The1985 Hong Kong horror comedy that unleashed the jiangshi hordes...
Once more we dive into the rich world of Chinese monster movies -- and it's the highly influential horror comedy Mr. Vampire! This was a really fun episode to put together, because it gave us an excuse to finally watch a jiangshi movie and discuss this uncanny variety of hopping vampire as well.
As I mention in the podcast, the jiangshi actually pop up in the latest DND book Van Richten's Guide to Ravenloft, so if you need a good grounding in these monsters, Mr. Vampire is the movie for you -- plus hopefully we provide some fascinating historical background on them as well.
Let's go ahead and watch the original Cantonese trailer and have the episode:
I don't have much to share in terms of related media, but I'll go ahead and recommend Pu Song Ling's Strange Tales From a Chinese Studio for its wonderful array of weird tales. The Penguin Classics edition is a fine collection with insightful background and notes. And you can read The Afterlife of Corpses: A Social History of Unburied Dead Bodies in Qing China (1644-1911) right here.
What's next on Weirdhouse Cinema? Well, we haven't finalized our selection but there's a kaiju movie we're talking abotu as well as a shark movie. We'll see how it shakes out.
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