Shan zhong zhuan qi (1979)

User Rating:

7.1/10   

Director:

King Hu

Writer:

King Hu (writer)

Release Date:

4 October 1979 (Hong Kong)

Genre:

Fantasy | Horror | Mystery

Plot:

A scholar, tasked to copy a sutra, meets with a mysterious old lady and her daughter in the mountains. |

Plot Keywords:

Ghost

Awards:

5 wins & 2 nominations

Cast

Chun Shih	...	Scholar He Qingyun
Feng Hsu	...	Melody
Sylvia Chang	...	Cloud
rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Hui Lou Chen	...	Taoist priest Yang
Rainbow Hsu	...	Madam Wang
Yueh Sun	...	Han
Feng Tien	...	Zhang - ragged mad servant
Lin Tung	...	Adviser Tsui
Jiaxiang Wu	...	Woodcutter
Ming-tsai Wu

Also Known As:

Legend of the Mountain (International: English title)

Runtime:

184 min

Country:

Taiwan

Language:

Mandarin

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Singapore:PG

Company:

Feng Nian

Chinese ghost story - the prequel?

Ching Sui Tung, long time admirer of King Hu (he helped arrange Hu's direction of the first Swordsman film), was to take the bare bones of this film and make his legendary "Chinese Ghost Story" films. It's about a monk on retreat to an isolated temple in order to write a sutra, who thereby comes under the observation of two female ghosts who may or not actually fall in love him - Hu maintains a careful ambiguity on this and other issues, clearly conveying to the audience the very confusion of the scholar himself, who never quite gets a handle on what he's accidentally walked into here.

But in the last analysis, this is neither ghost story nor romance, but a determined effort on Hu's part to make a visually beautiful set-piece of open, well-lit Chinese landscape, and high-contrast, sharply defined interiors. In short, it is an attempt to make a beautiful work of art.

Because Hu's principle interest is just this visual beauty, the pacing of the film gets a little slow at times, and Hu shows no interest in "cutting to the chase" story-telling. Consequently, I think he has succeeded in this artistic perfectionism, but at a price, which is that the film is not going to appeal to a wide audience. But given some patience, it offers real rewards to the senses.