Seven Swords (2005)

Seven warriors come together to protect a village from a diabolical General.

Director:

Hark Tsui

Writers:

Chi-Sing Cheung, Tin Nam Chun

Stars:

Leon Lai, Donnie Yen, Charlie Yeung

3 wins & 24 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Leon Lai	...	Yang Yuncong (as Ming Li)
Donnie Yen	...	Chu Zhaonan
Charlie Yeung	...	Wu Yuanying
Honglei Sun	...	General Fire-Wind
Yi Lu	...	Han Zhibang
So-yeon Kim	...	Green Pearl
Chia-Liang Liu	...	Fu Qingzhu
Jingchu Zhang	...	Liu Yufang
Li-Wu Tai	...	Xin Longzi
Duncan Lai	...	Mu Lang (as Kwan-Tat Chow)
Jason Piao Pai	...	Liu Jingyi (as Piao Pai)
Kuan-Chun Chi	...	Qiu Dongluo
Peng Huang	...	Guan Sandao
Haitao Li	...	Twelve Guardians (Si Yilang)
Jingwu Ma	...	Master Shadow Glow

Storyline

In the early 1600's, the Manchurians have taken over sovereignty of China and established the Ching Dynasty. While many nationalist revolts still brew within the martial artists' community, the newly set-up government immediately imposes a Martial Arts Ban, forbidding the practice of martial arts altogether in order to gain control and order. Wind Fire (Sun Hong-Lei), a surrendered military official from the previous dynasty, sees this as an opportunity to make a fortune for himself by helping to execute the new law. Greedy, cruel, and immoral, Wind Fire ravages the North-western China, and his next goal is to attack the final frontier, Martial Village. Fu Qingzhu, a retired executioner from the previous dynasty, feels the need to put a stop to this brutality and sets out to save Bowei Fortress. He brings Wu Yuanyin and Han Zhiban from the village with him to Mount Heaven to seek help from Master Shadow-Glow, a hermit who is a master of swords and leads a group of disciples of great ...

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Plot Keywords:

village | sword | martial arts | china | journey | 

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Genres:

Action | Adventure | Fantasy

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Certificate:

Not Rated

Did You Know?

Trivia

This was the last film that Chia-Liang Liu starred in before his death in 2013.

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Connections

References The Flying Guillotine (1975)

User Reviews

Nice Comeback!

I saw ZU:Warriors from the Magic Mountain and found that one incredibly too fast for both my eyes and my brain. Nevertheless, it was a great spectacle that left me shouting all the way from beginning to the end "WOW!!" Then I saw Legend of Zu, and I went "God I don't want to watch this.. pleaseee!" Then I rented 7-Swords and thought it would be something either in the first category (really fast editing, you don't know who's who, or who's fighting with who, etc) or in the second one (lots of special effects, bad music, no story - yes I'm talking abt the Legend of Zu) But, 7-swords exceeded my expectations! It give nice backgrounds to the characters and their motivation, the editing was a nice flow, at some points I even thought that the movie was going too slow, considering that it's Tsui Hark who made Zu, whenever he took time to develop stories between characters.

I talked to a friend and he said "It's not worth watching, just another commercial film". HELLO? From the very beginning, Tsui Hark had always made commercial films, what did you expect? Duh.. In terms of storytelling and kungfu fighting, i think 7-swords is much much better than Hero or House of Flying Daggers. I can't say if its better than Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon because I personally didn't find that movie special enough.. but it won an Oscar anyway, so...

7-Swords reminds me of the golden times when kungfu flicks are based on good choreography and not just colorful costumes and international stars. I was very disappointed with Legend of Zu because it's filled with bad can music and cg-animation. But 7-swords.. waow.. it's back to the original Tsui Hark.

Overall, its a nice comeback, good to see some real Chinese kungfu films again :)

Details

Official Sites:

Official site Official site [UK]

Country:

Hong Kong China South Korea

Language:

Mandarin Korean Cantonese

Release Date:

29 July 2005 (Hong Kong)

Also Known As:

Sete Espadas

Filming Locations:

Xinjiang, China

Box Office

Budget:

$18,000,000 (estimated)

Cumulative Worldwide Gross:

$3,473,290

Company Credits

Production Co:

Beijing Ciwen Digital Oriental Film & TV Production Co., Boram Entertainment, City Glory Pictures Ltd.

Technical Specs

Runtime:

153 min 141 min (cut)

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1