A Touch of Zen
1969
Directed by King Hu
I apologize again for not posting lately. Finding these movies lately has been an adventure in itself and I haven't really been in the adventurous mood. Particularly adventures involving illegal downloads and crappy subtitles.
This movie is almost impossible to find with subtitles so I had to use the old "download the subtitles and read along and half through the movie realize I have been behind by one scene the entire time which is why I have been hopelessly lost the whole time" method. Thankfully, once I realized that the mother was somehow also the love interest of the son, it was quite enjoyable.
Ku is an artist, who much to his mother's disappointment, has no interest in becoming a government official. He falls for his neighbor Yang who, of course, is secretly a fugitive princess.
This film falls under the wuxia, or the sword and sorcery, genre. I personally love martial arts movies and any film that reverses gender roles soothes the angry feminist within. While Ku is a pretty clueless and useless character, Yang kicks ass. Although I should add that Ku grows into more of a man after bedding Yang, which gave me horrible American Pie flashbacks.
My only complaint would be that the fighting wasn't great, but there are plenty of great martial arts films on the horizon that excel in that respect. Definitely worth checking out.
RATING: ****-
Interesting Facts:
Originally divided into two parts.
I would say this is a great movie despite the over-the-top martial arts parts. An actual story in a Wuxia movie!!! That is something. And the production quality is very high too.
ReplyDeleteHow can a film (as this one does) have a guest star? Possibly if it's one film in a series, but even then the idea is pretty tenuous. What makes one actor a star in the film and another a guest star?
ReplyDeleteAnyway, film was quite good. Went on a bit, so it makes sense to learn that it was originally released in two parts and then Selotaped together for a re-release years later.