DEVIL FETUS
Color,
1983, 92 mins. 13 secs.
Directed by Hung-Chuen Lau
Starring Eddie Chan, Pak-Kwong, Hsu Meng-Kuang, Hsiu-Ling, Ouyang Sha-fei
Vinegar Syndrome (Blu-ray) (US RA HD), Joy Sales (DVD) (Hong Kong R0 NTSC) / WS (2.35:1) (16:9)
HER VENGEANCE
Color, 1988, 90 mins. 2 secs. / 82 mins. 48 secs.
Directed by Ngai Choi Lam
Starring Siu-Fung Wong, Ching-Ying Lam, Elaine Jin, Kelvin Wong
Vinegar Syndrome (Blu-ray) (US RA HD), Fortune Star (DVD) (Hong Kong R0 NTSC) / / WS (2.35:1) (16:9)
The more extreme 
end of Hong Kong company Golden Harvest's output finally gets a worthy salute with this 2025 Blu-ray pairing of two of the 
beloved company's exploitation classics, finally presented in pristine quality in their uncut versions. Longtime fan favorites on rough-looking Hong Kong VHS and DVD as well as gray market composites, these assaults of wild imagery and action-packed set pieces deliver more entertainment value per dollar than just about anything else you'll find from the era. Both are also prime examples of '80s films retroactively branded as Category III, the country's most restrictive rating, an emblem of pride now since it means the potential for a barrage of wild sex and violence.
First up is the outrageous Devil Fetus, whose title leads you to expect something very different from what you actually get. Released in 1983 but retroactively branded a Cat III once the rating took effect a few years later, the onslaught begins at a busy Hungry Ghost Festival street auction where Ching becomes entranced by and spends far too much for a jade vase. Accompanied by her mother-in-law, she takes it back home where she lives with her family including her brother-in-law and nephews. The vase soon overtakes her including sexual indulgences, abusive behavior, and full-on possession that gets even worse when her husband comes back from a trip and smashes it during a demonic tryst. 
A few magic rituals and gruesome deaths later including the supernatural pregnancy and sealing up of the dead Ying, we jump ahead twelve 
years as one of the nephews, Zheng (Meng-Kuang), becomes a target of the malignant force when it escapes and temporarily goes into a German Shepherd.
Gleefully trampling all over numerous taboos (including a couple of brief bits of hopefully simulated animal violence), Devil Fetus is a wild ride whose opening and closing 20 minutes in particular will knock you on the floor. It's also a fun sonic experience as, in common practice at the time, it was apparently assembled from someone's handy vinyl collection with a whiplash-inducing mixture of prog rock, soundtrack needle drops, and New Age electronics. However, it's been impossible to see a truly uncut version of the film on home video since all the various VHS, laserdisc, and DVD editions have been altered to some extent, with the DVD in particular clocking in at a scant 87m15s thanks to its unconverted PAL master speedup issues and cuts for nudity (plus alternate milder takes of several shots). It was also cropped significantly on the sides and horribly interlaced, with the presence of optional English subtitles being one of the few things it had going for it. The Vinegar Syndrome Blu-ray is completely uncut, featuring some very rare bits of topless nudity that were edited or cropped on most past releases and featuring a much gorier shot of facial blood spraying during the dog attack. The transfer itself from the original negative looks stunning with vibrant colors and fine detail, but not to be overlooked is the equally excellent audio presentation with Cantonese and Mandarin DTS-HD MA 2.0 mono options (with excellent translated English subtitles) plus the extremely scarce English dub for posterity. The film also comes with a solid new audio commentary by Travis Woods who contextualizes this within the crazed cycle of '80s Hong Kong horrors, other connected genre films, the backgrounds of the relevant actors, and plenty more.
