When Chang Cheh’s swordfighting film The One-Armed
Swordsman received its premiere in July 1967, Hong
Kong was experiencing unprecedented riots. Large numbers
of workers, students, and citizens from all walks of
life had taken to the streets to protest the British colonialist’s
oppressive rule. This later resulted in terrorist
activities. Law enforcement units kept busy dealing with
the riots, and it was not until five months later that order
was finally restored.
During this period of turbulence, The One-Armed
Swordsman broke all previous box-office records. This
prompted Shaw Brothers, and other film companies, to
mass produce similarly-styled wuxia [chivalric] films.
The popularity of wuxia films preceded that of kung fu
films by six years. In the mid-Sixties, the Italian spaghetti
westerns and Japanese samurai films had a profound
impact on Hong Kong and South-East Asia. Shaw
Brothers immediately embarked on producing action films
with “Chinese characteristics” to win a share of the market.
These experiments had scripts prepared by Chang
Cheh, and were directed and acted by newcomers. The
result was a “new style of wuxia”– a series of swordplay
films with vigorous action, strong emotions, exaggerated
violence and bloodshed.
The initial attempts were only partially successful. But
when Come Drink With Me (1966, King Hu) and The One-
Armed Swordsman (1967, Chang Cheh) became boxoffice
hits, Shaw Brothers went all-out to promote the
“Colour Era of Wuxia Movies”.
In 1968, The One-Armed Swordsman was distributed in
Italy and received a lukewarm reception. I remember seeing
the film’s Italian version by chance at a little cinema at
Capri in December 1971. There were not many visitors at
Capri in winter time and the cinema was quite empty. At
that time, Bruce Lee’s The Big Boss (1971) was a huge
hit in South-East Asia, and the kung-fu craze was about
to sweep the globe. In less than a year, Italy was caught
in this mania and by mid-August 1973, over 30 martial
arts films were shown all over Italy.
The One-Armed Swordsman told the story of a young
knight (Wang Yu) whose relationship with a female disciple
(Pan Yingzi) leads to a misunderstanding one snowy
evening, when she cuts off his right arm. Thereafter, he
leads the life of a recluse in a fishing village with his
benefactress (Lina Chiao), and assiduously trains as a
swordsman using only his left hand. When an implacable
enemy threatens his former martial arts school with
destruction, and the female disciple is kidnapped, the
one-armed swordsman returns to save his master and
family, using his broken blade to kill the enemy. He then
leaves. Less than a third into the film, we are shown the
hero losing his arm – a bold narrative touch. We see his
depression, then his resolve to become a heroic onearmed
swordsman.
On the one hand, there is the influence of spaghetti
Westerns where the hero meets with misfortune and
humiliation but finally delivers the comeuppance to his
tormentors. On the other hand, Chang borrows from
Louis Cha’s martial arts novel describing the young hero-whose arm is cut off by the girl who loves him - returning
good for evil. Chang’s borrowing does not seem out of
place.
The real innovation of the film lies in its cinematic rendering
of the action sequences. Photography, editing, art
direction, and music are employed to build atmosphere
and pacing. The severing of Wang Yu’s arm during a
snowy night scene is something which imparts a sense of
icy cruelty. He recuperates in a fisherman’s village, and
finds love with the woman who saves him. Their love
scene takes place by the river. His training scenes take
place at dusk, or dawn - something which add ambience.
But the talking-point remains the well-choreographed
fight scenes and the unusual design of the weapons. The
Long-Armed Devil and his gang fight with a weapon that
traps and locks the golden swords of their opponents,
who are then dispatched with daggers. This formidable
weapon is useless against Wang Yu’s broken blade. The
Long-Armed Devil (Yang Zhiqing) carries on his back four
short spears, and a metal staff. He is also adept with the
whip. Each weapon possesses its own advantages that
are difficult for the enemy to withstand.
In the final combat between Wang Yu and Yang Zhiqing,
the audience is anxiously waiting to see how Wang Yu will
defeat his enemy’s weapons with his short broken blade.
