[KFCC] Story of Ricky Review

Story: In the not too distant future the corporations will control prisons where they use the inmates as cheap labor. Ricky is sentenced to a maximum-security prison after he killed a triad boss who was responsible for the death for his girl friend. Ricky soon finds out the terrible nature of these corporate prisons, prisoners are kept in line with various terror tactics and gangs control certain aspects of prison life. It is not long before Ricky gets in trouble for standing up for the innocent both gang leaders and prison staff will try to break Ricky.

Review: Story of Ricky Oh is definitely one unique movie, we have never seen anything of its type from Hong Kong. If you are familiar with cult movies then you might have heard of it or already seen this movie. This movie is mostly based on a 1988 Manga called Rikki-Oh ("Power King") by Masahiko Takajo (story) and Tetsuya Saruwatari (art). You can say that this movie has sort of a cult status but you usually have that with any non-standard movie that people keep on discovering over the years. Ricky Oh is kinda like old low budget sci-fi movies from the early 70's, but what really makes this movie stick out is something we call Gore Kung Fu. The story in this movie is pretty much cheesy and the context for the various events are hilarious in an unbelievable way, but it's all good, it's a part of the Ricky experience.

The characters are just as cheesy as the story, not much is really taken seriously in this movie. The only character who has any background is Ricky, his story is told through a series of flashback during his imprisonment. The rest of the characters are pretty devoid of background or development. The characters are in a sense highly stereotyped as if they were taken directly from the comic book (manga origins). So don't expect any serious or incredible characters, it's a cheesy bunch with lame acting but then again that's another point to the Ricky experience.

This is where Story of Ricky Oh shines, entertainment! Its trademark is the nonsensical ultra gorish violence and kung fu. We are serious this movie is filled with needless gore, for example of what to expect: Ricky punching this fat guy in the gut and his fist goes right through the stomach and gore is spilling out. We won't say anymore as not to ruin any of the scenes but you have some pretty crazy scenes where people get dismembered is various creative fashions. For the members of the audience that are not too keen about gore, don't worry these are the cheesy type of special effects, you won't have the brutal realism of photosofmurdervictims.com. The general thing to say about the action is basically hilarious cheesy fun; the movie is plain and simply entertaining.

The subtitles were very good on the DVD version and the text is very basic and simple to follow. So Ricky is a cheesy weird gore filed action movie, what makes it so good? Ricky is not a masterpiece or a brilliant production it is just a simple movie that tries to do only one thing and that is to entertain its audience. Of course with the content matter, the target audience will be quite reduced but those that would watch this movie will find it purely entertaining for the complete un-serious gore fest. Hype can only damage this movie, if you heard about this movie before and expect big things don't, it's just a cheesy B movie cult classic. We had a friend over to see another movie but after the movie we decided to fast forward through Ricky and show him the action scenes, not knowing the movie he was simply in awe at the senseless gore in the fight scenes. If you like senseless violence and you are not turned off by gore then check out Story of Ricky Oh, it's a wild ride and worth checking out.