Old School Kung Fu ’16: A Terra-Cotta Warrior

He is like the Golem, except more heroic. General Meng Tian Fang was promoted to Lord Chamberlain after saving the life of China’s first emperor, Qin Shi Huang. The decent Meng quickly starts to doubt whether the emperor deserved saving, but he has no reservations when it comes to the lovely Snowy. Unfortunately, it be another three thousand years before he gets another shot at protecting her in Ching Siu-tung’s A Terra-Cotta Warrior (trailer here), which screens this weekend as part of Subway’s Cinema’s Old School Kung Fu 2016, with the support of Warner Archive, which released the era-spanning romance in their series of Golden Harvest classics on MOD (manufactured on demand) DVD--to order, fans must visit the Warner Archive website: www.warnerarchive.com

Meng does indeed save Qin Number One, so unlike the rest of the Imperial guards on duty, he gets to live. He is also promoted, but he is profoundly disillusioned by the way old Qin conducts business. Seeking to satisfy the Emperor’s desire for immortality, court alchemist Xu Fu has struggled in vain to develop an eternal elixir. To save his head, he convinces the Emperor to back a dodgy pilgrimage involving five hundred male and female virgins. That is how Meng initially spies Snowy. The attraction is mutual, but her virgin status obviously implies trouble.

Love truly hurts when the love of your life slips you an eternal elixir before the despot you ever so loyally serve immolates her before your eyes and then encases you in clay to guard his mausoleum for the rest of time. However, Meng’s lonely vigilance will be interrupted by a Republican era film crew. Actually, the film they are making, a dubious Chinese remake of Gone with the Wind, is just a cover for the treasure-seeking leading man and director. However, star-struck extra Zhu Lili is convinced it will be her big break. She also happens to be the spitting image of Snowy.

Frankly, Terra-Cotta sometimes feels like a film that should have quit while it was ahead. The Qin-era scenes are wonderfully tragic in a wuxia kind of way. There are also some rousing action scenes and some suitably murky intrigue. As the star-crossed lovers, Gong Li and Zhang Yimou (then the real life first couple of Chinese cinema) have immediate, smoking hot chemistry.

Unfortunately, the fish-out-of-water comedy of act two is pretty shticky. The camera still loves Gong, but Zhu is a problematically shallow character. Still, if you persevere, things perk up considerably in the tomb-raiding climax. There are some inventive action scenes, a few “borrowings” from Indiana Jones, and the legion of Terracotta Warriors in all their glory.

The surviving Terracotta Warriors are quite a sight to behold in person, so it is cool to see Ching try to convey that on film. There are also some clever callbacks in the epilogue, especially given the rumored destination of Xu Fu. In comparison, all the bickering slapstick in between just seems like such a miscue. Even (or rather especially) in 1990, most movie fans would much prefer to see Gong and Zhang in a tragic embrace than mugging at each other.

Arguably, that makes Terra-Cotta a good film for home viewing, because you can fast forward the jokey parts. On the other hand, there are some stunning visuals, particularly in the Qin-Era sequences that cry out for the big screen. Of course, when you really get down to it, every Gong Li film is worth seeing. Recommended for wuxia fans who understand its eccentricities, A Terra-Cotta Warrior screens this Saturday (4/9) as part of Old School Kung Fu at the Metrograph and is available for sale online at Warner Archive.

Old School Kung Fu ’16: Big Bullet

Evidently, Hong Kong was a city almost entirely without cell phones in 1996. That would change in a hurry, but their aptitude for action films remains undiminished. In 1996, Benny Chan was also relatively new to the action genre, but his reputation was quickly transformed with Golden Harvest’s release of Big Bullet (trailer here), which screens this weekend as part of Subway’s Cinema’s Old School Kung Fu 2016, with the support of Warner Archive, who have included the HK policier in their series of Golden Harvest classics on MOD (manufactured on demand) DVD (to order, fans must visit The Warner Archive Collection: warnerarchive.com).

After the wildly incompetent and possibly slightly bent Inspector Guan leads his major crimes team on a nearly disastrous raid, soon-to-be Sgt. Bill Chu subsequently explains his disappointment with his fists. Unfortunately, it will be Chu who is busted down in rank and transferred to an emergency response team. However, his reputation proceeds him. Most of his new team members are in awe of the in/famous cop, but not the strictly-by-the-book Jeff Chiu.

Naturally, their contrasting temperaments will lead to conflict when Chu starts pursing Bird and the Professor, two hardcore gangsters who killed his best friend during their freshly launched crime spree. Technically, they are Guan’s case, but he refuses to heed any of Chu’s warnings. That forces Zhu and his team to go rogue, which is fine with most of them.

Big Bullet is a perfect example of how super-slick, uber-stylish execution can make a workaday narrative shine like a diamond. Although there is plenty of fighting, it isn’t what you usually consider a Kung Fu movie, but whatever. The important thing is the action sequences are big-picture in scope but clearly and tightly staged. They all look great on-screen.

