Ngai Choi Lam

"Lik Wong" (Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky) is a totally insane Hong Kong Category III martial arts fantasy gore-fest. Written and directed by Lam Nai-choi (from the Japanese manga "Riki-Oh" by Masahiko Takajo and Saruwatari Tetsuya), the film sees Riki-Oh (Siu-Wong Fan) being dragged off to a privatised prison after taking revenge on the thugs that killed his girlfriend. Riki-oh is an adept at a mystical Kung fun style known as Qigong and despite wanting a quiet prison life is soon drawn into various battles between the prisoners, the bosses of the four prison wings, the corrupt prison officials led by Warden Sugiyama (Ka-Kui Ho) and Assistant Warden (Mei Sheng Fan).
The plot line of "Lik Wong" is typically cliched prison movie fare which would be instantly forgettable if it wasn't for the brutally extreme, hyper-violent and fantastical blood-drenched delivery masterminded by director Lam Nai-choi. That delivery is hugely unrealistic and eye-poppingly gory - heads are crushed; bodies are chewed-up; stomachs are sliced open; faces and limbs are literally punched clean off. At one stage an opponent even tries to strangle Riki-Oh with his own intensities and in another scene Riki-Oh repairs the tendons in his own arm - with his teeth! Added to all this blood-soaked lunacy is comedy dialogue which is made even funnier by its (I presume deliberately) poor English dubbing. There is no character development; the prison seems to exist in its own hermetic world; the sets are poor; the acting is appallingly poor and the special effects are amateurish. All these would normally be hugely negative points for any film, but for "Lik Wong" they are neither here-nor-there disappearing, as they do, beneath a storm of outrageously stylised violence and an astonishing flood of blood and gore.… (meer)