If you are reading this review, then like me, you have potentially watched far too many movies for your own health or you've just been intrigued by the title! Over the years, I've sat through a lot of exploitation cinema and as a consequence, have developed a relatively strong constitution to the levels of insanity that some descend into, given that Hong Kong cinema had a reputation for producing moments that we in the West would be surprised by, before the advent of Category III. It should come as no shock to learn that given the extra yard, some filmmakers took the whole mile.
Sau Ling works in a small factory that makes leather shoes. There she looks after the manager Lee, his son Tien (who she secretly loves) and a few co-workers. Lee has a gambling addiction and one evening, Sau Ling tries to stop him taking the companies cash, only for an unknown assailant to attack him from behind and kill him. Shocked by the event, Sau Ling is left shocked by the events and unable to tell the police captain (Dick Wei) what had occurred. Tien, whilst searching for his father, brings back a new girlfriend Man Li (Suen Tong) who takes an instant dislike to Sau Ling. Events escalate further with the involvement of Kuen (Shing Fui-on), a wheelchair bound gangster and a fellow worker Wong, who also has feelings for Sau Ling. Murder, blackmail and the real reason for the shoe's uniqueness occur as the body count rises.
I am actually doing “Horrible High Heels” a disservice with this synopsis as am giving the impression that it's a fairly straightforward narrative. For about 25 minutes, that is indeed the case. Then it proceeds to completely fall apart in every conceivable way. Traditionally, Hong Kong cinema doesn't follow the standard structure that we expect from Hollywood pictures. It will move from reel to reel, which is why tonally, they can veer from one genre to the next without drawing a breath. Here though, we don't even get the remotest sense of cohesion, with the plot giving the impression it was made up on the go. Three credited directors are never a good sign and you do have to wonder if either of them knew what the others were doing, such is the incoherence of the whole piece. We get a flashback that has no actual meaning. A potential chief villain in Kuen who disappears halfway through the movie and all we learn is that he is a bit obsessed with shoes. The Police are completely incompetent and appear to have the world's smallest police station to work from. Yukari Oshima lookalike Lin Hsiao-Lao appears for about a minute only to disappear until the end fight. Tien goes from moping son (apart from having drunken sex with Mai Li) to gun totting avenger when the final reel inexplicably decides to turn into heroic bloodshed. He even develops the ability to sense people behind him as he guns them down. In fairness, this did lead to the best line of the film, where one of the villain's yells “Explode Him” as he lobs a grenade.
So far so exploitation. Yet this is not a pleasant movie by any stretch of the imagination. We get not one but two rape sequences and this is where I feel the line was crossed in the wrong way. Rape scenes in my opinion are always troubling. There is a very thin line between showing the act and gratuitous exploitation. Here, we get the sequences framed almost like love scenes with the camera objectifying the naked bodies of the women. These scenes aren't short either and go on for several minutes. In the second one, we even get flashbacks to the first because clearly it was not enough. It is a disturbing series of events that does not portray anyone in a good light. You do wonder in this day and age who the target audience was and sadly it is a massive weakness in Hong Kong cinematic culture that these scenes keep occurring in category III films. You could argue that the distress of the situation is shown, but really that is no defense as consistently there are references to rape even in comedies. It's a sad indictment of how parts of society in that area see women.
The horror element by proxy does not go as far. It's bloody and we get severed limbs thrown across the screen but after the unedifying sexual aspects, it's just the standard horror effects. If you've seen “Human Lanterns” then I do not need to explain where the leather for the shoes comes from. The killer wears a mask that spectacularly fails to hide his identity which only completes the ineptness of its construction.
Just when you think you have got through the excesses though, we still have the blackmail sub-plot which leads to you guessed it…. another attempted rape sequence. Seriously, by this point I was starting to wonder just what the creators of this movie were up to. Every main male character bar Tien is obsessed with sex and not in a good way. I am watching this expecting some Grand Guignol bloodbath and instead I get something that makes “I spit on your Grave” feel like a Disney musical. Only in this case, the female cast are not those that get revenge, it has to be the male protagonist that achieves this. Another element of dubious sexual representation.
The actors by and large look disinterested, probably not surprising given the direness of the dialogue and the likelihood no-one knew what was going on during its creation. With Dick Wei, Billy Chow and Lin Hsiao-lao in the cast, I though maybe some decent action might be on display. I think by now you know the answer to that! Normally when I review something, I try to find the positive, try to see what the intended product was supposed to be. Sadly, I cannot do this here. “Horrible High Heels” is a prime example of the worst excesses in Category III filmmaking. Incoherent plotting, poor direction, lousy acting and deeply disturbing sexual politics. Offensive in all the wrong ways, it is just an atrocious piece of cinematic garbage.
