Color, 1982, 100 mins. 45 secs. / 98 mins. 17 secs. / 99 mins. 2 secs. / 98 mins. 39 secs.
Directed by Sun Chung
Starring Tony Liu, Kuan-Tai Chen, Lo Lieh, Ni Tien, Linda Chu, Hsiu-Chun Lin, Meng Lo, Chien Sun, Fei Ai, Susan Shaw
Vinegar Syndrome (UHD & Blu-ray) (US R0/RA 4K/HD), 88 Films (Blu-ray) (UK RB HD), WVG (Blu-ray & DVD) (Germany RB/R2 HD/PAL), Image Entertainment (DVD (US R1 NTSC), Siren (DVD) (Australia R0 PAL), DFW (DVD) (Holland R2 PAL), Intercontinental (DVD) (Hong Kong R3 NTSC) / WS (2.35:1) (16:9)
One of the 
most notorious films from Shaw Brothers' genre-bending experiments in the 1980s, Human Lanterns also takes the top spot 
as the wildest film from in-house director Sun Chung, also known for more traditional fare like The Deadly Breaking Sword and The Avenging Eagle. Mixing wuxia action, dark melodrama, and extreme flesh-tearing horror, the film has often been categorized as one of the closest things to a slasher movie in the Shaw canon given what was happening around the world cinematically speaking. With its giallo-worthy lighting, twisty plot, and opulent sets, it's still an experience like nothing else out there.
A tense small town rivalry is brewing between the richest local man, Lung (Liu), and ambitious martial arts master Tan Fu (Chen), with the latter causing a public provocation by claiming Lung's favorite rent girl, Yen (Chu). The biggest upcoming local event, a flamboyant lantern festival, proves to be the vehicle Lung chooses to show up his foe by hiring the most gifted (albeit eccentric) lantern maker, Chao (Lieh), to create the winning entry. Soon someone hopping around like a monkey in a skull mask and wild hair is slicing up people to turn their skin into lanterns, which entangles both law enforcement and a newly-arrived hit man (Lo) which results in plenty of swordplay and a rising body count.
Though a small handful of Shaw Brothers horror films managed to score reasonably good international exposure (especially Black Magic and 
its sequel), the more extreme ones like this existed primarily as tantalizing references in movie guides since 
they were never dubbed into English or got VHS releases back in the day. When the SB floodgates finally opened in the early '00s with a slew of DVD and VCD releases, this was one of the most anticipated titles given the flamboyant write-ups it had been getting for decades-- and the film itself did not disappoint. The opulent costumes and sets are up there with any of the studio's golden age epics, but the moody, stylized lighting gives it a very different, more sinister atmosphere throughout. Of course, the main claim to fame comes at the 20-minute mark with the first of two bloody, unflinching murder scenes with the cackling maniac's skin-flaying methods shown in horrific detail. The combination of nudity and grisly effects work even made this one a tough proposition back home, with numerous different edits created for various territories-- but more on that below. Anyone expecting a straight-up horror film will have their work cut out for them here as the film alternates between those savage skinning scenes, combat sequences, and extensive dramatic intrigue that can make you forget you're watching a genre film at times. The payoff here is highly satisfying as well, including a nightmarish rooftop showdown and a lengthy, fiery climax that would have made Roger Corman proud. The actual killer's identity isn't much of a shock and gets revealed pretty early on, too, so no patting yourself on the back if you figure it out right away.
The first home video options out of the gate came from Intercontinental in Hong Kong, who issued DVD and VCD options as part of its mammoth, still unsurpassed wave of Shaw Brothers catalog titles spanning every possible genre. As was their practice at the time, the film was mastered in PAL but presented in NTSC with some iffy conversion issues; it was also visibly trimmed of gore with some obvious audio skips. As it would turn out, this was the first of five distinct edits that would come out on video at various points. The film made its North American home video debut on DVD in 2007 from Image Entertainment as part of its 
SB line, taken from a different 98m39s master supplied by Celestial with the first murder scene featuring an 
alternate edit adding some skinning and bloody footage but also missing some brief bits on the Hong Kong release. Unfortunately the licensor adamantly refused to allow a composite edit to be made, so the prior version of that scene could only be included as an extra. The Mandarin-language master was interlaced and looked okay for the time, with optional English or Spanish subtitles. The main extra here is "Shaw's Baby Doll" (14m1s), or "Hong Kong Doll" according to the on-screen title, a 2005 interview from Frédéric Ambroisine with Susan Shaw a.k.a. Shawn Yin Yin, about her acting career, a detour to Golden Harvest, and the pluses of doing nudity for the studio. Also included were a 56s production photo gallery, the trailer, and bonus trailers for titles like Black Magic, The Magic Blade, The Super Inframan, The Water Margin, Heaven and Hell, Legendary Weapons of China, The Shadow Whip, The Bells of Death, and more.
