This is a special issue of Bright Lights, even by our "every issue is special!" standards. It’s the first in which we reprint an entire print issue of the old BL (#13 from 1994) in the snazzy new online version. We did this at the behest of virtual armies of students, teachers, and drooling fanboys who were tired of hearing about the "legend" of BL’s all-Hong Kong issue and couldn’t find the goddamn thing. (And of course, we sympathize deeply with their exhaustion; we couldn’t find one either for awhile!) So here in all its glory is "lucky" issue 13. (Remember this is a reprint of a 1994 magazine, so don’t expect it to be up-to-date.) Roger Garcia leads off with "Alive and Kicking," a mini-tour of the HK kung fu film." Next up is "Achievement and Crisis," Sek Kei’s expansive history of that seminal decade for HK films, the ‘80s, and what led up to it; this should add some heft to fans’ often sketchy if not entirely incorrect info on the subject. The same author, abetted by Rolanda Chu and Grant Foerster, helps clear up millennia of confusing history in "A Brief Historical Tour of the HK Martial Arts Film." HK’s brightest star entertained choreographer Dr. Craig Reid during "An Evening with Jackie Chan." Then Jillian Sandell tackles those perennial favorite "isms" — masoch- and capital- — in her study of John Woo’s homo-drenched gangster flicks. She also probes Mr. Woo, sans speculum of course, in a revealing interview. Finally, Rolanda Chu dives into the pleasure pit that is the Swordsman series, with fabulous results. In its print incarnation, this issue had the help of guest editors of Roger Garcia and Rolanda Chu, to whom as always we tip our big feathered hat (which we call "macaroni").

Initially we planned online BL #31 to be solely a reprint of the Hong Kong issue. But of course, we couldn’t just shut up and be happy with what we had. Under some strange compulsion still being investigated at this writing, we insisted on throwing together practically an entire additional issue as well. So you’ll find lots more goodies here outside the Hong Kong realm. Stellar wit and BL regular/associate editor Alan Vanneman leads the band by "doing" the underrated Fabulous Baker Boys as only he can. AV also continues his exegesis of the Astaire/Rogers canon with a — oh let’s just say it! — brilliant analysis of Top Hat. Readers who ache to check out post-perestroika Russian cinema but couldn’t make it to Greece last year will welcome Cleo Cacoulidis’s vivid tour of that component of the 41^st Thessaloniki Film Festival. And of course your prattlesome editor weighs in with a cornucopia of alleged treasures: a review of the rather overrated Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, four fresh "Homo Corner" entries (The Jaundiced Eye, Burlesk King, Just One Time, and Angel), and a walloping six DVD entries, q.v. Next issue we’ll try — try — to return some of those categories that readers have come to expect, treasure, and, we fear, demand: "S&M Alcove," "Bondage Foyer," "Underground Film Lanai," etc.