Writer-director King Hu’s second wuxia film and his follow-up to COME DRINK WITH ME is yet another genre masterpiece that stands the test of time thanks to a thrilling story of Ming-era espionage, lush visuals, iconic heroes and villains, and chambara-influenced swordplay action and cinematography, all wrapped together in a sophisticated presentation rarely seen within the wuxia genre apart from modern swordplay epics like ASHES OF TIME and HERO.
One of the most appealing aspects of DRAGON INN is its historical-driven story which was somewhat unique by genre standards at the time of release. Before King Hu came along, wuxia stories largely existed within a fantasy realm of qi-blasting energy, flying sword heroes and martial clans feuding over dominance of one another, often presented in a stagy, operatic fashion. This colorful depiction of the jiang hu, or martial underworld, often marked by elaborate wirework and special effects, was mildly tapped by Hu in COME DRINK WITH ME but after breaking ties with Shaw Brothers he thereafter moved his new stylized brand of action closer to reality. This can be seen in setting, art direction and narrative tone.
DRAGON INN is set in 1457 during the Ming Dynasty when eunuchs commonly served the emperor. In the film, one of these castrated men, a certain blonde-haired Tsao Shao-chin (Bai Ying) has become head of a notoriously evil wing of the government known as the Eastern Agency. They essentially performed the function of spies to use clandestine and frequently unlawful tactics in order to protect the sovereignty of the Emperor, yet more often to protect the interests of the corrupt eunuch.
Where the story begins, Minister of Defense Yu Chien is wrongly accused of treason against the state and executed. His children are ordered by the state into exile to a remote border region known as the Dragon Gate. Having orchestrated the frame up, Chao fears possible reprisal by the children and secretly orders his men to assassinate them before they arrive at their destination. An unknown swordsman intervenes, forcing Chao to send his two chief lieutenants, both top swordsmen named Pi Hsiao-tang (Miao Tien) and Mao Tsung-hsien (Han Ying-chieh), to finish the job.
Hsiao-tang and Tsung-hsien, along with a sizable band of undercover operatives ride ahead of their target to take over the Dragon Inn, a remote teahouse that Yu’s children will be forced to visit on their journey in order to stock up on provisions.
Enter our first hero, Hsiao Shao-tzu (Shih Chun), a gentleman swordsman and personal friend of the Dragon Inn’s owner Wu Ning (Cho Kin), who arrives at the inn with a green, spear-tipped umbrella in hand. He immediately suspects the suspicious occupants of foul play. After a failed attempt by the spies to poison Shao-tzu ends with one of their own dead and threatens to blow their whole operation, the crafty Hsiao-tang, fearing Shao-tzu’s fighting ability, intervenes to calm tensions while planning his next move.
Polly Shang-kuan and Hsieh Han in DRAGON INN (1967).
Next enters Polly Shang-kuan in her big screen debut as Chu Hui, a swordswoman dressed as a man and escorted by her fiery-tempered brother Chu Chi (Hsieh Han). The pair force their way into the inn despite efforts by a distraught waiter to keep them out. Chu Hui is the wiser of the two and quickly picks up on the fact that most of the inn’s occupants are not to be trusted. The two eventually join forces with the inn’s owner and swordsman Shao-tzu in planning to rescue the Yu children from this carefully laid trap. Meanwhile, Hsiao-tang and Tsung-hsien, fully aware that these four are working against them, plot to rid themselves of these would-be sword heroes.
When the Yu children finally do arrive at the inn, the face-saving pleasantries are dispensed with and all hell breaks loose as battle erupts between opposing sides. After an initial assault by the Eastern Agency members fails, word is sent to their master and soon Eunuch Tsao Shao-chin arrives to settle matters himself. This is bad news for the heroes as they discover through two agents who have defected that Tsao has deadly fighting skills honed from childhood that may surpass their own.
As the Yu children and their remaining escorts sneak away from the inn to make a final, desperate flight to safety in the surrounding mountains, Shao-tzu and his companions face down Tsao and his forces in a fight to the finish.
DRAGON INN was the first production of Union Film Company, one of Taiwan’s largest film distributors in the 1960s. They formed a production house and built their own studio in 1965 after breaking ties with Li Han-hsiang’s failed Grand Motion Pictures Company. Union easily lured King Hu away from Shaw Brothers. The auteur had had a rocky relationship with the controlling Run Run Shaw from the beginning. Hu’s first film had been re-shot by another director, the second went over budget and Shaw had expressed dissatisfaction with COME DRINK WITH ME before it was released. Clearly, Hu did not fit the studio system, a fact that became evident in his subsequent films which became longer and more tailored to the filmmaker’s artistic sensibilities with each release.
