One man wears white, the other black. One broods all the time, the other one is outgoing and keeps making dumb jokes. They sit at opposite sides of the law. The symbolism is pretty clear.
Oh, and as if to drive the point home, one likes light and the other one doesn't. That leads to a huge, elaborate, ridiculously fun fight the first night they camp together, as one of them wants to light a fire and the other one doesn't; I like to believe that whenever two people want to watch two different TV shows over in Hong Kong, it always results in a delightful kung fu tussle.
Where were we? Oh, yeah. The man in black's past soon catches up to him, in the form of three assassins from the Iron Boat Clan. The leader of the cult-like organization, Yu Xi-hong, takes orphans and cruelly raises them to become heartless martial artists (any display of emotion is grounds for a brutal beating), and... yes, you guessed it, our man Chi has defected - he used to be the ninth eagle, one of the most feared of the clan's thirteen assassins, each one a master of a different kung fu weapon and decked in a different bright colour. Got to love multicolour villains.
All this is explained to Chao after he steps in and aids Chi in the fight against the other, still loyal eagles, in the form of a couple of pretty long flashbacks that go into what drove him away from the organization. It's a pretty damn good story.
Chao obviously has some stake in all of this, although he keeps his cards close to his chest - the 'twist' is easy to see coming and, to be fair, the film knows this and reveals it to us before it does to Chi. The growing respect and developing friendship between the two men, despite Chi's mistrust, is a pleasure to watch unfold.
The kung fu mayhem is copious, and thanks to the variety of weapon masters, extremely varied. We get many types of swords and knives, spears (pointed and bladed), one chain with knives and another with a flail head, Chi's three-part staff, something that's between a sai and a trident, hatchets, claw gauntlets, a pony tail and more. Seriously, it's a ridiculous lineup and all of them get at least a little time in the spotlight.
While they're not as intricate or exciting as other films (even in the older, more stylized kung fu movie tradition), they're all a huge amount of fun and have plenty of cool stunts. Director Chung Sun's style is stately and, to be honest, not very interesting or energetic, but he does get right in the middle of the action a little more than usual. He also adds a lot of slow motion shots and still frames to give the action a little more impact. Most of it looks a little jarring to me, but I respect what it's going for. He also uses a lot of natural scenery, which helps distinguish the movie a little from the more usually stagebound Shaw Brothers look.
The script, by Ni Kuang elegantly lays out the parallels between the two protagonists and their history before sending them out on a joint quest for revenge (I'll overlook that a major development relies on a pretty huge coincidence). A lot of these movies share themes and tropes with the Western genre, but this one seemed to me to lean a little more heavily on them... or maybe it's just the scenery, which includes mostly barren landscapes and a (nearly) abandoned ghost town.
As usual, some things don't translate all that well - Chao's mugging and humour, for example - but Ti Lung's Chi more than makes up for it in both intensity and presence, and that their journey together ends up being affecting. The rest of the cast includes a killer's row of talent from the Shaw stable, including the great Ku Feng, Wang Lung and Eddy Ko, all of them very effective.
It's another good one. I'd personally start with something a bit more impressive in the martial arts department, but this one's compelling story would make great entry point if you can avoid getting distracted by the hilariously weak eagle squawk in the title sequence or by all the luscious sideburns on display.
No comments:
Post a Comment