Republished from the show notes of my other site, Fuds on Film.
I should perhaps note that I was watching the 2008 Redux version, which in the main appears to be broadly the same as the original versions apart from some more aggressive colour grading. Highly aggressive.
Originally released back in 1994, I gather to a politely baffled response for entirely relatable reasons. It’s certainly a Wuxia film in the literal definition of the term, but certainly not of the highly fantastical, superjumping wirework shenanigans that was the typical movie translation – it’s more grounded, in a very literal sense, than the likes of Fong Sai-yuk, Chinese Ghost Story or the later Crouching Tiger.
I rather regret giving myself this to attempt a plot recap, as it’s a little obtuse. It is, in what’s perhaps become a Wai staple technique, split into a few stories based around Leslie Cheung ‘s Ouyang Feng, initially a middleman connecting mercenary fighters with those seeking to hire them, typically for revenge, who later becomes a warrior himself. I mention this as, being told through a not completely clear non-linear framing, this may be confusing to some people, pointing no fingers at myself.
Further complicating things, his mercenary friend Huang Yaoshi (“Big” Tony Leung Ka-fai) has shown up, on the way killing a group of bandits to steal a horse, which will in a way precipitate most of the rest of the film’s events, the remnants of the gang looking for revenge. Before that, he’s brought a bottle of wine that a witch claims will steal memories. This may or may not actually work on Huang. It’s not clear. in fact, so many things are not clear to me in this film that I’m perhaps best served skipping over any attempt at a plot recap.
As the film progresses, we’re introduced to segments more or less focused on each of “Little” Tony Leung Chiu-Wai as a Blind Swordsman, Jacky Cheung as Hong Qigong, a beggar looking to become an assassin, Charlie Yeung as the perfunctorily named Girl with Mule, a poor villager looking for vengeance for her brother, killed by imperial goons, and Brigitte Lin as Murong Yang and Murong Yin, who is either a woman sometimes pretending to be a man, or possibly actually is supposed to become a man, given the genre, although at all times looking like a woman, even when she’s a man.
I’m not saying this film’s impenetrable, more that I was not able to penetrate this. Oo-er, matron. Perhaps it’s clearer if you know the bones of the classical work this is setting itself up as a prequel to, but as a first introduction to these characters and their actions, I’m left with questions. Actually, I’m not sure I’m given enough information to form those questions, other than who, what, where, why, and how?
I find myself in the same position as when we spoke about Hsiao-Hsien Hou’s The Assassin back in 2016, which is to say it’s doing a great deal of things that I’d ordinarily be exceedingly irritated by, but, somehow, the atmosphere and the visuals power through it and left me somewhat entranced by it.
It’s a tough film to know who to recommend it to, however. There’s not the usual quantity of action that’s typical of Wuxia films, and what little that is there is atypical and somewhat more visceral than you’d expect. If you’re looking for a compelling plot do drive the action that there isn’t, well, strike two. On the other hand, if you’re more looking for a character piece, well, I don’t think there’s much here for you either. Again, I have no complaints with the acting but I don’t feel there’s much revealed about the characters. I get the impression that the depth is very much there, but not in any way that is meaningfully explored.
Briefly, back to the visuals, and particularly the grading – it’s an exceedingly saturated film. Particularly in the yellows. To the extent that some are claiming it’s an error. I don’t know the truth of that, but give how strongly Wai’s used colour in his other work, I’m more inclined to think it’s intentional, giving parts of this the feel of an Edo scroll or something similar but more culturally appropriate. Once I’d got over the visual shock of this I grew to rather like it, but I’ll happily hear counter-opinions saying it’s ugly.
A real curate’s egg of a film. I don’t regret watching it in the slightest, but at the same time I don’t think I can recommend anyone else do so without a cavalcade of caveats.