The sequence is skilfully staged. In the whipping scene,
the camera is hand-held, following the movements of the
combatants. The scene becomes even more powerful with
the sound effects. The whole movie conjures up sensations
of tragedy, melancholia, and depression, mixed with
heroism and noble suffering. These are crucial elements
that may explain the box-office success of the film.
After The One-Armed Swordsman, Chang scored another
success the same year, The Assassin/Da Cike, followed by
The Golden Swallow/Jin Yanzi (1968), and The Return of
the One-Armed Swordsman/Di Bi Dao Wang (1969).
These successes brought status and respectability to
Chang and the new school martial arts films. Chang was
the sole leader of the new school, and inspired many imitators.
Directors of all ages at the Shaw Brothers studio
were compelled to follow in Chang’s tracks. Thus, in
1968, Shaw released 12 martial arts films out of a total
of 29 productions. In 1969, there were 17 wuxia films
out of 35; in 1970 (16 to 34); in 1971 (24 to 39), in
1972 (26 to 37). Martial arts had become Shaw
Brothers’ major genre.
Chang himself said that it wasn’t until The Golden Swallow
that he established his own style. Beginning with that film,
it becomes increasingly evident that Chang was fond of
focusing on the knight-errant’s lofty sentiments and aspirations,
his life and death existence, and his youthful
rebelliousness. These themes are pushed to the utmost
romantic limits. The love between man and woman, and
moral love, are themes relegated to the sidelines. Male
friendship, the pursuit of individualism and righteousness,
are prominent themes. His films usually end in violent
death. Even when the hero is mortally wounded, he fights
on to the last drop of blood, continuing to kill more of
the enemy.
Chang deliberately uses slow-motion to prolong the sensations
of death. This is Chang’s aesthetic of violence,
which at the time aroused a lot of negative criticism. His
defence was that he wanted to express the beauty of
machismo: “I use dance to express pain, emotion, and
death,” he said. “The whole world is immersed in violence,
so how can the movies avoid it? Of course, each
filmmaker has his own style, but my style of macho emotion
and rebelliousness is integrated with the violence, and there’s nothing wrong with that.” Chang also pointed
out in his memoirs: “The Assassin [which includes a grisly
death scene] was made during the 1967 riots. I was not
living inside the Shaw Studio at the time. When going to
work, I encountered the results of the explosions of
home-made bombs. The fervour, violence, and rebelliousness
of The Assassin were clearly touched by the 1967
riots.”
Certain critiques have focused on his films’ yang gang
[masculine] characteristics. The have been understood
as simple machismo, with all its implications of boldness,
unrestrained shows of strength, love of fighting, and
martyrdom. However, if we look closely at Chang’s early
works, there are many descriptions of men down on their
luck– knights-errant who receive the cold treatment or
are wrong done by, and are hard-pressed by love. These
heroes seek to escape, shut themselves up, and become
introspective failures. They become born again through
the guidance and encouragement of both female and
male friends, gradually regaining the confidence and selfrespect
to become macho once more.
Thereafter, they repay the friendship given to them, fight
and even die for their friends. This is to say that Chang
Cheh’s heroes are not yang gang all at once. On the contrary,
there is a long process of yin [feminine] softness in
which the heroes are immersed in sorrowful wallowing,
melancholy, depression, and all kinds of complex emotions.
These emotions are expressed in a rather anomalous
manner, which is quite new and unique in the wuxia
cinema.
Chang Cheh was not the only director at Shaw Brothers
studio to deal with martial arts. However, in terms of personal
style, Chang is the most striking and most consistent.
He later fell into a rut of slovenly filmmaking and his
standards notably slipped. But his ideas remained strong.
He cultivated many followers, including Wang Yu, Di Long,
David Chiang/Jiang Dawei, Wu Ma, Danny Lee/Li Xiuxian,
and John Woo/Wu Yusen – all of whom established their
own styles, continuing the action tradition.
In the mid-70s, Chang’s martial arts director and action
choreographer Lau Kar-leung/Liu Jialiang became a
director in his own right, making his own impact on the
film world with kung fu. In the 80s, Lau’s achievements
surpassed that of Chang’s.
Note: Part of this article appears in the anthology The
Shaw Screen, published by the Hong Kong Film Archive,
2003
Law Kar