SOUL OF THE SWORD is a slightly above average Shaw Brothers movie that benefits from a fast pace and plenty of sword fights to see it through; it's also less confusing than one of the, say, Chor Yuen films that Ti Lung made during the late 1970s. In this one he plays an arrogant swordsman who makes it his business to beat all his peers and become the number one swordsman. He starts the film off by impaling a budgerigar, so I wasn't exactly endeared to his character, and he remains arrogant throughout.The rest of the film benefits from the usual strong cinematography that Shaw brought to Hong Kong cinema, and the appearance of the usual players from that company: Ku Feng is an ally, Norman Chu a rival, Lily Li an assassin, Yuen Wah a white-haired master, and so on. The choreography isn't quite top tier, but the fights are brisk and violent, and the ending's a cracker, so there's little to dislike about this one.

When Nameless (Ti Lung) witnesses the death of a swordsman at the hands of the mysterious Lu Tien Kang (who keeps his face covered so no one will know who he is; a great way to avoid answering for whatever problems you might cause others), he is shocked to see the swordsman's wife commit suicide to be with her dead spouse. Being a kid, this leaves quite an impression on him (he is haunted by visions of the dead woman) and he grows to manhood driven to meet and one day kill the mysterious Lu. He kills anyone who gets in his way (or who stumbles across his path). "My worth is my sword," he proudly proclaims at one point. "There are three kinds of people," he learns: "Men, women, and the dead." When he encounters an elderly priest, whose flexible sword "is long but flaccid," he leaves the man pinned upside down to a temple gate. "Leaves when dead will fall..." Because he is attacked while in a bath, he thereafter refuses to take a bath "without holding my sword." (...) He meets and falls for Miss Ho- but can a man driven to be the best swordsman in the Martial Arts World measure up...?

Another period Chinese film about martial artists battling for the rank of number 1. How is Shen Hua the obscure director of the legendary "Super Inframan" going to shake up the genre?First of all, this film is very unlike other Shaw films. Shen Hua had a distinct visual style going here, one that doesn't really work all the times but is interesting. There are many shots with the main characters somewhere behind a lot of foreground clutter. Trying to read the subtitles and find the characters at the same time can make this a tad difficult to watch. Also Shen Hua's direction tends to hide Tang Chia's expert choreography. There is an attempt to use zooms and quick cuts to accentuate the dramatic dialog which is a very interesting concept but can be dizzying to watch.Despite the directorial problems, the story is one of the better entries in the martial world genre. It's unusual although you might guess some of the surprises. Ti Lung and Ku Feng give great performances and the fight scenes are very good. There is a small amount of nudity, a strange sex scene and a rape by the good guy (!).An eight for the story and a six for the direction. Recommended.

SOUL OF THE SWORD (1978) is a swordplay drama from Hong Kong's Shaw Bros. studio starring Ti Lung and featuring several superb fight sequences involving both sword fighting and kung fu. However, it's quite different from the studio's usual swordplay films, particularly those directed by Chor Yuen (THE MAGIC BLADE) and Chang Cheh (BLOOD BROTHERS), both of whom also worked frequently with Ti Lung. This one has fewer characters and more of an emphasis on the romantic relationship that grows between "Nameless" (Ti Lung), a swordsman seeking to unseat the current "King of Swords," and Ho Lien, a young woman shopkeeper (Lin Chen-Chi) with whom he falls in love. In between sword fights, the film addresses the question of how love affects a swordsman's destiny. Complicating matters is the fact that the woman is identical in appearance to a woman glimpsed by "Nameless" as a boy in the film's opening sequence. In that scene, a swordsman who challenges the King of Swords is defeated and killed and his woman companion (also played by Lin Chen-Chi) kills herself out of grief. This incident inspires "Nameless" to excel in swordsmanship so he can defeat the "King," but also haunts him with visions of the dead woman and has tragic implications later on. Ku Feng plays Chiu I, the last of the film's three leading characters, a clever doctor who befriends Nameless and offers him advice.Directed by Hua Shan (INFRAMAN, LITTLE DRAGON MAIDEN), the film is beautifully shot and edited and includes an important cinematic feature less frequently used in the films of Chor Yuen and Chang Cheh. Hua Shan and his cinematographer provide frequent closeups of the leading performers, adding a powerful emotional lift to the story. It helps that Ti Lung is at the top of his game here, as both an actor and an action star, and that Lin Chen-Chi is a most beautiful young actress who photographs well from every angle. This is only the third film I've seen her in (the others are SPIRITUAL BOXER, also reviewed on this site, and BATTLE WIZARD), yet I find her among the most riveting of Shaw Bros. actresses. Breaking with the conventional model of Shaw Bros. beauty, she's thin and angular with a long nose and thick lips too big for a small face but balanced by piercing eyes set wide apart and a nice space of forehead. The cumulative effect is just mesmerizing and the cameraman seems to agree.One of the small number of significant supporting characters is Yien (Norman Chu), a rival swordsman who has unsuccessfully courted Ho Lien, only to see her fall for Nameless. His attempts to settle matters are equally unsuccessful, although he gains an ally in a vengeful swordswoman who'd lost a female partner to Nameless's sword earlier in the film. (Kung fu diva Lily Li has a cameo as the ill-fated partner, with awkward shots of a nude body double spliced in.) The large number of cast members listed by IMDb for this film is presumably accounted for by the numerous quickly-glimpsed and hastily-dispatched opponents of Nameless.The consistently exciting action is staged by Tang Chia and includes a number of sword duels and larger-scale fights in which Ti Lung faces off against multiple opponents, including one memorable confrontation in a studio-built bamboo forest. Ti is also forced to fight without sword in more than one battle and uses his kung fu skills to great effect. The fights may not be as brutal or bloody as those found in Chang Cheh's films, but they're also far less gimmicky and stylized than those in Chor Yuen's films. This is a film that relies more on character and relationships and less on tricks and plot twists. There's a very moving and evocative Chinese music score tying it all together, a welcome change-of-pace from the mix-and-match, cut-and-paste scores we often hear in these films.