The film is remarkable in that virtually all of the lead cast were new. Future TOUCH OF ZEN star Shih Chun was making his big screen debut as the heroic lead. Although not known for his screen fighting skill he makes for a charming and competent swordplay lead, aided by various tricks of the trade. He’s matched well by newcomer Polly Shang-kuan, a feisty 17-year-old who went on to greater stardom as one of the few female kung fu stars of the 1970s. Although forced to share screen time with her co-stars it’s evident that Shang-kuan was upstaging everyone with her energetic physical performance. This film doesn’t provide us with her best showcase as a martial arts star but I would argue that it is the overall best film she appeared in throughout her roughly 12-year film career.
Although it may not appear so by viewers unfamiliar with Ming-era garb and genre convention, Shang-kuan spends the entire movie dressed as a man and is treated as such, at least until Hsiao Shao-tzu makes physical contact and discovers to his surprise that her character is in fact a woman in disguise. King Hu goes just far enough in his acknowledgement of Shang-kuan’s onscreen gender to later suggest that there might be some unspoken romantic interest shared between her and Shao-tze. The only other character to acknowledge her true gender is the eunuch, although it’s never made clear why he is able to discern this and supposedly no one else is.
Bai Ying (sitting) in DRAGON INN (1967).
There is a long tradition in Chinese opera and subsequently Chinese wuxia and period kung fu movies, of women dressing as male heroes. In some cases they were actually playing male characters but what was more common at the time of this film’s release was for women playing female fighting characters to dress as men so they could move about freely in a period in Chinese history where it would have been inappropriate for a respectable woman to be getting into fights with men, not to mention the unwanted attention a heroine might attract from would-be male suitors and sex offenders. The problem with this today is that audiences can choose to suspend their disbelief that a beauty like Shang-kuan could pass herself off as a man but it takes considerable effort. Nevertheless, this convention has remained in place ever since and in 2000 director Ang Lee paid homage to the cross-dressing swordswoman in his wuxia film CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON by having Zhang Ziyi’s character dress as a man while going on a rebellious fighting spree.
Bai Ying, who went on to have a long and fruitful career in martial arts cinema makes his debut in a very memorable role as the evil, blond-haired eunuch. It’s quite possible that with this role, King Hu created the prototype for what would become the stereotypical “supervillain” of martial arts cinema all throughout the ’70s and early ’80s. I refer to those martial arts masters, often sporting white hair to denote internal mastery of their qi energy, who required extreme skill or multiple opponents to defeat. For instance, it’s not difficult to see a measure of Bai’s performance in Lo Lieh’s white-haired take on “Pai Mei” in the kung fu classic CLAN OF THE WHITE LOTUS. The seemingly invincible fighting eunuch is a role that Donnie Yen attempted early in his career in Tsui Hark’s 1992 remake of DRAGON INN with a measure of success, despite being too young to be playing what was intended to be an elder sword master.
In only his second role is the steely-jawed Miao Tien as Eunuch Tsao’s crafty chief lieutenant whose fear of Shao-tzu’s skill leads him to attempt to bribe the hero. He also had a long career in martial arts cinema with subsequent roles in A TOUCH OF ZEN, Jackie Chan’s HALF A LOAF OF KUNG FU, but perhaps most notably in Shaw Brothers’ costume epic THE EMPRESS DOWAGER.
The only relatively experienced lead cast member was also the action director. Han Ying-chieh plays the eunuch’s second in command and battles both lead heroes without upstaging either of them like a good action director should. He does have one memorable stunt clearly performed without a double where he leaps off the top of the inn onto a hidden trampoline and somersaults sideways over a wall. Cool stuff.
Today, Han Ying-chieh is best known as the action director who was overshadowed by Bruce Lee in THE BIG BOSS and FIST OF FURY. It’s an unfair position he ended up in on those two films because his previous choreography could be included among that of Lau Kar-leung, Tang Chia and Sammo Hung as being part of the “next generation” movement in Chinese cinema that was revolutionizing screen fighting in the late ’60s and early ’70s. Han’s work on the fight sequences in COME DRINK WITH ME was cutting edge for its time, although King Hu’s influence was clearly felt as well. This was actually Han’s third pairing with Hu and he remained the director’s favored choreographer through VALIANT ONES in 1975. Han later directed Polly Shang-kuan in the kung fu classic GENERAL STONE (1976) and the costume epic THE LAST BATTLE OF YANG CHAO (1978).
