Blog the Fest: Seven Swords

Film Title: Seven Swords
Director: Tsui Hark


Early in the Qing Dynasty, the royal court has imposed a ban forbidding the practice of martial arts in an effort to prevent an uprising. A military official named Fire-Wind (Sun Hong-lei), sees an opportunity to make a fortune by helping enforce the prohibition. After massacring countless innocent people, he targets the last hold-out: Martial Village. Retired executioner Fu Qin-zhu - played by famed Shaw Brothers Studio director Lau Kar-leung - resolves to protect the community and travels to distant Mount Heaven to procure the services of Master Shadow-Glow (Ma Jing-wu), a legendary swordsmith. Together they enlist a number of young warriors and bestow seven unique swords upon them to use in battle against Fire-Wind ruthless army.

The latest from Tsui Hark, never really a big fan of his work, the last one of his work that i saw was Time and Tide, and i liked his "Sinnui yauwan" serie...
since i know this is a pretty big production for Seven Swords, and my friend is a big fan of TH's films, so i guess i will give it a try and see it on the big screen..


WHICH, is not that great of a decision...
The camerawork is alright, the Kung Fu style that Tsui always employed, just the usual Lau Kar Leung work..and what i expected to see in the film..
BUT the story just failed really bad..
Because the movie title is named "Seven Swords", so i expected the characters with these 7 swords will be more in depth and more defined...
we do not see the characters get trained, how they developed their skills, why there are these swords, how did they exist, nothing..
why they are so good and kick everyone's ass...

The intro to the 7 swordsman really sucked, the village was under attack, so they just went to the mountains to get help, and boom, some fire fell out of the sky, all the characters blacked out and out comes the swordsman from nowhere, no explaination of where they came from, and they just agree to help the villager just like that...


Wu Yuan Yin (Charlie Yeung), a normal villager who almost got kill at the beginning of the film, also was able to inherent one of the legendary swords, when she doesn't even know how to use it and almost hurt herself..

The storyline just doesn't flow..
Tsui added a few romance lines into the film,
in one scene, Yang Yun Cho (Leon Lai) just teaches Yin how to use the sword, in the next scene they are together, Charlie already fell for him..
another incident, Chu Zhao Nan (Donnie Yen) just gave a bowl of wine to the elder's daughter and bing,
she is in love with him, what she was fed a love potion in the wine??

And i don't understand when the villagers have to give up their horses, and Han is really sad to see one of them go (Joy Luck), there is none what so ever why he misses that one horse so much.. is it his childhood friend or something? the horse that he learn how to ride on?

The movie is adapted from a novel, the same author as the White Hair Bride, i have never read the novel itself, but the story/plot of the movie just is cheating its audience...

If you don't care if a movie have any content, just want to see some great action scenes, then i suggest you can just rent one of Tsui Hark's old Wong Fei-Hong or Dung Fong Bat Baai movies, which has more heart in its filmmaking and actually touches the audience..