Lethal Lady (1990)
"Huang jia nu jiang" (original title)

SHE SHOOTS STRAIGHT (1990) was directed by Corey Yuen and produced by Sammo Hung and turns out to be a fascinating and entertaining movie along the lines of the IN THE LINE OF DUTY series from the 1980s (one of which was also directed by Yuen), with its hyper policewomen-in-action scenes. The difference is the greater attention paid here to family drama.

The only son (Tony Leung Ka Fai) in a family of police officers marries Mina, an ambitious `half-breed' colleague (played by Joyce Godenzi), incurring the resentment of his four sisters, all policewomen, especially the eldest, Ling (Carina Lau). There is pressure on Tony to father a son, to keep the male line going, although Mina wants to delay pregnancy until she gets promoted to Superintendent. The family dynamics make the non-action scenes more interesting than usual for this type of film and add an emotional layer missing from the more action-oriented entries in this genre.

The crime-fighting plot centers around a Vietnamese criminal gang (led by the always formidable Yuen Wah) which robs a nightclub where the five policewomen are working undercover as hostesses, initiating the film's most spectacular action setpiece. The rest of the film details the various conflicts with the gang culminating in a big shipboard/shipyard battle and one-on-one hitting/kicking fight between Mina and a muscular female gang member (Agnes Aurelio). When they get their undercover assignment at the nightclub, one of the sisters, Ling, gets up at a department meeting and wonders just how far the girls are expected to go with the customers, a question I don't recall being asked in such American counterparts as the old `Police Woman' TV series or the `T.J. Hooker' episodes where Stacy went undercover as a hooker, stripper, club dancer, or anything else they dreamed up to put Heather Locklear in a bikini or miniskirt. (Not that anyone wanted Stacy to ask that question, which would have defeated the whole purpose.)

The film has far less kung fu than the LINE OF DUTY films, with its action scenes more steeped in the stunt leap/breaking glass/gunplay mode. One of several clever action sequences involves a series of Vietcong-style jungle traps laid in a public park for Mina, Tony and Ling. Lead actress Joyce Godenzi is, however, not the fighter that Michelle Yeoh, Cynthia Rothrock and Cynthia Khan were in the LINE OF DUTY films, although Joyce is a far better actress than the two Cynthias and is quite watchable throughout. I've previously seen her only in the great EASTERN CONDORS and the mediocre THE RAID.

In fact, all the women in SHE SHOOTS STRAIGHT are good actresses, most notably Carina Lau and Sandra Ng, and a couple I don't recognize. The women here are all a bit harder, beefier, and tougher than the usual Hong Kong starlet type. They run the show in this film and even Sammo Hung takes a supporting role, staying out of the fighting for the most part. The final action scenes here are something of a disappointment, because only two of the main women participate. But overall, I highly recommend this disc.