Though Hong Kong cinema had already treaded into the dangerous waters of the rape-revenge film on occasion including the Shaw Brothers exploitation shocker Kiss of Death in 
1973, its most notorious contribution arrived in 1988 with a much more extreme reworking of that same film’s plot. Her Vengeance, which easily lives up to the promise of its title and is included on a second separate Blu-ray, pares the formula down to its savage essentials as nightclub worker 
Ying (Wong) is sexually assaulted and verbally debased by a gang of drunk men after her night shift finishes. She learns from a subsequent medical visit that she has contracted a particularly virulent STD (or AIDS, depending which version you watch), and her blind younger sister (Yin-Ling) encourages her to get back at the men who did her wrong. Ying goes for guidance to wheelchair-bound former gangster Hung (Ching-ying) and attracts the romantic attentions of a reporter (Siu), all while putting together a hit list that will leave numerous mangled bodies in its wake. No birthday party, burial, or even simple walk home is safe with this rampaging evil on the loose as the remaining family members turn to the magic arts and sacrifice for salvation.
Her Vengeance is easily one of the career high points for unsung director Ngai Choi Lam who delivered one of the most intense later period Shaw Brothers action films with 1983’s Men from the Gutter and went on to stun viewers with The Seventh Curse, The Cat, Erotic Ghost Story, and the legendary Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky. It shouldn’t be a surprise that he doesn’t pull any punches here either with the revenge scenes escalating in savagery towards a jaw-dropping club showdown finale (complete with what Joe Bob Briggs might call "wheelchair-fu") guaranteed to bring the house down. It’s also one of the most confusing Hong Kong films in terms of its many versions, with the uncut version only viewable for decades on a scarce VHS release and the retroactively rated Category III version being issued on laserdisc and VCD. An alternate Category IIb version was the easiest to find courtesy of its release on DVD, with multiple gray market fanedits cobbling together the Fortune Star DVD with elements of the earlier releases for varying degrees of completeness.
Once again the Vinegar Syndrome releases hurdles past expectations with the most complete release to date, or releases in this case as it features 
both the longest and most brutal variant of the Cat III version (in Cantonese) as well as the full Cat IIb one (Cantonese or 
Mandarin) which has a number of alternate scenes with significant plot point and dialogue variations. (You can find a breakdown of the convoluted official release differences here.) Again the new scan from the negatives looks remarkable and blows away any version we’ve had before, with optional English subtitles also doing a far better job of conveying the dialogue as well. This time Bruce Holecheck, Art Ettinger, and Ryan Smith team up for an audio commentary that fuses together their combined expertise in Hong Kong and rape-revenge films for a fine dissection of the differences between the multiple cuts, the carryovers from the Shaw Brothers film, the director’s background, the confusing nature of classifying films as Cat III that weren’t initially released during the rating’s existence, and plenty more.
All of the video extras are included on the first Blu-ray starting with "Eagle Blood & Pig Intestines" (12m12s), an interview with Meng-Kuang about his stumbling into acting and general lack of experience, the likely reason more established names didn't do the part, the secret ingredients used to create the canine guts he consumes, the brief local controversy over shooting a rape scene, and his thoughts on the theatrical release and finished product. "Her Vengeance in Four Cuts" (7m7s) is a a video essay written and narrated by John Charles (who also provides an extensive, very informative essay for the 20-page insert booklet) helpfully delineating the history of the four official release cuts of the film and explaining how essentially two of each were combined for what we now have here. Finally "Her Vengeance and Category-III Rape Revenge Films" (11m9s) is a new video essay by Samm Deighan which actually spends most of its time focusing on the shift in '80s Hong Kong films to contemporary settings while pushing the boundaries of what was permissible on movie screens with an eye geared for various markets both domestically and abroad. Also included are trailers for both films, the alternate softer takes for Devil Fetus (1m58s), a promotional image gallery for Devil Fetus courtesy of Ryan Smith (1m30s), and an abridged 1-minute "crime doesn’t pay" ending for Her Vengeance apparently designed to avoid endorsing vigilante behavior.
DEVIL FETUS: Vinegar Syndrome (Blu-ray)
DEVIL FETUS: Fortune Star (DVD)
Reviewed on June 2, 2025
