Face Behind the Mask, The (1979)

Dastardly double-crosses and delightfully dynamic swordplay abound in THE FACE BEHIND THE MASK, a faced-paced, Taiwanese wuxia pian featuring three of the genre’s leading superstars all performing at their best.

It’s not a huge surprise to discover that the film delivers unusually high-quality action scenes and dramatic thrills by independent genre standards. It’s helmed by veteran Hong Kong director Chan Chi-hwa, who started out working for Lo Wei on SHAOLIN WOODEN MEN which led to a long working relationship with Jackie Chan as assistant director on hits like THE YOUNG MASTER and POLICE STORY.

The action director isn’t credited, so I don’t know who to thank for the brilliant swordplay fighting in this movie. Whoever he is, he manages to make Lo Lieh and Yueh Hua look at least as good as in their many Shaw Brothers roles, if not better. And as for Hsu Feng, this wuxia queen of Taiwanese film is as deadly and beautiful as ever.

Lo and Yueh play first and second pupils of Chi Tien-wei, an elder swordsman who has just recently been elected to the top spot in the martial world. Hsu is Tien-wei’s daughter. Together, the three heroes have vanquished the last remnants of the martial world’s villains including the colorfully-named “Dragon and Tiger Malignant Stars” and the “Blood Evil Star,” or so they thought. Even as Tien-wei is celebrating with well wishers, assassins ordered by Szu-To Ming strike, but are thwarted by his pupils. This begins a series of similar assassination attempts and brazen and chilling warnings delivered to a perpetually petrified doorman at the Chi household.

An eventual confrontation with Szu-To Ming reveals that he is only the pawn of some greater villain and that someone close to Tien-wei is involved. Tien-wei and his close friend Tung Ling-hu begin to suspect that one of their top pupils may be the traitor. A traitor is finally uncovered, but is appears as if he was really framed… or was he? Apparent loyalties shift and nothing is left certain until the real villain lurking in the shadows and hiding his face behind a mask finally reveals himself in a climatic confrontation to decide the fate of Chi Tien-wei and the martial world.

Watching this movie post-CURSE OF THE GOLDEN FLOWER is quite interesting. Both movies share similarities in the extreme nature of their plot twists and how they’re dramatically revealed. This is a staple of good wuxia stories, which often are structured as Tang Dynasty-era soap opera mysteries. When done right, it can be of immense fun to ride along with. That’s certainly the case here, although I’m sure some viewers will scoff at the near-absurdity it borders on. Then again, if you’re watching a movie where people take superhuman leaps like Wonder Woman and do extended battle with all manner of weaponry in colorful outfits complimented by shiny headbands and wispy goatees, you better expect the story to be just as outrageous.

Also like CURSE, this film takes a deeper exploration into familial relations, not so much in the literal sense but more in how Lo Lieh’s character as an orphan relates to his master and father figure Tien-wei. Their relationship gets severely tested by the deceptions in the story and ultimately provides one of the more intriguing and satisfying aspects of the whole movie. It is this extra care taken in character development that shows despite any other minor faults the movie has, that the filmmakers were making more than just a throwaway genre movie like so many others.

A bit of welcome humor is injected by the light-hearted relationship between a clownish third brother who is always trying to impress the lesser pupils and the “doorman” of the Chi household, who generally ends up suffering for it when he’s not quaking with fright every time someone knocks on the door to deliver the next cryptic message of doom to Chi Tien-wei.

Production standards are uneven, with some sets looking quite picturesque and detailed, while others such as the villain’s secret lair are looking laughably bad. The same goes for the outdoor locales used, which range from a moody forest thick with trees to the typical barren dig site one can see as backdrop for countless low budget kung fu movie finales. At least is there is a nice variety of weapons and colorful costumes.

Swordplay in the film is well above average for anything not choreographed by the likes of studio directors like Sammo Hung and Lau Kar-leung. The choreography is still founded in the era before Ching Siu-tung and others began adding more sophisticated wirework and editing to the genre. But I’d argue that it represents about the best swordplay action you’ll likely find in a 1970s wuxia pian.

The proof is in the way in the AD (action director) handles group fights. The finale is an all out battle where the heroes take on a small army of swordsmen fronted by a couple of more unique villains with equally unique weapons. Just about every tried and true trick is employed including trampolines, acrobatic doubles, slow motion, and overhead leaps. The camera work for the fights is better than usual also as it appears that Chan managed to either get his hands on some track rigging for smooth panning or managed to simulate the effect with available resources.

Amid all of this are the stars and stuntmen who all perform their moves in a highly-coordinated and dynamic series of takes. A wonderful example is when Hsu Feng takes on three fighters. With the precision of a ballet dancer, she spins and weaves through two of them to evade a sword thrust that impales one, while she slices and impales the others with twin daggers. The last victim caps the scene with a flip.

On more than one occasion, we’re treated to terrific three-way duels. One-on-one fights are hard enough to do. This is definitely advanced fight work. Its representative of the kind of freestyle exhibition sparring one might see at wushu meets where three fighters go at each other, usually with two ganging up on one. It shows that Chan and the AD were well in tune with the current trends in leading martial arts choreography in the late ’70s. About this time top-level ADs like Sammo Hung and Wilson Tong were creating highly technical three-way kung fu sparring in films like THE ODD COUPLE and SNAKE IN THE MONKEY’S SHADOW.

It’s not all just technical prowess when it comes to the action. Like any great swordplay movie, THE FACE BEHIND THE MASK comes with a fair amount of fun gimmicks. The villain’s main weapons are a clawed glove and darts, both dipped in poison. He also springs a wild trap on the heroes where dozens of artificial hands fly out from every direction to impale their victims. Once the mask comes off, his weapon of choice changes to a utility sword capable of locking other swords or transforming into a fast-spinning blade for less discriminate slice and dice action. As for the violence level, at one point a swordsman’s face gets lightly sliced to ribbons by a fast thousand-stroke-like sword attack shortly before getting run through the middle, while on another occasion a heroes’ arm is graphically severed at the shoulder.

Production values could have been much better in places, while some of the camera effects including slow motion and intentional warping are cheaply done and annoying. Yet all-in-all, THE FACE BEHIND THE MASK is a very enjoyable swordplay movie. Lots of high-quality martial arts action is scattered throughout a genuinely puzzling mystery plot. Fans of Lo Lieh, Yueh Hua and Hsu Feng should be quite pleased with their performances, even as they’re balanced out by key roles from lesser-known stars.