Reviewed by: ororama Date: 11/06/2013 We're Going to Eat You, the second movie directed by Tsui Hark, is a wild mix of kung fu, comedy and cannibalism. A police officer called Agent 999 (Norman Chu) pursues a criminal called Rolex (Melvin Wong) to an isolated village where the inhabitants supplement their diet with unfortunate travelers passing through the area. Rolex has become the assistant of the ruthless head of security of the village (Eddy Ko), who supervises the hunters and butchers and divides the spoils. However, Rolex has had second thoughts about the morality of his new job, and is trying to escape. Agent 999 is never sure who he can trust when he discovers that he has stumbled upon a far more serious case than he expected, since most of the village is eagerly involved in the crimes, and the few who aren't involved must hide their opposition or become next on the menu. The movie is fast paced, rushing from one well-choreographed fight to the next, occasionally slowing for brief interludes of plot. It is unusually bloody for a Hong Kong horror comedy of the period, and features a few of the comic grotesque actors who regularly appeared in movies of this genre. There isn't any time for character development, but it does offer a very unusual erotic subplot. We're Going to Eat You is an unusual and interesting horror comedy, offering more action than scares or plot and combining the usual jokes of this genre with an unusual amount of blood, all at the quick pace that has become characteristic of the movies of Tsui Hark. It makes up for its deficits of polish and coherence with a lot of energy and a bit of bizarre humor.

Reviewed by: ewaffle Date: 07/18/2010 Summary: If you are going to see just one cannibal movie... ...it shouldn't be "We're Going to Eat You," a not very entertaining mix of hungry cannibals, unfunny humor and decent kung fu. The cannibals--at least the proletariat underlings--are hungry because their megalomaniacal leader keeps most the human flesh for himself and his security force. Eddy Ko was born to play the cannibal leader. He dominates with the force of his personality (and his insanely flashing eyes), keeps the entire population in constant fear and slaps around his captive girlfriend instead of bringing her the hearts she wants. He is almost a match for Agent 999 of the Central Surveillance Bureau --Norman Chu--who is on the trail of master thief Rolex. Since Rolex is the leader's increasingly squeamish executive assistant there is conflict between the cannibals and the cops. Rolex want to get away but doesn't want to be prosecuted for his thefts, thinking that since he has given up a life of stealing to become the second in command of a gang that murders and eats anyone they can catch that the authorities should give him a pass. Agent 999 doesn't agree. He is a rule-bound cop who goes by the book, even when the book is a cookbook for human organs or is a scholarly text with a dripping hunk of entrails used as a bookmark. The fights between Chu and Ko are well done, exciting and brutal. They are evenly matched in skill and fitness and are well served by the action choreography and editing. Most of the rest of the action is of the milling around and falling down school. A little of that goes a long way and there is quite a bit of it. The DVD we watched was from the Media Blasters Tokyo Shock line showed all the care and precision that one has come to expect from that company. A couple of scenes were chopped before they were finished, there were major color shifts and at least one scene was left out entirely. None of this impaired out enjoyment of "We're Going to Eat You" since a perfect Criterion transfer with frame by frame corrections would make this any better a movie. Recommended for those who want the complete works of Tsui Hark or who want to see Eddy Ko act like a tinhorn dictator in a surplus RAF jacket, complete with campaign ribbons.

Reviewed by: j.crawford Date: 03/09/2010 Summary: Lots of energy, but one ugly film. Reviewer Score: 5

Reviewed by: Chungking_Cash Date: 07/01/2007 Tsui Hark and first time writer Sze-To Cheuk-hon have all the wry stuff here and pull off the daunting task of synchronizing cannibalism, comedy, and kung fu in near-perfect harmony. Only when a reoccurring gag, featuring a randy Amazon woman (quite obviously an actor in drag), does the writing falter. And yet given that the epicenter of "We're Going to Eat You" is a remote village of cannibals -- fed by a group of Leatherface indebted butchers -- it's strangely fitting. Reviewer Score: 8

Reviewed by: mrblue Date: 09/27/2005 A policeman (Chu) travels to a remote island in pursuit of a killer (Wong). Upon his arrival, he meets up with the mayor (Hung) and soon notices that the locals might be more dangerous than the criminal he's after. While The Butterfly Murders was Tsui Hark's first movie, We're Going to Eat You might be considered his first "true" film. Even though it goes all over the map, ranging from farcial comedy to gory horror, one gets the sense that the movie is going exactly where Tsui wants it to go. Any one scene can have the viewer laughing and then gasping in disbelief. It's a tremendous ride -- akin to a movie like Evil Dead II (not suprisingly, EDII director Sam Raimi has long been known as a fan of Hong Kong movies) that might anger film purists (or as I like to call them snobs) or viewers who don't like to be challenged, but for those who like to sample something a bit different, they'll find one of the more unique experiences in cinema. [review from www.hkfilm.net]

Reviewed by: Sydneyguy Date: 02/04/2005 Summary: A little twisted What a strange movie, with a blend of humour, action and canabalism!! There is a few laughs in here, the action is a little better than average and the excitement generated as the heroes are not one man armies makes this entertaining viewing!! 7/10

Reviewed by: MrBooth Date: 11/24/2002 Tsui Hark's second movie as director is a Kung Fu Horror movie, laced with black humour and gleeful splatterhouse gore. Norman Chu plays a kung fu cop on the trail of a bandit called "Rolex", who finds that the trail leads him to a village where the locals have unusual eating habits. I know that Tsui Hark's early movies are considered to be quite groundbreaking work, early contributors to the "new wave". I'm not really familiar enough with the wave before the new one to say what is especially groundbreaking about his second movie. Maybe the dark humour, or maybe the trademark lapses into slapstick that are here quite unwelcome intrusions. Probably it was mostly the camerawork that broke new ground, but with the horribly cropped VCD it's hard to really appreciate it. The movie is an ok piece of not-quite old-school, though it would have been a much better experience without some of the lame humour attempts. There's some decent humour in there too though, and a fair amount of very good action. Norman Chu is pretty good as officer 999, but Eddie Ko has more screen presence as the sinister village chief. The VCD is nearly unwatchable, sadly - at least if you need subtitles, since they're right at the bottom of the image, where they will be invisible on most tvs. Thanks to Malata's XY scaling I was able to shrink the image to the point where they're on screen, though that leaves them small and difficult to read. If you've got the facilities to do something like this then the VCD isn't a bad purchase, but I wouldn't stress too much about it if you don't get to see it. Reviewer Score: 7

Reviewed by: STSH Date: 07/03/2000 Summary: Gallows humour aplenty An early example of the now familiar wacky humour of Tsui Hark. Fast-paced, very silly, both grim and humourous, with tons of mugging and wild screams, and Norman Chu (playing a rare good guy role) and co putting in some great fu fighting. Annoyingly, none of the actor's names are listed in the credits, either beginning or ending. There is a large cast, and some well-known faces, but hard to ID them. Overall - rather offbeat, and not bad. Reviewer Score: 6