Lang nu (1974) [possibly 1976]

... aka: 狼女

... aka: 野女狼

... aka: สาวหมาป่า

... aka: Wanita Serigala
... aka: Wild Female Wolf
... aka: Wolf Girl, The

... aka: Ye nu lang

Directed by:
"Chen Tung Man" (Tung Man Chan)
"Chin Weng" (Kuang Hui)

A year after many were slaughtered by a group of counter revolutionaries, the survivors, who’ve fled to a small village, have been stewing and plotting their revenge ever since. Displaced Lord Hang Pao (probably played by second-billed “Chin Weng” aka co-director Kuang Hiu) is especially pissed since his father was murdered so he goes to visit a black magic-practicing wizard living in a cave to see what his revenge options are. The magician suggests he make a “ghost child.” which will grant any wish he desires. The catch is that the only way to do so is for him to sacrifice the life of his own child while it's still in the mother's womb and he must first get his wife's (“Ai Lan Yeh” / Aranya Namwong) consent before doing so. Overhearing their plans, the wife is not having any of that and flees into the woods. She ends up being taken in by a lonely old widow named Shih (Chosri Misommon) and gives birth to twin girls at her home. The widow offers her home and help to the young mother, but instead she takes one of her babies and runs off into the night. That turns out to be a dumb move as she accidentally falls over a cliff and kills herself. The baby she left with, however, isn't harmed at all by the fall. Thankfully, a pack of wolves (which are played by normal dogs) stumble upon her and, instead of chowing down on the newborn delicacy, decide to raise the baby as their own.

As the one baby girl left in the widow's care (named Aloonee and also played by Namwong) grows into a beautiful young woman, the other girl turns into a dirty, wild woman (Namwong once again) adept at killing small animals with her bare hands and such. Hang Pao and the magician have spent most of that time attempting to get a proper male fetus to create their “ghost child.” That requires Hang Pao to spread his seed to any lady who'll have him and the magician later ambushing the ladies and slicing them open with his “Holy Sword.” Much to their dismay, every single baby has been a girl. Hang Pao decides to marry the bitter, evil and possibly infertile Adi (Lam Dai aka Lin Di aka Metta Rungrat, who's great) to carry on a façade of normalcy and then knocks up a succession of young servant girls, takes them on a walk through the woods and then has the magician do his thing. But still, no male child... and it's been 20 long years since they first started.

Aloonee has an admirer in hard-working carpenter Anan (“Song Pa” / Sombat Methanee), but when Hang Pao lays eyes on her and notices she is a dead ringer for his long-dead wife, he instantly becomes smitten and begins trying to woo her with gifts. Little does he know but it's his own daughter that he's trying to persuade to marry him. Jealous over all that, Hang Pao's wife tries to get revenge by attempting to get pregnant with Anan's child. In an outrageous and hilarious scene, she has four of her young, giggling servant girls push Anan on the bed, tie him up and pull down his pants, then she climbs on top of him and starts raping him! That's followed by a scene of her attempting to coerce her husband to impregnate her “country cousin” who shows up there filthy and stinking (“We only bath twice in a year... I supposed a little water wouldn't hurt me.”) The wife gives her a good “rub down” in the tub but she's so ugly that Hang Pao has a hard time “making it” with her, but eventually does... with the lights out.

The Lord's wife stages a scene to make Anan look like he's cheating on Aloonee, prompting her to take a bunch of sleeping pills. The wife then drugs and has her way with Anan a second time, but cries rape herself when he tries to force her to come clean about what she's been up to. While this amazing little warped soap opera is going down, the Wolf Girl twin and her pack are terrorizing the village, raiding chicken coops, destroying property, eating livestock, trampling gardens, killing people and such. Wolf Girl surprises a couple having sex in a barn and then claws the guy to death with her extra-long blue (!) fingernails. She then slashes the throat of one of the Lord's goons when he attempts to bury Anan alive, takes our hero back to a barn, offers him raw meat, starts licking his face and then then two have doggy-style sex in the hay. All the while, Anan thinks it's Aloonee and she's lost her mind because of all the pills she took.

Meanwhile, the “country cousin” who's been having sex with the Lord discovers she's pregnant and pukes all over the floor. Her Master takes her to the “doctor,” which is actually the cave where the now old and gray magician lives. The two slice open her stomach, discover the baby is male (finally!) and then start the ritual to conjure up the “ghost child” using the cut-out fetus, smoke, a smoldering cow head and chanting. When all that's over, Hang Pao becomes the “Master of the Ghost Child” and is given a special necklace which enables him to summon the ghost at any time he pleases. The little boy ghost / fairy is then sent out to kill the unfaithful wife, who's also having sex with her husband's #1 thug (Choomporn Theppitak) but complications arise when Hang Pao discovers the identities of both Aloonee and the Wolf Girl.

This is a really hard one to rate. On one hand, it's ridiculous, dumb and cheap. On the other hand, it's hilarious, outrageous, weird and never boring. This really isn't SBIG material as it seems somewhat campy from inception. However, the camp is multiplied by about 100 thanks to an often hysterically funny re-dub. This doesn't exactly go the What's Up, Tiger Lilly? route by turning the entire thing into a comedy, but the people who recorded the English dub certainly had a great time poking fun at the absurdity of it all. At one point, the slutty wife character tries to comfort the husband by telling him, “You can't blame yourself, honey bun... You got her pregnant but then she happened to be eaten by wolves.” At a pub, Anan gets drunk and sings a hilarious song that goes “The wolves are terrifying the humans, the humans. It's terrible. It's terrible. Pretty girls are falling in love with the bastard. It's terrible. It's terrible. It's terrible. Young girls they are all marrying the old man. It's like throwing pearls before swine. Why do the young girls do it? They do it for the money. Open the box. Open the box. Take the money. Ahhhh!” It's almost as good as the SHADOWS OF BLOOD theme song.

Extremely rare nowadays, the only American home video release this received was through the Hong Kong-based Ocean Shores and their print has a 1981 copyright date on it. In other words, this has been out of proper circulation for over thirty years now. The Ocean Shores print is dark and murky to the point where it's nearly impossible to make out what's happening in the night scenes. Subtitles strangely appear at the very end despite the rest of the film not having them. The entire soundtrack was stolen from other films, including nearly all of Krzysztof Komeda's famous score from ROSEMARY'S BABY (1968) right down to Mia Farrow singing “Lullaby.” IMDb and the Hong Kong Movie Database say it was released in 1974 but the Thai World View database claims 1976. The latter also says the original Thai version no longer exists and this is only available in Mandarin. Guess they don't know about the rare English release.

Lead actor Methanee, who was best known in his home country for his action films (and gets several fight scenes here to show off), is almost completely unknown to American audiences, but he once held the Guinness Book of World Records record for most film appearances... over 600! Methanee himself claims to have appeared in over 2,000 productions if you include television appearances. He and Namwong also appeared together in KRAI THONG (1980).

★★1/2