the monk finally decomposes the boxer will die too... a horrible, messy death! So the boxer has to become a taoist monk and beat the black magician to break the poisonous spell and save his life and the eternal life of his ex-twin brother (are you confused yet?). But the black magician has a few cards up his sleeve too... or rather decks and decks of 'em to! The final battle between good and evil that takes place is in an inferno of laser beams, crocodile carcasses, weird magic, maggots, bats, magic relics, devouring of disgusting foods, adult baby birth, monk chanting, puke eating, monsters etc. etc. etc... You could go on and on and on!

At the risk of sounding like a fashion-blogger: GAH! OMG! I can't believe I haven't seen this before! All I can say is do believe the hype because this is an amazing slice of HK black magic-weirdness. And best of all it's not only "so weird it's good" like movies like Devil Fetus or Wolf Devil Woman, it's actually a really good, original, well-crafted weird film with good actors, production values, lots and lots of imaginative effects and impressive trippy cinematography... visually it looks nothing else! All the actors work fine but extra credit goes to the guy who played the black magician (he's sort of like an though-to-be harmless, half-crazy old hobo who gets sudden outbursts of extreme anger) - best voodoo-style screen black magician ever! Genius! Not a guy I would let anywhere near a chicken farm though... A question: Did HK producers hire their cast at the geek section at their local freak show or was it considered a normal thing to eat maggots, kill animals and puke live barracudas (!) in Hong Kong movies?

Even though I didn't find it scary (a little bit disgusting maybe) I had WILD nightmares about witches and black magic all night tonight. I even woke up at five in the morning scared as hell, decided it was too good to miss and fell right back to sleep. It was like the film's sweetness continued in my dreams.

Sorry catholicism, paganism, old school (pre-LaVey) satanism & Jewish mysticism - close but no cigar, buddhism is now the coolest religion on the block. An absolute must-see!

Get inspired by the great films of Jodorowsky and Raimi, put in some Asian black magic, kickboxing and go completely nuts. With laughably bad acting, production and script the producers were over-ambitious in this crazy B movie that seems to fail on all levels. Why this insult to filmmaking itself is loved by some will be a mystery to me. There are far better bizarre films that need better reception than this crap of a movie.

I have been a long time fan of hong kong movies as they have a certain vibe that no other film industry has been able to replicate. The films usually move at an incredibly fast pace with you only being able to comprehend all that is happening if you give it your utmost attention (and hopefully having proper subs). The Boxer's Omen follows this practice of break-neck speed, but is filled with so many mind melting effects and plot twists that you could be the most jaded of filmgoers and still walk out of this a better man/woman just for having been exposed to such artistic magnificence. Your brain will race to conclusions only to find true subversion of your expectations. Without a doubt one of the most creative and unique movies I have ever seen... and I have seen A LOT, making it my life's mission to seek out the craziest movies in existence. Really the only thing that compares to this film is The Seventh Curse with Chow Yun Fat (one of my absolute favorites... Honorable mention to Mystics in Bali) yet The Boxers Omen far surpasses the black magic/spiritual horror of that and quite frankly every other film in the genre at large. Almost every single scene is working off twisted mad scientist ideas like it was directed by Dr. Mangele on ayahuasca. Like other reviewers have said it does seem the filmmaker was influenced by Lucio Fulci and Alejandro Jodorowsky's work (in terms of sheer visual imagination/materializing the most ludicrous thoughts one could conceive + the heavy reliance on traditional zen Buddhism that is contorted by the directors more malicious sensibilities). This simply must be seen to be believed. 13/10. Admittedly it is not for everybody but for me it breaks the scale.

Ko plays Xiong,out to avenge his brother,crippled in a kick-boxing fight by Bolo Yeung.His hallucinations lead him to a temple and his karmic twin priest;their fates are inextricably linked, and that's bad,since the priest was killed by a black magician.Xiong initially sceptical is eventually convinced-the graphic scene of eel-vomiting seems to do the trick - and agrees to become a monk in order to take on the forces of darkness and save both the priest's soul and his own.This surreal and completely over-the-top HK trashy horror flick has to be seen to be believed.The special effects are weak,however you will laugh until it hurts watching several totally weird moments.The action is fast and the film is loaded with hallucinatory imagery straight from Jodorovsky's works.9 out of 10 for sheer pleasure of watching this surreal madness.

I stumbled upon the 1983 Hong Kong horror movie "Mo" (aka "The Boxers Omen") by random chance here in 2023. And never having heard about it or seen it before, and with my love of Asian cinema, of course I opted to sit down and watch the movie.

I didn't know what I was in for here, nor what to expect, so writers Chih-Hung Kuei and On Szeto had every opportunity to impress and bedazzle me with this movie.

However they failed to do so most horribly. The storyline in "Mo" was rubbish. It was a chaotic mess of a storyline that was all over the place, but being nowhere all the same. So there was very little entertainment and enjoyment to be found in this movie from director Chih-Hung Kuei.

It was fun, however, to see Bolo Yeung show up in the movie, but trust me, it doesn't make up for all the shortcomings of the movie.

My rating of "Mo" lands on a one out of ten stars. It simply isn't worth the effort to sit down and watch this 1983 movie.

I feel like Roy Batty at the end of Blade Runner, because this movie made me see things you people wouldn't believe. I sometimes feel like I've seen it all, after nearly three decades of watching movies and having seen thousands at this point, but The Boxer's Omen is unlike anything else. It's got mixed martial arts, supernatural horror, nightmarish fantasy/mythological elements, and plenty of genuinely disgusting gross-out scenes that genuinely made me feel queasy.

