Magic Taoism: ‘White Bone Yin Yang Sword, Part 1′

Features | Electric Shadows | by Jean Lukitsh

WHITE BONE YIN YANG SWORD (alternate title THE INGENIOUS SWORDS), Part 1 (1962). Directed by Ling Wan. starring Yu So-chau, Walter Tso, Connie Chan Po-chu, and Shek Kin.

Walter Tso and Yu So-chau are students of a Taoist master of magic and martial arts, who sends them off in search of a magic sword. Connie Chan is the beloved daughter of a wealthy and kind-hearted man. Their paths cross because of Shek Kin, the cruel enforcer of a sorceress known as Ghost Mother. After Tso and Yu intervene to protect an innkeeper from Shek’s extortion, they become enemies of Ghost Mother’s gang. As her name implies, Ghost Mother’s power comes from the dead. She uses human bones – a magic ray-emitting skull, an animated skeleton – to magically threaten the heroes.

Ghost Mother with her magic skull.

Tso and Yu have a powerful talisman of their own that counters her sendings. Thwarted, Ghost Mother’s next attack is on Connie Chan’s house, where a mysterious beggar woman and her young daughter have taken refuge. Chan’s father and the beggar are killed, but not before we see the woman conceal a small knife in her daughter’s sleeve. The daughter escapes with Chan and a servant.

Pursued by Shek Kin and Ghost Mother, the fugitives continually stumble into trouble and are rescued each time by Tso and Yu. All five of the protagonists are driven to seek shelter in a cave, which happens to be home to an extremely hostile wood spirit. While Ghost Mother and her gang watch from a safe spot, the heroes battle the monster valiantly but unsuccessfully. Reinforcements are dispatched by the Taoist master, but nothing stops the fire-breathing demon until the beggar’s daughter plunges her little dagger into his single eye. He’s transformed into a pile of bones, and two of the bones further transform into the Yin Yang Swords, a matched set of rippled blades that suggest flattened spinal columns. Tso hands the swords to Chan and the beggar’s daughter, which triggers an attack by Ghost Mother’s gang, since these are the famous magic swords desired by all masters of the jianghu. A friendly corpse herder shows up in the nick of time and directs her zombies to kill the intruders, but Ghost Mother escapes. End of Part 1.

I know, I know. A what directs who…? Well, the corpse herder is a lovely young woman who also studies magic and kung fu with the Taoist master. And I didn’t even mention the little girl with the paper sword who fights the monster. Or the giant flying centipede. The WHITE BONE YIN YANG SWORD series is an old fashioned Hong Kong mash-up, half BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER and half Halloween theme party, with a miniscule budget and crude but exuberant special effects. The battling skeleton is a life-size marionette; the magic rays are painted directly on the film stock. This style of wuxia shenguai (martial arts/magic spirit) film has been intermittently popular since the late 1920s, when the commercial successes like BURNING OF RED LOTUS TEMPLE showed that a combination of opera- and kung fu-inspired live action and movie magic could be box office dynamite.

The director and cast of WHITE BONE YIN YANG SWORD are the same as the later film A GODDESS’ SWORD, and it’s probably typical of the kind of movies Yu, Tso, and the very young Connie Chan were making at the time. The actors all seem to be enjoying themselves. The humor is very broad; most of the menace is played straight. There’s a nice variety of weapon styles shown by the leads. Walter Tso uses a long stick as his signature weapon. Yu So-chau has a straight sword (gim) but often wields the empty scabbard in her left hand, turning her swordplay into a double weapon style. Shek Kin uses a broadsword (do) and shows the tan tui “spring step” in his footwork. Unfortunately, very little of the fighting is straightforward combat choreography. Modern fans may complain that kung fu movies now rely too much on CGI, but this type of story has always used whatever special effects were available to depict “real” magic. I’m not sure who the choreographer of WHITE BONE YIN YANG SWORD was, but Lau Kar-leung can be seen briefly as a young Taoist monk, and his brother Lau Kar-wing turns up as a brawler in a street scene.

First posted on May 6, 2007.