I'm not as comfortable or confident at reviewing and analyzing movies as I am with books, but hopefully I can get better by trial and error. That being said, consider this more of an impression rather than a tradition review--what folks would call "thoughts."
The first of what I consider King Hu's trilogy (along with Dragon Inn (1967) and A Touch of Zen (1971)); this was the last feature film he made for the Shaw Brothers Studio production company and one of their greatest films. It is very different from the formula that would be put in place by Lau Kar-leung in subsequent years. Hu had been an actor and assistant director at Shaw Bros during their early years making mostly musicals, adaptations of Chinese Opera, historical pieces, romances, and adaptations of classic Chinese literature and comedic-musicals. With the growing popularity of Japanese martial arts movies and the growing popularity of adopting the Wǔxiá genre (originally fantasy literature) for movies saw the demand for martial arts films in the Sino-cinema world go up--and this film was one of the first to meet that demand.
The contrasting influences of things like the
One thing that distinguishes this film from other Shaw Brothers movies is the narrative-driven plot and style of King Hu. Shaw Brothers would become known internationally for the by-the-numbers, Han nationalist, pure action style of Lau Kar-leung & others, but their start in martial arts movies can be traced back to this movie and Hu's more art house sensibility which was going against the new style that Shaw Brothers (and Run Run Shaw in-particular) were shaping. Hu's films had a more spiritual aspect to them and saw the Han Chinese more conflicted with themselves than any outside invader.
The film introduces us to the first of King Hu's (and one of the first of Run Run Shaw's) badass female fighters. What would distinguish Hu and the Shaws throughout their careers was their embrace of women as capable fighters in action movies in their own right. This film introduces us to Golden Swallow who would get a sequel after the success of this film. We meet her in what would be a trademark of King Hu: a fight in close-quarters, usually an inn, temple, or forested area. Golden Swallow is in disguise (another King Hu trait) and she is one of two main protagonist fighters in this film. We also see the introduction of another mysterious, noble fighter who is a sort-of trickster character, but is crucial to plot.
What I like about villains in Chinese martial arts movies is that they are usually as strong as their rank in their organization. The number two really is the second-strongest person the bad guys have. The big bad is a lot of times the strongest person in the movie and it takes as many of the heroes as possible to bring them down. In King Hu's "trilogy", his fight choreographer Han Ying-jie plays one of the lieutenants in this film and Dragon Inn (in A Touch of Zen he is the big bad). The big bad in this film is an evil Buddhist priest who betrayed his master and is after one of his master's relics, while also holding the governor's son hostage.
This movie is the pinnacle of 1960s Shaw Bros martial arts cinema and the beginning of King Hu's long career as one of the most unique Chinese martial arts film-makers of all time. He would leave Shaw Brothers after making this film and head for Taiwan (taking a lot of the actors and crew of this film with him), where he would make his two greatest films Dragon Inn and his masterpiece A Touch of Zen (one of my all time favorite films). Much of the early tropes of the Shaw Brothers that we see in this film would be gone in Dragon Inn, as well as in the more realist-based Kung Fu films that SB would make following this movie.
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