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Chinese Vampire research

Page history last edited by Helena Zhang 14 years, 2 months ago
Jiang Shi, or Chinese Vampiresreanimated corpse that hop around, killing living creatures to absorb life essence from their victims.

When someone died away from home and their family was too poor to hire a wagon, they would pay Taoist priests for teaching the dead bodies to hop and bringing them back to their home town for proper burial. This was once popular in Xiangxi. 






Hopping Mad: A Brief Look at Chinese Vampire Movies

 

 

 Chinese Vampires

 

The Chinese Vampire, or Geung-Si

 

The Geung-Si (or Chiang-Shih, or Jiangshi) is hardly as suave as his Western counterpart.  Being a corpse, his rigor-mortis-stiffened limbs are rigid and he can only move by hopping (hence his other name, the “Hopping Vampire”).  Arms outstretched to grasp his victims, he more resembles an American zombie than your typical Euro-Dracula.  The comic effect of this movement, and the vampire’s inherent stupidity and occasional blindness, is exploited for humor in many Hong Kong vampire movies; but sometimes the filmmaker takes license, giving a vampire more agility and the requisite kung-fu skills for a fight scene. 

 

A corpse becomes a Geung-si by one of several causes:  a violent death, an improper burial, a need for revenge against the living, or simply a desire to create mischief (sometimes of a sexual nature).

 

Controlled by his inferior soul, or p’ai, he hops the Earth at night causing trouble.  He is invariably dressed in the traditional Manchu robes and black hat of the Qing dynasty (even in present-day-set films like Mr Vampire 2).   He does not suck the blood of his victims, although he often sports fangs.  Instead, he sucks their Yang energy, or kills them by stabbing them with his long fingernails, or simply rips their limbs off. 

 

Anthony Chan and Wu Ma in 'Mr Vampire 4'

Stopping a Chinese Vampire

In Chinese vampire films, a Taoist priest skilled in magic is the one to turn to when a geung-si is on the loose.  He is usually accompanied by one or two bumbling apprentices (a precedent, like many others of the genre, set in 1985’s Mr Vampire).  To immobilize a geung-si, the priest slaps a magic talisman, in the form of a rectangular piece of paper, onto its forehead.  Unfortunately, the  apprentices usually free the vampire through foolish games or incompetence.

 

 

Lam Ching-Ying

Lam Ching-Ying

When Lam Ching-ying died of liver canver in November 1997, Hong Kong vampire cinema would never be the same.  The star of the original Mr Vampire, he went on to play similar roles in over a dozen vampire movies.  

 

Born in Shanghai in 1952, Lam attended Peking Opera school in Hong Kong, after which he began work as a stuntman in Shaw Brothers kung-fu movies.  He then became an action director (he was assistant action director on Bruce Lee’s The Big Boss).  He had a few acting roles, but did not find his niche until 1985 when Mr Vampire was released.  From then on, he was known to fans as the wise, yellow-robed, unibrowed, vampire-wrangling Taoist priest.  

 

 

 

Links of Interest

For an excellent guide to the rules of Chinese vampire cinema:

http://www.greencine.com/static/primers/asianhorror1.jsp

 

A Lam Ching-Ying page:

http://www.angelfire.com/movies/lcy/

 

To purchase Chinese vampire DVD’s:

http://us.yesasia.com/en/Browse/ListAll.aspx/section-videos/code-c/version-all/did-10092/

 

Final Note

To prevent Chinese vampires from entering your home, feng shui experts recommend installing a barrier at your doorstep.  Many Taoist temples in China have these. Six inches is an acceptable height: they can’t hop any higher than that. 

 

 

 

Movie Reviews:

 

Vampire Controller (2001)

 

Vampire Controller (2001)

Directed by Tony Leung Hung-Wah (not to be confused with actors Tony Leung Chiu-Wai or Tony Leung Ka-Fai).

 

Southern Mao (Wayne Lai) and his sidekick John (Gallen Law) are professional corpse escorts who earn their living transporting vampires out of Guangdong.  An easy job: throw some sacks over the corpses’ heads, cast the necessary Taoist spells, line them up, and lead them in a swiftly hopping procession to their final resting places.  Unless, of course, one escapes.

 

Rival corpse wranglers Northern Ma (King-Tan Yuen) and her apprentice Tien (Kathy Chau) handle the female undead.  Corpses have to be segregated by gender – as Ms. Ma explains, there’s still blood in them, therefore the males can achieve an erection.  And what do these corpses really want to do?  Get laid.

 

Such is the case with recently deceased lovers Wong (interestingly played by gwailo extraordinaire Jude Poyer) and his hooker girlfriend Jenny.  Upon escaping, they immediately hook up and he knocks her up with an evil little ghost baby. 

 

Further complications arise as a “black magician” and a Japanese spy attempt to steal Wong’s corpse, and Mao’s unlucky cousin gets infected with corpse poison and is fed to a pack of hungry ghosts.

 

This 2001 throwback to 1980s vampire flicks has all the requisites of the genre: horror, comedy, romance and kung fu.  Unfortunately it falls a bit short on all counts, but is still worth a look.  It’s good to know they’re still making these movies. 

 

Quotes:

 

“Check the jade is still in their mouths.  Make sure it is or they’ll run around.”

“I’ve been scratched by a vampire.  Your master told me to put glutinous rice on it.”

 

 

 

Mr Vampire 4 (1990)

 

Mr Vampire 4 (1990)

Directed by Ricky Lau Koon-Wai

A “Mr Vampire” movie without Lam Ching-Ying?  Ricky Lau shows it’s possible in the fouth and final (official) film of the series.

 

Instead of Lam, the requisite Taoist priest is played by Anthony Chan.  But that’s not the only way this installment differs from its three predecessors: the vampire doesn’t show up until the second half of the film.  (There’s a good vampire-escorting scene at the very beginning, with a sexy huli jing, or fox-spirit, thrown in for good measure.) 

 

The first 45 minutes are devoted to the Taoist priest’s sitcom-esque feud with his neighbor, a Buddhist monk (Wu Ma).  Their disputes, which are not particularly theological in nature, escalate despite the efforts of their respective apprentices (Chin Kar-Lok and Rachel Lee).

 

Instead of living austere lives of meditation and studying the works of Lao Tzu and the Buddha, the two holy men spend their days having childish fights and plotting idiotic revenge schemes.  They arm-wrestle over tea, hurl preserved tofu over breakfast, and cast spells on each other.

 

But one day, an official procession passes by their homes.  Among the travelers are the Taoist’s brother (Chung Fat), also skilled in magic; a young Manchu royal and his retainer, a flamboyant homosexual (Yuen Wah); and a giant gold coffin containing an angry geung-si, who of course escapes.  Some guards are transformed into vampires, the vampires multiply, and soon enough there is complete geung-si chaos.  The survivors, including the Taoist and Buddhist, must unite to defeat the undead – including Yuen Wah’s mincing gay vampire. 

 

Quotes:

“Don’t touch my corpse, or I’ll make you a moron!”

 “Hm. Why is master giving these sticks to the vampires?”

 “Glutinous rice won’t work now.”

“That sissy man’s made my mouth stink.”

 

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