By Russ Houghton

'Project A' and 'Ninja in the Dragons Den' on the big screen. Both films are pure class, and the thought of seeing them in a theatre, bold and bright on a full size cinema screen, is an exciting prospect. In London, this is not a likely event, and previously, the sight of Baby Jesus juggling poop on a unicycle is more common than a chance to see any Kung Fu in the cinema in the UK. Not any more, though, because any circus trained deities will have to learn some new tricks now that Hong Kong Legends have brought 'Fight Night' to London.

So far, Hong Kong Legends DVDs have been impressing fans of HK cinema, and making the rest of the world jealous that their televisions can't handle PAL signals. The thought of them handling attempts to put uncut, original language movies into the cinema is a comforting thought, as the company already has a good reputation, and have the cash behind them to do something like this properly. As a try-out for the real thing, which they hope to run regularly, this evening was free to those who had entered the competition on the HKL website, and I had a couple of tickets.

The Prince Charles cinema off Leicester square in the heart of London was the venue, and just before eight in the evening, 'my photographer' Jay Husbands and I filed into the cinema reception. There were people milling around in the bar, and in the name of journalism, we decided to grab a bottle of the cold stuff. For this first event, we discovered it was free. Cheers, HKL!

There was definitely a bit of a buzz around the place. There was a stall selling cheap HKL T-shirts, DVDs, and very stylish, if a little pricey, HKL rugby shirts. The staff, both of HKL and the cinema were also very welcoming, and many seemed to have decent knowledge of HK cinema. There were a few faces around too, including Rick Baker of Eastern Heroes, and John Richards of 'Wasted Life' (. Also there were 'Zed' and Darren, a pair of old-school collectors who I have met before, and believe me, if there is something about old-school kung fu that they don't know, then it isn't worth knowing.

Jay and I worked our way into the auditorium, to find a good turn-out. I would say that 75% of the seats were occupied, and after some bumbling, we found our clan and sat down. Five minutes later, we were given a brief introduction to the films, and the lights dimmed. The biggest Golden Harvest logo I have ever seen appeared in front of me, and I nearly wet myself.

On a large cinema screen, Project A feels like a whole new experience. An initially reserved UK crowd started to loosen up, and watching Jackie, Sammo and Biao strut their stuff on such a large, noisy scale, with cheers and whistles from an enthusiastic crowd made me re-think everything I usually whinge about in terms of hearing the film. One thing I hadn't realised until I sat down was how many people had been given whistles. I was not aware of this, but apparently in the states it is part of the Kung Fu experience to blow your whistles when the on-screen action kicks off. For Project A, which I had never noticed had so many whistles in it, this was a stroke of genius. Every time a character in the film blew a whistle, the crowd replied with their own. This was especially fun in the bar brawl near the start of the film, during the 'pee-pee' song. Brilliant stuff.

The film played out in what felt like minutes, so I must have had fun. During the interval, I spoke to Richard Larcombe, who is a 'film and video publicity specialist'. In other words, he had put this show together. I asked him if he was pleased with the result, and he confirmed that it was going well, but they had only had three weeks to organise the whole thing. If HKL can do this in three weeks, I look forward to seeing what they can achieve in the long run.

The second film, 'Ninja in the Dragons Den' is a real cult favourite. It is only officially available on DVD from HKL, and has never been seen on any cinema in the UK. While a good film, it could not possibly compete with the mighty Project A, so while the crowd was considerably smaller, the theatre comprised of a more 'hardcore' crowd. There were some minor sound problems, but it wasn't too intrusive. This time around, the audience simply sat back to enjoy Conan Lee and Hiroyuki Sanada doing their thing. Then Hwang Jang Lee appeared near the end, and the audience went wild!

As we left, there was a camera crew filming interviews for a Fight Night feature for future DVD releases, and your's truly found himself jabbering manically (and nervously) in front of the camera. If they use any of that footage, I'm never going to stop bragging.

The evening was great fun, and something that is really needed in the UK. Internet journalists such as myself may be tempted to point out the smallest of flaws (such as low turn-out for 'Ninja'), but trust me, it was still a fabulous night out. Let's hope that the big-wigs at HKL see fit to put money into doing this again, because it started well, and it can only get better. Lets see some Kung Fu in the UK.

Thanks to Jay Husbands (a.k.a. Akuma) the Master of Diagonal Photography.