Shatter [Call Him Mr Shatter] ** (1974, Stuart Whitman, Ti Lung, Peter Cushing, Anton Diffring, Lily Li) – Classic Movie Review 13,729

Hammer Films and Shaw Brothers 1974 Hong Kong martial arts action film Shatter [Call Him Mr Shatter] stars Stuart Whitman, Ti Lung, Peter Cushing, Anton Diffring, and Lily Li.

Producer/ director Michael Carreras’s 1974 Hammer Films and Shaw Brothers action film Shatter [Call Him Mr Shatter] stars Stuart Whitman, Ti Lung, Peter Cushing, Anton Diffring, Lily Li, Yemi Ajibade, and Lo Wei.

In a desperate search for new film genres to exploit, Britain’s Hammer Films studio teamed up with the Shaw Brothers to hit Hong Kong with this violence-packed kung-fu action adventure film that stars Stuart Whitman as Mr Shatter, an American hitman up against karate-chopping villains in Hong Kong. There, Chief Inspector Rattwood (Peter Cushing) is head of the Royal Hong Kong Police Force. Also there is a German banker called Hans Leber (Anton Diffring).

Hammer stalwarts Peter Cushing and Anton Diffring certainly add a smooth touch of class, but Stuart Whitman’s dull star performance doesn’t help, Don Houghton’s script is Hong Kong-phooey, and director Carreras fails to hit the light touch he seems to be striving for. However, the kung-fu action and the 1973-74 Hong Kong location footage keep up the level of involvement.

It was Cushing’s last feature film for Hammer, his scenes filmed in four days.

It was filmed on location in Hong Kong, including Kai Tak Airport, from 17 December 1973 to 15 January 1974.

It was a troubled production. Monte Hellman was fired as director less than two weeks into shooting, leaving Carreras to finish the film. Carreras said: ‘The action scenes lack excitement, the dialogue scenes are dull and Hong Kong looks like a slum. I just don’t know how to salvage it.’

The original Shaw Brothers score horrified the film’s musical director Philip Martell and it was replaced by a new score by English composer David Lindup.

It premiered in London on 6 December 1974 but was not distributed in the UK till its release by EMI on 7 September 1977. 

It was released by Avco Embassy Pictures in March 1975 in the US as Call Him Mr Shatter. It was not released in Hong Kong until 1 July 1980.

Carreras recalled: ‘Unfortunately, a bad picture. We ran into all sorts of problems, and like all pictures that are bad, I think it was badly conceived from the start. One did all sorts of things to try and save it, but it didn’t work.’

It is the second of two co-productions between Britain’s Hammer Film Productions and Hong Kong’s Shaw Brothers Studio, following The Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires. Everyone had got their fingers burned, and that was that.

Houghton’s script is developed from his unused script for an action film titled Shoot that was shelved.

Runtime: 90 minutes.

Hong Kong actress Lily Li Lai-lai (14 June 1950 – 27 October 2024)

Ti Lung (born Tommy Tam Fu-wing,19 August 1946)

© Derek Winnert 2025 – Classic Movie Review 13,729

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