Late in the 70's Kung Fu cycle, director King Hu shows how to direct classic Wu Xia. This swordplay film focuses mainly on action. The setup is minimal, characters are barely introduced, if at all. No story, little exposition, no romance. Just a series of scenes where the heroes, always outnumbered, cleverly draw the pirates into traps, and then fight them. Hu is mostly interested in the tactics and cunning. His direction of the action scenes is exemplary and a joy to watch: dynamic movement, jump cuts, fast camera movements, quick strokes, rhythmic dancelike movements. The fight choreography is presented more like the films of the 60's, emphasizing rhythm and movement over clarity. This is not the movie to watch if you want to study different fighting styles. The most exemplary scene is the last one, which features a duel between Ying Bai and Sammo Hung. It does not matter that Sammo is a much better martial artist, the scene is so dynamic, cut with quick strokes at the fast rhythm of clanging swords, that the viewer cannot observe for even a short moment what each fighter is doing, but gets taken instead by the sheer momentum and mayhem. Only in the 80's did Tsui Hark and Honk Kong Cinema pick up where King Hu had pioneered.

The performers are charismatic, in particular Ying Bai as the cool hero (very 60's in style), and the lovely Feng Hsu as the cool, silent but deadly wife. She is such a striking presence in this film, that it is not surprising that King Hu featured her in practically all his movies during this period. Sammo Hung is appropriately menacing as the head Japanese pirate and was responsible for the fight choreography. The landscapes (possibly Taiwan) are impressively and beautifully filmed, creating great settings for the action scenes and adding to the pure enjoyment of watching this well orchestrated and graceful film.

It starts with the helpful narrator explaining to us about the pirate problem. If you suspect the pirates are Japanese then you have been paying attention.

There is not much to this movie. The plot, characters, backstory, are all simple. Yet there is a lot to this movie. That contradiction is because of the director. Enough has been said about King Hu so I will say only a little more. He took all the simplicity and made it rich.

It could be said Sammo Hung did the same for the fights. It's almost all swordfights and that could make the action repetitive and tiresome. Sammo keeps the action fresh by keeping it simple.

I am a hard core fan of martial arts movies of the golden age from 1967 to 1984. I have had this movie on DVD for years now and just realized I never watched it. That was a pleasant surprise. More of a surprise was the enjoyment. I will add this movie to my list of best of 1975.

Corrupt officials have taken bribes and allowed a band of Japanese pirates - which includes Han Yingjie (Han Ying-chieh), Hakatatsu (Sammo Hung) and Simon Yuen as a bald pirate with a bo staff - to terrorize the South China coast. A small band of fighters, led by husband and wife Wu Ji-Yuan (Pai Ying) and Wu Ruo-Shi (Hsu Feng), have come together to stop them.

Made at the same time as The Fate of Lee Khan, director and writer King Hu has made a world where one big fight still solves things, but to get there our heroes must endure corruption at nearly every turn.

Yet what an ending, as Sammo makes for a wonderfully brutal final boss after a film filled with not just amazing action, but plenty of gorgeous coastal scenes. Hu also realizes that the music is not just wallpaper, but instead makes the fights more dramatic and impactful.

I'm all for more pirates battling against heroic martial artists; what else is out there?