It is pretty crazy to watch a relatively young Sean Lau Ching-wan kicking butt as Chu. In a nod to reality, the soon-to-be-late Inspector Yang (played by ever reliable Francis Ng) tells him he is getting a little “stocky” for a cowboy-copper. Maybe so, but he is still all kinds of steely. It is also pretty nuts taking in the now stately Anthony Wong as Bird, the psycho-sleaze, but he is as intense as usual. However, it is Theresa Lee who steals a bunch of scenes as Apple, the girl-next-door patrol officer with mad martial arts skills. She adds the right amount of comic relief, whereas Spencer Lam slightly overdoes it as their Dan, the old veteran of their emergency response van.

Chan really earned his spurs with some massively-charged but totally street level and almost realistic action sequences. He keeps raising the stakes and boosting the adrenaline quite deftly. Of course he had the advantage of what now looks like an incredible all-star cast, who will not disappoint their more recently converted fans. Totally recommended for action connoisseurs, Big Bullet screens this Friday (4/8) and Sunday (4/10) as part of Old School Kung Fu at the Metrograph and is available for sale online at Warner Archive.

Old School Kung Fu ’16: The Blade

He is wuxia’s most iconic underdog, who embodies a major chunk of Hong Kong film history. His first appearance came in The One-Armed Swordsman, a smash hit for the Shaw Brothers that made Jimmy Wang Yu an overnight superstar. Tsui Hark would reboot the uni-limbed hero for Raymond Chow’s equally storied Golden Harvest studio in the mid-1990s. It was a bit of flop at the time, but it has subsequently been recognized as an influential masterpiece. In celebration of Golden Harvest’s legacy, Tsui’s The Blade (trailer here) screens this weekend as part of Subway’s Cinema’s Old School Kung Fu 2016, with the support of Warner Archive, which has released a series of Golden Harvest classics on MOD (manufactured on demand) DVD (to order, fans must visit the Warner Archive collection: www.warnerarchive.com).

Ding-on’s life has already been marked by tragedy. The master of a saber foundry took him in as a young boy when his father was killed by the Falcon, a feared assassin who supposedly has the gift of flight. Temperamentally, Ding-on is rather suited to pound away at the forge, but the master’s daughter Siu Ling perversely yearns to see a rivalry develop between him and the more hotheaded Ti Tau. The two apprentices are clever enough to avoid her clumsy mind games, but a more serious rupture develops when a gang of outlaws brutally murders a shaolin monk.

Like many of the men at the saber-works, Ti Tau wants to posse-up and administer some frontier justice. In contrast, Ding-on discourages their rash impulsiveness, in accordance with their master’s wishes. Yet, Ding-on will have an arm severed by the very same outlaws when he rescues the flighty Siu Ling from their clutches. Feeling essentially emasculated, Ding-on retreats to a life of menial labor, shacking up with Blackie, a young hermit living outside town. Yet again, Ding-on endures the beatings of nomadic outlaws, led by the sinister Skeleton. However, the partial burning of Blackie’s hovel leads to the discover of an ancient martial arts text. Much of the diagrams are missing, but what remain are still adaptable to Ding-on’s condition. By the time he has retooled his skills, Siu Ling and his old master will desperately need his help.

In a way, The Blade is a hinge film linking the Shaw Brothers releases that inspired it with later, more expressionistic wuxia, like Wong Kar Wai’s Ashes of Time (which originally predated The Blade in 1994, but became more “auteurist” in the 2008 Redux version) and Hou Hsiao-hsien’s The Assassin. Frankly, from the vantage point of 2016, The Blade is easy as pie to follow, but it was considered quite arty and adventurous at the time for its use of stunning, saturated colors and whirling dervish action cinematography.

There are still plenty of beatdowns in Blade, some of which are unusually violent. While Vincent Zhao has yet to reach the level of international popularity attained by Jackie Chan and Jet Li, he has serious skills and powerful screen presence. Viewers will have no problem buying into his lethalness, even with one arm literally tied behind his back.

However, probably nobody is as dangerous in The Blade as Valerie Chow, who causes no end of chaos and ill will as the temptress-prostitute. She makes the screen sizzle in her limited screen time. As Siu Ling, Song Lei has a slightly creepy Lolita-thing going on, but her unreliable narration adds a further layer of distinctiveness to the film. It is also hard to understand why Dickens Chan Wing-chung isn’t more of a name, because he makes quite an impression as the heroic but ill-fated monk.

There is no question The Blade is a masterwork from Tsui, possibly even a masterpiece. It is a great film to see on the big screen and also an ever reliable movie to own for repeat home viewing. Highly recommended, it screens this Friday (4/8) and Sunday (4/10) as part of Old School Kung Fu at the Metrograph and is available for sale online at Warner Archive.