Hex vs. Witchcraft Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		2.0
Video		4.0
Audio		3.5
Extras		0.5
Overall		2.0

Hex vs. Witchcraft Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman November 18, 2025

Note: This version of this film is available on Blu-ray as part of the Shawscope Volume Four collection from Arrow Video.

Things seem to have calmed down a little from the gauntlet I experienced toward the end of 2024 where it seemed I was getting a Shaw Brothers title (or several) in my review queue virtually daily. Arrow has been curating its immense Shawscope collections for a few years now, and they're helping to alleviate any perceived deficit in high definition presentations of the venerable studio's output with this fourth volume which aggregates sixteen more films from the Shaw Brothers canon (some of them previously released in other territories, though Arrow advertises new 2025 restorations for all of the films in the set). Arrow has packaged all of these volumes consistently, and this latest volume shares the same basic dimensions as its shelf mates (if you even have shelf space for such large boxes), and it also includes the wealth of bonus material that the previous releases from Arrow have offered.

For "rabid completists" who may want to peruse the immense prior volumes in this series from Arrow, please click on the following links:

Shawscope Volume One Blu-ray review

Shawscope Volume Two Blu-ray review

Shawscope Volume Three Blu-ray review

Ian Jane's kind of unavoidably comical film notes on this title included in Arrow's insert booklet begin with a description of the above key art theatrical poster, which is absolutely gonzo in and of itself while perhaps being even more gonzo (and hilarious) by offering very little information about what Hex vs. Witchcraft has in store. The first bit of (mis?)information is the frankly kind of weird decision to "brand" this film with the Hex imprimatur, despite this film also being co-written by Chin-Hua Tan and directed by Chih-Hung Kuei, as was the first film (interestingly, Chih-Hung Kuei was Chin-Hua Tan's collaborator on the screenplay for the first film). If Hex is kinda sorta a riff on Diabolique, it's hard to know what to compare Hex vs. Witchcraft to, other than maybe a gender reversed Ghost, though with the female spirit in this case a bit of a provocateur trickster a la someone like Beetlejuice. It's all very strange, and played squarely for laughs, which is something else that immediately sets it apart from any perceived connection to the first Hex film.

Cai Tou* (James Yi Lui) is a compulsive gambler whose problem gets to bad he offers up his wife to pay off his debts. That understandably leads to the end of that marriage and a demand for suicide, which the hapless Cai Tou is unable to finalize (there's a lot of slapstick in this enterprise). The upshot is that Cai Tou is more or less forced to marry a ghost in order to set things right, though this particular spirit is able to possess actual humans, leading to a kind of screwball ambience as Cai Tou has to navigate more and more chaos.

This is an unrelentingly goofy effort that is played to the veritable second balcony, especially by James Yi Lui, but it has a few laughs along the way, probably especially for those prone to guffaw at physical schtick and/or toilet humor. Why this was kind of almost burdened with the Hex connection is kind of strange, and it's probably best to approach this effort as its own "spell", so to speak, for better or worse.

*This is another film where what I assume are the transiliterations from Cantonese or Mandarin of various character names are pretty widely variant. I'm using the character names offered in the cast listing, not the film synopsis in the booklet.

Hex vs. Witchcraft Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Hex vs. Witchcraft is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Arrow Video with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.34:1. Arrow's almost overwhelming insert booklet lumps all the films together on its informational page about the transfers, as follows:

All sixteen films in this boxset are presented in their original aspect ratios (all 2.35:1 except for Bewitched, Hex After Hex and Seeding of a Ghost in 1.85:1) with their original Mandarin and/or Cantonese and/or English monaural soundtracks. Every effort has been made to present these films in their original and complete versions using the best materials available.

All sixteen films have been newly restored by Arrow Films in 2025, in collaboration with L'Immagine Ritrovata, Hong Kong Film Archive and Celestial Pictures. The original 35mm negatives for these films were scanned at L'Immagine Ritrovata Asia and restored in 2K resolution at L'Immagine Ritrovata, Bologna. Super Inframan, Oily Maniac, Battle Wizard, Black Magic, Black Magic Part 2, Hex, Hex Vs. Witchcraft, Hex After Hex and Twinkle Twinkle Little Star were graded at R3store Studios, London. Bewitched, Bat Without Wings, Bloody Parrot, The Fake Ghost Catchers, Demon of the Lute, Seeding of a Ghost and Portrait in Crystal were restored at Dragon DI, Wales. These restorations have used the entire film negative without resorting to the practice of "frame-cutting" resulting in the loss of film frames at each negative splice point.

The mono mixes were remastered from the original sound negatives at L'Immagine Ritrovata. Additional sound remastering was completed by Þorsteinn Gíslason. The audio synch will often seem loose against the picture, due to the fact that the dialogue and sound effects were recorded entirely during post-production, as per the production standards of the period.

All film materials supplied for these restorations were made available from the Hong Kong Film Archive via Celestial Pictures.

The American cut of Super Inframan, titled Infra-Man, is remastered using a composite of the newly restored Hong Kong version and selected excerpts from a 35mm US exhibition print. This print also featured a rare quadrophonic sound mix ("Stereo-Infra-Sound") that is featured here, for the first time on home video. The print, as well as 16mm TV spots and a 7" record with two radio spots, was scanned by Film-Tech Cinema Systems in Richardson, Texas. Special thanks to Lee Demarbre for granting us access to the 35mm print, and to Jarrod Varney for supplying the TV and radio spots.

The original camera negative for Bewitched is conformed to a censored version missing select scenes in the first two reels. When the film was originally remastered in high-definition by Celestial Pictures in 2007, these additional scenes were scanned from a lower-quality element as the negatives for them could not be located. When preparing for this new restoration, this element could not be located anymore either, so the scenes have been incorporated from the earlier HD master instead.

The original trailers were restored by Arrow Films from the original 35mm materials held at the Hong Kong Film Archive. Special thanks to King-Wei Chu and Denis-Carl Robidaux for donating and scanning additional trailers for Bat Without Wings and Bloody Parrot.

Hex vs. Witchcraft offers a nicely robust palette, which is one of this transfer's strengths. Reds are especially evocative throughout but all of the better lit material pops quite commendably. Some of the darker material doesn't fare quite as well, and grain can look a bit noisy at times in some near nighttime material. Detail levels are generally very good throughout, and fine detail on props and costumes looks precise. Aside from the aforementioned variances, grain resolves without any real issues.

Hex vs. Witchcraft Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Hex vs. Witchcraft features LPCM Mono tracks in Cantonese or Mandarin. As is the case with some of the other films in this set, the Cantonese is louder and fuller bodied overall, but with a more balanced high end and better sounding midrange. The Mandarin track is fine with no major issues, but it's kind of thin sounding and has a pretty strident high end at times. Dialogue is rendered cleanly and clearly throughout. Optional English subtitles are available.

Hex vs. Witchcraft Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Additional Mandarin Voiceover Clip (HD; 00:44) is a curious bit of narration offering a summary of the focal character's hapless ways. This plays largely to a freeze frame since no one is quite sure where this was supposed to go.

Hex vs. Witchcraft Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

James Lui Yi comes off as a kind of Jackie Chan wanna be in this effort, though he doesn't really have Chan's inherent charm and kind of can't help but seem like a hapless schnook due to this film's preponderance of sight gags and not exactly Noel Coward level wit. Technical merits are generally solid for anyone who may be considering making a purchase.