In 2022, 88 Films debuted the film on Blu-ray in the U.K. with Celestial obviously loosening up in the interim as this featured a composite of the first murder sequence with all the extant footage from the earlier releases. Presented in DTS-HD MA 2.0 Mandarin mono with improved English subtitles, the transfer looked fine and came with a new audio commentary by Kenneth Brorsson and Phil Gillon of the Podcast On Fire Network who do a fine job of tackling the main personnel, the state of the studio in the early '80s, the director's overall output, and the evolution of both the wuxia and Hong Kong horror. The Susan Shaw interview is ported over here, this time called "A Shaw Story," plus two additional interviews from Arnaud Lanuque. In "The Beauty and the Beasts" (14m39s), Linda Chu chats about martial arts choreography, the process of working under a studio contract, the tricks of using your fists on camera, the sometimes confusing rush of genre trends, the guidance from Sun Ching, and the use of a body double for her sole "nude" scene. Then "The Ambiguous Hero" (51m11s) with Lau Wing, a.k.a. Tony Liu, has really rough audio but is worth a look as he talks about starting at Golden Harvest opposite Bruce Lee, his approach to doing martial arts, the influence Sun Chung had in the industry, and a funny story about 
Chang Cheh. The trailer is also included.
A very surprising twist came along in 2026 when Vinegar Syndrome added this to its roster of Shaw Brothers releases as a UHD and Blu-ray set with a fresh 4K 
restoration from the original camera negative. However, they also uncovered an alternate Mandarin-language version featuring just under two minutes of additional footage including more gore, skinning, and screaming, as well as other extended bits including more comical skinny-dipping nudity. You can play the film in its 100-minute Cantonese version with those extra bits added in, and they've done a nice job of matching the quality as closely as possible; you can still spot the Mandarin footage easily since it featured burned-in subtitles. That version comes with the Brorsson-Gillon commentary as well as a new Samm Deighan commentary, and as always she makes for fine listening company talking about the stars, '80s Hong Kong horror, the gradual move to Category III cinema, the function of fighting and horror here, lantern festivals, and other relevant genre films.
There's also an option (on both the UHD and Blu-ray) to watch the Mandarin cut of the film (98m17s), which drops the entire melancholy epilogue sequence and instead extends the climax by quite a bit to apparently just kill off a major character instead. Both versions come with newly-translated English subtitles for their respective DTS-HD MA 2.0 mono audio tracks. Image quality is excellent, comparable in framing to the 88 Films one (the Image DVD was zoomed in a bit) but with much more robust colors (especially reds and blacks) and detail.
The trailer and Susan Shaw, Linda Chu, and Lau Wing interviews are all carried over here, the latter two now called "A Fairy in Hell" and "The End Justifies the Means" in streamlined cuts now running 14m52s and 24m25s. In the new visual essay "A Skinning Team: Peeling Back the Layers of Action" (10m6s), Kenji McGuire surveys the history of martial arts horror, the integration of high-flying wuxia, the previous year's Revenge of the Corpse from the same director, and the background behind the fight choreography. The limited edition (which features some outrageously extreme packaging) comes with a 40-page book featuring worthwhile essays by Hsieh Chia-chin ("Human Lanterns: When Wuxia Meets Horror, Face Becomes Fatal"), Keith Allison ("From Kungfu Comedy to Cruelty: Human Lanterns as the Anti-Encounter of the Spooky Kind"), and Erica Shultz ("The Skin You Live In: Class and Identity in Human Lanterns and Horror Cinema").
Vinegar Syndrome (UHD)
88 Films (Blu-ray)
Image Entertainment (DVD)
Reviewed on July 3, 2026
