Michael Hui was already a popular funnyman on Hong Kong TV when the powerful Shaw Brothers studio enlisted him for this high-budget black comedy from helmer Li Han-hsiang. Casting a silver-screen newcomer in The Warlord’s title role was a daring choice, but it paid off handsomely when the film hit the theaters. In addition, it helped set in motion Hui’s rise to new box-office heights in the mid-1970s.
The setting is the early 20th century in northern China, where Pang Ta-fu (Hui) has emerged from the turmoil of the 1904-05 Russo-Japanese War as a top political figure. Taking over Shantung Province, Pang is faced with three months of drought — a calamity he’s able to end in a feat that wins over the masses. Soon the Warlord is dispensing justice and managing political intrigue and conflict, but his actions become increasingly reckless and ruthless when his hold on power is challenged.
Writer-director Li, a student of early Republic of China history, found a meeting point for many of his filmmaking specialties in The Warlord. His early talent in staging grand spectacles with lavish sets is on full display here, shooting on the Shaw Brothers’ backlot and inside impressive studio constructions. Also on show is the blend of comedy, eroticism and exploitation that characterized much of Li’s 1970s work.
Though not a wall-to-wall laughfest, The Warlord showcases Li’s versatility as a director who can deftly deploy a range of comedic styles, at its most subtle relying on sight gags (such as when a closeup pulls back to reveal an oversize kettle) and rising to lengthy (although not necessarily funny) scenes that culminate in a punch line. One of The Warlord’s most striking — and politically incorrect — scenes is a rape trial in which two sides of the story are told, Rashomon-style, before Pang orders guards to attempt a sexual assault in the courtroom.
Li also toys with the image of the bold chieftain, at turns depicting him as grandiose and easily deceived by cheating mistresses as well as prone to spectacularly unwise moves such as deciding war strategy at the dominoes table and robbing an empress’s tomb.
All that is fodder enough for a densely packed and darkly comic narrative. But what’s most memorable is the central performance of Hui in the role of Pang Ta-fu, a character based loosely on Yuan Shikai, the first President of the Republic of China and a leader who proclaimed himself emperor in late 1915 just months before his death. Even when made up to look older and with his lines dubbed into Mandarin, Hui shows off a splendid array of facial expressions, displays impeccable timing and uses comic devices such as repetition and exaggerated pride to great effect. Hui’s performance helped carry The Warlord almost to the top of the 1972 box office chart, coming in second only to Bruce Lee's kung fu cinema.
It wasn’t long before the actor was breaking out with a comedy blockbuster of his own in 1974’s Games Gamblers Play.
Tim Youngs