This oft-lambasted kungfu sci-fi film is an early directorial offering from modern-day action director Kirk Wong, who has garnered both critical and fan acclaim for his stylish, tense thrillers like Organized Crime and Triad Bureau before he came to the United states and did what all Hong Kong filmmakers did at the time, which was make a Jean Claude Van Damme film. Although cheap and a bit corny, this gem from his formative years is not nearly as bad as many people would have you believe. at least, not to me. And like John Woo's Heroes Shed No Tears or Shakespeare's Titus Andronicus, you can see all the creator's future signature styles in a very rudimentary, raw form.

In fact, I quite like this film, though I may be the only one in the world. Seems like everyone else hates it, or at least most people I've talked to. True, the kungfu isn't all that great (it's mostly kickboxing and arm-waving), and the production is cheaper than a desperate crack whore (did I just write that?), but I admire the film's ambition, if not its actual execution.

The plot is something special: in a dirty, dystopic future, a kungfu student named Killer (Wang Lung-wei in an ultra-rare non-villainous role) seeks revenge for the destruction of his school against a cut-throat gang of body-building neo-Nazi Chinese skinheads who sell drugs you take through vastly complex ventilation and gas mask systems, conduct strange genetic experiments, and commit performance art murders inside their decadent Studio 54 discotheque and video game arcade!!!

No, I swear! Really!

How can you not love a film as brazenly weird as that? Forget Skinheads: The Second Coming of Hate starring Chuck Conners. Forget Blade Runner. Actually, no -- don't forget Skinheads: The Second Coming of Hate, because it was awesome. But this film gives you best of both worlds. And to top it all off, you get freaky Tangerine Dreamish music, some sexy drugged-out future women whose avant-garde stage show is stripping while looking bored and killing fat people to the sounds of The Velvet Underground, lots of cars with tubes and stuff taped to them (because it's the future, where people live in apartments filled with televisions tuned to dead channels for no discernible reason), and a lot of other crazy future stuff. And lots of slightly below average martial arts.

What can we learn from these Blade Runner-inspired cautionary tales of the future? Well, the main thing we take away from them is that we will be hanging lots of wires and tubes and gratuitous air ducts in our cars and apartments. You know you are living in the future when you have big bundles or wire taped to your wall. Also, it helps if you have several small computer or television monitors tuned to dead channels or that weird blue screen that just has the white line going up it over and over. Leave them on all day, all night. Get some of those, scatter them around, and presto! Welcome to the future!

But the gestalt feel of this freakish little experiment is something I must admit I completely love. Today's art house film-makers and cyberpunk wannabes couldn't make a film this disjointed and fucked up if they tried. And at its heart is the basic kungfu plot of a student seeking revenge for the destruction of his school. There is a reason Wang Lung-wei usually played villains. He's really not that great a hero. I kept waiting for him to do something evil, and he never quite clicks as a good guy. Ko Hung as his teacher rules, though, but Ko Hung pretty much always rules. That guy is a definite underappreciated talent. And the ladies are not too bad, despite their Cyndi Lauper meets Devo wardrobe. They're supposed to be drugged-out, listless space cadets, and that's exactly what they seem like.

Amid all the mind-blowing silliness, you can actually see some moments of genuine talent and promise in Kirk Wong's direction, and recognize all the basic ingredients of a Kirk Wong film in extremely elementary and raw form. In a film that stars Ko Hung. Hmmm. And then you have Heroes Shed No Tears, an early action film by John Woo, in which you can see all his basic themes and stylistic tendencies in a very raw, undeveloped film. Who stars in that film as well? Ko Hung. And these two directors go on to become two of the biggest most influential men in action cinema. Coincidence? Or was Ko Hung the real power behind the Hong Kong New Wave?

On top of it all, be amazed at what the cast and crew pull off in a film that must have had a budget of $9.00. I love Flash Future Kungfu, and I'm not ashamed to admit it. It's utterly absurd, mind-bendingly bizarre fare!