Comparison between the cut British BBFC 18 DVD by Eastern Heroes and the uncut German DVD by Schröder Media

- 6 cuts
- Runtime of cuts : 43,6 sec

 

Background to HELL'Z WINDSTAFF

In 1979, Hell'z Windstaff was probably one of the best of the many humorous brawlers shot in Hong Kong during this period. Obviously, in the wake of successes like Jackie Chan's Drunken Master, there are also lots of curious training scenes in the countryside, in which the rather less known warriors Meng Yuen-Man and Mang Hoi demonstrate their undoubtedly existing skills. The secret star of the movie is of course Hwang Jang Lee, who can show off his footwork in several extended brawls. Shaw Brothers veteran Jason Pai Piao also stops by and with Corey Yuen (The Legend) four more stunt coordinators take care of the polished fight scenes. A flippant German synchro with lots of well-known voices completes the whole thing for fans in this country.

As with so many cheap productions from that time, there is the problem of poor availability and no uncut release has been known so far. The German VHS should correspond to the local theatrical release and is shortened by about 7.5 minutes. But this is only partly due to the distributor in this country, because at least 5 minutes of it have been cut identically on the US VHS and thus probably also on other foreign releases. Therefore, one can probably speak of an export version, which has been tightened a little bit more in Germany. In Great Britain, a DVD was released in the original audio version with burned-in subtitles, which in principle is based on the original version - but on the one hand is shorter due to various errors in the original version and on the other hand was censored in an animal scene and violence in the final thanks to BBFC guidelines.

The German DVD and the cuts of the British version

The German DVD premiere is now available in the Asia Line series starting on April 02, 2020 and once again, a virtually uncut long version has been reconstructed resp. the film has been patched together for the longest possible version. A purely German cut version was also added as a bonus.

Unfortunately, it was no longer possible to find a cinema reel. For the long version, they took the clearly best looking master of the British DVD as a basis and took the trouble to only zoom in on the shots with burned-in subtitles throughout the whole film. Thus, the film runs continuously in 2,35:1, the fighting scenes are to be seen in full splendour and only at dialogue points some image information gets lost. But without knowing about it, this is basically not noticeable. The parts censored in the British master were integrated by the German VHS, which also came along in scope format.

Regarding the cuts in the British version, it has to be said that thanks to BBFC requirements, censorship was applied at the beginning in the case of animal violence and in the finale in an easily imitable fighting technique. In addition, there are various master-related errors. All in all, it's still a quite presentable version, but with the reconstructed Uncut version on the German DVD it's finally obsolete.

Runtimes are ordered as follows: British DVD in PAL / German DVD in PAL

The title insertion after 45 seconds was built by the distributor for the British DVD. For the German DVD, this was replaced by a German title block.

British DVD	German DVD

06:28 / 06:28-06:32

The beginning of the next fight was tightened in the UK. Probably because one can clearly see that the chicken held in the hand is still alive.

3,5 sec

06:41 / 06:45-06:57

Tiger lets the chicken fall down at the end of the shot and pulls it up again with its legs. Stone tries to grab it a few times without success until Tiger remains standing on his head.

12,3 sec

06:50 / 07:06-07:20

After the headstand, the fight continues for a while, with Tiger continuing to hold the chicken in his arms, throwing it up briefly and also using it to block. Finally, Stone can throw it to the side.

14.5 sec

48:16 / 48:46-48:47

Ching hits for the first time after looking to the side in the earlier starting shot.

1 sec

84:25 / 85:55-86:05

Tiger's elbow blow hits Lu in the abdomen, while Stone beats him several more times with his head between his legs. Then they grab him together and carry him to a nearby tree stump. Pushed headfirst into it, they jump up and pull both legs down in opposite directions, cracking them.

9.7 sec

84:29 / 85:09-85:12

Another long shot where you see Lu hanging in the tree stump again and Stone continues to beat him.

2.6 sec

The last picture freezes and then has a red end fade-in on the British DVD. For the German DVD, this was replaced by a German end font on a black background.

British DVD	German DVD