Bu yi shen xiang (1984)

User Rating:

6.9/10   

Director:

Chin-Ku Lu

Writer:

Chin-Ku Lu (screenplay)

Cast

Lau Chan
Shen Chan	...	Wudang elder (uncle)
Kuan Tai Chen
Tao Chiang
Miao Ching
Norman Chu
Phillip Ko
Kuan-chung Ku
Yin San Lai
Siu-Kwan Lau
Tony Liu
Lieh Lo
Tien Hsiang Lung
Alex Man
Jason Pai Piao
Chien Sun
Chih-Ching Yang

Also Known As:

Biu yi san seung (Hong Kong: Cantonese title)
Return of Bastard Swordsman (International: English title)
Tian can zai bian (Hong Kong: Mandarin title) (original script title)

Country:

Hong Kong

Language:

Cantonese | Mandarin

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Company:

Shaw Brothers

Fun sequel in the waning days of Shaw Brothers studios

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

RETURN OF THE BASTARD SWORDSMAN is one of those sequels that isn't needed, and isn't particularly better than the first film, but is still nice enough to be worth watching. I feel the same way about a few other sequels, like RETURN TO THE 36TH CHAMBER. But what really sells the movie is Lu Chin Ku, one of the more interesting directors to pop up in the twilight years of Shaw Brothers. He was the director of infamously bizarre fantasy Kung-Fu films, the sort of thing that the studio had resorted to in hopes of winning back the audience being attracted by Tsui Hark films like ZU. This produced several bizarre films, which were still noticeably in the Shaw Brothers style. The costumes, sets and location shooting were ever familiar, having been utilized since the sixties in production after production. The style of cinematography still dominated by old fashioned uses of in camera editing, gaudy colored lighting, limited camera movement, and -in general- conventional shooting. Some directors did their best to change that, utilizing ideas that had been put into practice by directors at Golden Harvest studios, imitating Tsui Hark, Patrick Tam, and Ching Siu-Tung.

Among these were Lu Chin Ku, himself an action director and martial artist, who had gotten into directing on independent films before making his debut at Shaw with THE MASTER. He quickly established himself as one of the directors willing to experiment with tricky editing, special effects, and the stranger, more esoteric parts of the Wuxia cinema tradition. All of these came into effect with BASTARD SWORDSMAN, which was a spin off of a television series featuring Norman Chu. The film once again brought Norman Chu back, learning silk worm Kung Fu and dominating the martial arts world. The sequel sees him return as the baddest man of the martial world, but he's not really the star here. Instead, ninjas are introduced, lead by the angriest Chen Kuan-Tai you've ever seen. The Iga ninja clan has come to prove themselves dominant over the Chinese martial arts, while Alex Man, returning from the first film in chief villain role and looking for a duel with Norman Chu, steals the show much the way he did in BUDDHA'S PALM. Of course, with all of these side plots going on, where does the titular bastard go? Well, he spends a lot of the time on his back, doing very little, through a contrivance of the script that allows for numerous ninja attacks, all building up to only a couple of fight scenes that feature Norman Chu.

And if there's anything that's bad about the movie, it's that. There's so little actually going on. It's mostly fighting, fighting happening every few minutes. At the very least it isn't boring, but the movie could really use something more interesting than ninjas constantly getting hacked up by Chinese swordsmen. The nice thing is that the fighting is bizarre, creative, well choreographed and well edited. Most Shaw films are fairly static, and directors like Lau Kar-Leung utilize long takes to show off traditional martial arts, and Chor Yuen often filmed fight scenes in long shots to make for ethereal, flowery combat. Lu Chin Ku and action director Yuen Tak put the camera in high and low angles, often off kilter, undercrank and edit furiously, and introduce as many bizarre style as possible. The Iga clan lets them play around with ninja tricks, such as giant throwing stars and smoke bombs, while the Chinese swordsmen have animated rays and Chen Kuan-Tai has an expandable chest. The strangest thing is how well they mix traditional choreography into the weirder effects, like a less flashy, cheaply done variant of Ching Siu-Tung and his later work on the SWORDSMAN movies.

Not everything about RETURN OF THE BASTARD SWORDSMAN is really all that great. As mentioned, the script and actual narrative leave something to be desired, and it certainly still has that feeling of a Shaw Brothers retread. While the kinetic editing and flashier camera work add something to the proceedings, the all too familiar sets, the lack of ability to truly go all out with wacky camera work and cinematography that would become not only standard for Hong Kong, but what was expected of it, and the fact that the special effects are mostly just gaudy, ugly animation keep the movie from being anything more than one of the more enjoyable desperate bids for attention of a studio in the throes of slow death. Even worse are some examples that just seem like badly thought out film making. For example, there's at least one instance of a fight taking place in what looks like a public park with a picnic bench clearly visible in the background (couldn't they have taken a few minutes to move it?). But like BUDDHA'S PALM, what it does well, it does well, and we're left with a very silly, very enjoyable, very entertaining sequel to BASTARD SWORDSMAN, which was every one of those things as well, just better. I had fun though.