Director Pearry Teo is no stranger to action, while most of his resumè is largely comprised of horror films. His latest, Shadow Master, combines some of the best of both genres, plugging in his penchant for costume fanfare, religious folklore, and graphic novel allure as the all-consuming backdrop for a story brimming with darkness and violence, and topped off with high-octane martial arts action.
Teo is joined by the efforts of producer Chaya Supannarat, along with executive producer Prachya Pinkaew, best known for directing several Thai action hits over the years which gave rise to stars like Tony Jaa and Jeeja Yanin. That the film was once set to shoot in Thailand at one point before pandemic restrictions became an issue resulting in the production’s move to a more stateside locale within the U.S. certainly makes Pinkaew’s involvement a little more magnanimous, especially given the talent on hand.
For this, we get Cambodian/American actor D.Y. Sao, who rejoins Teo for a second pairing after their 2021 revenge thriller, Fast Vengeance. Sao, whose martial arts specialty extends to several styles from Wushu to Bokator, plies his trade once more with Shadow Master, starring as a wayward drifter and ex-gang member named An Voaen, who now finds himself under scrutiny from Russells (Layton Matthews), a dodgy Detective seemingly bent on pegging Voaen for a crime after discovering him in a room full of dead cops.
The story toggles back and forth as we track our protagonist’s arrival from the city’s near-lawless, metropolitan wasteland, to the inner halls of an abandoned hospital, in response to a call looking to hire a night watchman. Once there and settled with the help of Boon-Nam (Craig Ng), he learns of the facility’s recent and recurring cases of children going missing in the night, and upon a single gaze, discovers several masked intruders in the dark halls, ensuing a scuffle that results in a near-fatal attack that leaves him on the brink of death.
Little does Voaen know that limbo awaits where a Death God will envelope him in a deal that will grant him a second chance at life, in exchange for the torn flesh and spilled blood of the enemies he’s hunting down. Thus, through the spirit and essence of the mythological deity, Hanuman, and with each kill, Voaen is slowly consumed by the entity and transformed into an inviolable fighting force against the mysterious Mephisto and the four horsemen seeking to trigger the apocalypse.
You’re certainly welcome to point to Sao’s identity and cultivation as your North Star considering his martial applications in the film’s stylish fight sequences. There’s no real fixation on any particular ethnic angle in the film’s reference to Hanuman or its other multiple religious references and inspirations, which all but allows any interpretation of Hanuman folklore to be as malleable as one needs or prefers.
One of the more crucial aspects of Shadow Master most certainly pertains to Sao’s viability as an actor. His performance here is a step up from Fast Vengeance, with some of the more tender and poignant moments shared with actress Luciana Faulhaber who plays Janett, a resident of the hospital living with her wheelchair-bound son, Benison (Eric Gay Jr.).
Par for the course of Voaen’s character development is the affliction he suffers as a result of his near-death experience, as his past becomes more and more weaponized against him by the Death God. It effectively makes him the lynchpin standing between the squatters looking for a savior, and a supernatural entity looking to embolden itself through a human host, someone who himself characteristically doesn’t typically believe in religious ideals or the practice of them. That he now embodies the very subject matter he’s denied makes for some motivating material to source in getting behind the character in all his travails leading up to the film’s major twist.
Bearing all this in mind, Teo’s script ultimately encapsulates itself with the sheer brute force of an anti-hero whose history of fighting brings him full circle with a dark fate – one that serves up plenty of action eye candy for fans of the genre when the time comes for Sao to shine, and shine he does! One of the film’s more audacious sales blurbs is that it comes packed with action that rivals Gareth Evans’ 2011 flick, The Raid. It doesn’t, and to Teo’s credit and that of the film’s stunt and action crew comprised of Sao and Martial Club’s own Brian and Andy Le, it doesn’t need to. The duo, along with Sao who has performed among several companies and crews over the years including Usurp Productions and the EMC Monkeys, craft an explosive array of stellar fight sequences that meet the demand, with the fight scene du jour set between Sao and co-star Brian Le who plays Samael, one of Mephisto’s horsemen.
I’m further inclined to believe that Teo’s inspiration for this film also stems from a short that “leaked” online twelve years ago that was meant to be a concept for a larger-scale thriller. The shot is almost beat-for-beat and invariably takes a life on its own going forward, which kind of speaks to something I told Teo before I wrote this review as an interesting bit in my post-screening observations. He laughed it off, but I’m keen on this aspect of his work as it invokes a certain vision I believe he has for a future project which this one could have easily been given the right people are brought to the table to support it.
For that matter, I can earnestly say that while Shadow Master isn’t any direct contender to the aforementioned Evans, Teo’s latest work easily stands on its own, emulating the utmost visceral action and brutality fans of the genre can take a liking to. Signed off with a co-starring credit by Teo in a key costume role and with the influence of one of Thailand’s most well-known names in modern action cinema, Shadow Master is a well-crafted, viable, and thrilling homemade martial arts action horror with a star well in the making.
Shadow Master will open in select theaters November 4 and on demand and digital November 8 from Saban Films.