It starts with a rape in the wilderness. Our swordsgirl hero gets there too late to save the victim and the attacker escapes her blade. He does leave a dagger to identify himself. Cut to the old guy identifies the dagger. Our girl arrives home to find her father has arranged her marriage to the rapist, Meng. He insists that was just an imposter. She runs away using a decoy bride.
Cut to another swordsman asks to learn a new technique. He insists Meng is coming to kill them.
Our girl wanders upon a grave and the filial son attends it. She challenges him but is interrupted by a beggar who challenges her and slips the son a message. It is written in Chinese and not translated. Next she becomes ensnared in a net. The girl who set it releases her and she walks off.
The son meets Meng and it comes out Meng once fought the rapist and threw his dagger at him escaping. They are amused by the naïve swordsgirl runaway bride.
Our girl continues to meet people who want to fight her and marry her but then she learns they are old friends of her father and know how she fled the marriage. It is like an elaborate plot to teach her a lesson.
The story is quite unusual and works for a light comedy. It feels as though this movie is just part of a bigger story and stuff has been left out but I can't confirm that. The comedy is totally chauvinistic and all at the expense of our girl but this was 1969 and China.
The fights are all weapons and the choreography is ambitious but most of the fights are actor versus actor. This was before the time actors knew martial arts so the result is slow moves with poor focus. It was not that bad though.
Chinese extras, particularly those playing a simple crowd, are known as the worst in the world. In this movie the extras just walking through the background look totally unbelievable, that's how bad they are!
Stanley Fong is the villain and this was before he grew the greatest moustache in Chinese history.
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