Three of Hong Kong’s hottest actresses star in this outrageous comic book fantasy epic that manages to make even the most insane productions coming out of the Free City look positively sedate by comparison. The film is a confident matching of contrasting styles and genres, perhaps too much so for some tastes. After all, can sugary romance, high-kicking martial arts, grotesque infant deaths, wild stunts, crazed melodrama, and Peter Jackson style gore sequences all peacefully co-exist in the short space of 87 minutes? Incredibly, the answer is yes, and with very entertaining results. The film’s intricate plot follows the adventures of three superheroines, initially enemies, who team up to defeat an ancient monster who is stealing children of royal blood in an attempt to find a new Chinese emperor. This relatively simple story is complicated through a series of flashbacks, complex character relations, and ridiculous plot conventions too difficult to fully explain here. The pacing is lightning quick, with directors Johnny To and Ching Sui Tung setting up plenty of memorable action set pieces and skillfully handling the changes in tone and genre. From Michelle Yeoh’s (Police Story III) chain-swinging “Invisible Woman” to Anthony Wong’s (Hard-Boiled) dim-witted zombie henchman, the cast has created characters who seem to leap right out of a four-color universe and onto the silver screen. Sure, you could say that this movie has too much going on for its own good, but to do so would be missing the point: Heroic Trio is a live-action comic book, and captures the quirky spirit and skewed logic of the medium better than both Batmans put together.
This article appears in May 6 • 1994 (Cover).