I can't even explain most of the things I just saw. This was a fever dream of a movie, and I don't even know if I really saw some of the things that I think I just saw. This movie just never stops finding bizarre, gross, and creative things to throw at its protagonist and, by extension, its audience. It's a ride that's mostly fun, but at other points feels dangerously deranged, and kind of uncomfortable... but it works, given this is clearly going for horror. While it's not the kind of horror that'll make me struggle to sleep tonight, it is the kind of horror that got a reaction from me.

I know only one person - maybe two people - who I could potentially show this to without them disowning me, and it's the kind of movie where I think I have to show it to someone, just so they can validate it really exists and the things on-screen really did happen. This movie's 104 minutes of utter insanity, and it made me very uncomfortable but I also had a surprisingly good time, so watch it if you think you've seen everything.

Yeah! This movie is totally awesome! The special effects are really great. Well, some of the puppets were a little cheesy, but I can truly appreciate the fact that it was done without entirely editing everything you see on a blue or green screen the way Hollywood seems to do with all its computer graphics stuff these days. That gets all too similar after a while. The old stuff that requires lots of food dye and corn starch rocks my world.

Any movie with exposed nipples is sure to be a hit. I thought this movie had a great spooky atmosphere at times. It really took me back to the old days. I see maybe some of the same elements from movies like Zu: Warriors of the Magic Mountain, Close Encounters of the Spooky Kind 1 and 2, Evil Dead, The Exorcist, and a little bit of Kickboxer thrown in for good measure. (That's the one with the brother, Van Damne?, who gets revenge against the Thai boxer that hospitalized his buddy.)

Sure, some of the effects look cheesy, but the footage of real people counters that and makes a very unique balance between the all too real world of the Buddhist monks and villagers and the fantastical realm of the dark voodoo spells that require fuzzy puppets. If it were up to me I would give this picture an Academy Award just for having the most burning bat puppets on screen at the same time. Honestly the bat puppets are rather cute and that's an adjective I'd prefer never to mention but perhaps it could give you some more ideas about wanting to see this movie if you haven't. Definitely a classic. In my opinion, Boxer's Curse aka Mo, is way better than Ju-On and the Grudge type of ghost stories that are all too common these days and unimaginative.

The elephant was an especially nice surprise. Hooray for elephants and their grand majesty!

Well, it's time for another black magic movie created by a bunch of Chinese people who must've been snorting mountains upon mountains upon mountains upon mountains upon mountains of heroin while making this..... whatever. Typically what to expect from this movie is what you would expect from any Eastern black magic movie and that's a lot of vomiting, maggots, body horror elements, black magic priest, ultraviolence and all other sorts of weird a$$ random $#!+. Boxers Omen only elevates it to sheer undeniable maniacal insanity. The filmmakers who made this movie had been on something. Methamphetamines, Angel dust, speed, heroin.... I don't know. But whatever. I enjoyed Boxers Omen for what it is and that is just incomprehensible psychedelic lunacy. Some of the effects are goofy as all hell but still you'll never see another movie quite like this. Just say no to crack.

This movie was beyond the definition of weirdness and strangeness in my dictionary. A combination of few naked women, Boxing, Buddhism, Black magic and flying alien's head. Top of the shelf nonsense, surrealist builshet which masterfully was put together. 👏

After a boxer is crippled in the ring, his brother seeks the party responsible which brings him into contact with a Thailand-based wizard attempting to conjure a spell that will grant him immortality and teams up with a good wizard trying to stop him in order to prevent his quest.

Frankly, this is easily one of the finest examples of the genre around. One of the brightest spots of the film is the need to rely on a stylized series of over-the-top examples of black magic and sorcery. The film wastes no time at all detailing the kind of wild and extravagant sorcery-based tricks to be expected here, from casting spells that turns a person into a bat, reviving animal skeletons to be controlled hypnotically and utilizing hosts of creatures to do his bidding. The type of power evident here is readily apparent from the start, and this all happens within the first half-hour of the film so it only grows throughout the rest of the running time. A large part of this is due to just utterly disturbing and gross-out material as the idea of conjuring up spells that require people to spit up blood, piercing eyeballs with needles and finding mummified corpses sealed gigantic urns gives this a start to the sort of madness presented here is enough to settle on one of the most disgusting sequences ever featured. This is the celebrated reincarnation sequence wherein the dead wizard is brought back to life by his servants which has some of the most extreme visual gags ever and has plenty of staying power to this day as it mixes together every kind of gross activity imaginable as they raise their fallen leader. Beyond the gross-outs, the film works in other areas. The martial arts fighting is quite enjoyable, as the fight at the very beginning gives an idea of the brutality to be expected throughout here and a return battle is also rather brutal as it's mixed alongside the reanimation sequence which may or may not affect their brawl. Likewise, there's also an exceptional attention to detail about the different forms of sorcery here. There's obviously great care here to accomplish the transformation or spell-casting scenes with accuracy and detail, allowing for shining examples of both good and black magic. Examining the tribulations he goes through in order to be accepted into the monastery is a fine example, while the wizards' manipulation of various liquids and animal parts for his calculating spells gives this a great contrast. Even better are the massively entertaining and enjoyable battles the two endure, from animating bats and crocodile heads to relying on conjuring protective fields of self-defense, the battle soon degenerates into a duel with a floating head and using the dangling veins beneath it. The final battle that takes place inside the temple is where this one really picks up by offering a slew of impressive scenes utilizing the guardian statues to attack him before the demon wizard arrives and starts attacking which results in the resurrection of the monks' spirit from the main statue. This whole sequence is a well-spring of creative and visual imagination that offers a rousing fantasy-driven conclusion. There's plenty of stellar special effects courtesy of throughout the sequence, and the range of styles makes for an exceptionally fun viewing.

Rated Unrated/NC-17: Extreme Graphic Violence, Full Nudity, Language and disturbing visuals of animal violence.