Shih Chun as sword hero “Hsiao Shao-tzu” in DRAGON INN (1967).
Han’s choreography in DRAGON INN is tightly woven with Hu’s direction so it’s difficult to discern where his influence begins and Hu’s ends. This is unlike the work of other action directors such as Yuen Woo-ping where directors frequently deferred to them on all things pertaining to an action sequence. DRAGON INN isn’t marked by any outstanding fight sequences and there is some noticeable undercranking, although there is plenty of solid swordplay action throughout that benefit from long takes and judicious trick editing to enhance character abilities. Instead, what makes the action in this movie great is how Hu incorporates it with the rest of the movie. Unlike other martial arts filmmakers, Hu maintains the balance between action and drama. Swordplay is a device that Hu uses to tell a story rather than a centerpiece with which to build a story around. Most swordplay movies are driven by action which means that the pace is dictated by the need for constant motion. Truthfully, martial arts moviemakers in Hong Kong and Taiwan were targeting rather unsophisticated audiences, not unlike most genre filmmakers and their output reflected this. Hu was an exception and DRAGON INN is possibly his best example of an intelligent and thoughtful martial arts movie that was driven by something more than clanging metal and bloodletting. This is probably where Hu’s interest in Japanese cinema came into play, more dramatically even than in the picturesque environments or bold staging of scenes.
Visually, DRAGON INN is flawless. King Hu is a master conceptualist and implementer of his conceptions. While all of the martial arts movies coming out of Taiwan and Hong Kong were in 35mm widescreen at this time, few made use of that wide angle lens anywhere near as well as King Hu did. The choice of perspectives, use of close-ups or wide angles, general scene composition, and pacing of edits are all complimentary and visually appealing. Long panning sequences, where a tracked camera follows a swordsman’s charge through enemies as various object in the foreground glide past while partially blocking our view, still look fresh today because it’s rarely done this well anymore.
DRAGON INN possesses a symmetry to it that extenuates whatever is happening on screen. The film’s DP Hua Hui-ying went on to lens Hu’s A TOUCH OF ZEN which is arguably even more visually impressive. Certainly the look of both movies has had considerable influence on future wuxia filmmakers. ASHES OF TIME and THE BLADE share with DRAGON INN a rustic, sprawling look while HOUSE OF FLYING DAGGERS and CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON clearly share aesthetics with A TOUCH OF ZEN as well as DRAGON INN.
In COME DRINK WITH ME Hu displayed a wonderful ability to introduce heroic characters to his story in a bold visual style. He does the same in DRAGON INN although I would say it is more sophisticated this time. The scene in which hero Hsiao Shao-tzu strides into the Dragon Inn and confronts junior members of the Eastern Agency is subtler, relying more on a test wills and character than simply a test of skill. The supporting cast, particularly the portly Got Siu-bo as the frightened inn waiter caught up in the middle of this deadly exchange, provides YOJIMBO-like dark humor that adds dimension to the scene. This was an element that Tsui Hark picked up on in his 1992 remake and took much further, particularly with the addition of the inn as being home to cannibals.
The high point of the film appropriately arrives when hero Hsiao Shao-tzu first confronts eunuch Tsao Shao-chin towards the end. King Hu’s genius comes through during this sequence as the two veteran swordsmen trade insults before sword strokes. The build up to this fight has been masterfully laid out and its execution doesn’t disappoint. It rightfully feels epic even though production-wise all we really have is a handful of men in costume facing each other on a barren mountain road. This is the sign of a great filmmaker. No amount of special effects or random action can create or replicate a moment like this.
The heroes of DRAGON INN (1967) gather together.
Hu doesn’t neglect the support cast which is rare in martial arts movies. Actually, my favorite characters in the film are relatively minor ones. There are two young Eastern Agency swordsmen who defect and join in the defense of the Yu children. It wasn’t necessary but we get to learn that they are actually conscripted Tartars forcibly castrated by Tsao Shao-chin. Over time they become critical in helping the heroes fight Tsao and his forces due to their knowledge of Tsao’s tactics and their own potent sword skills. In my opinion they are the real heroes of the film and Hu leaves it open for the viewer to decide whether this is true or not based on how the final conflict is resolved.
Chow Lan-ping’s bold score provides a rich accompaniment to the film through the use of traditional Chinese percussion, flutes and full-bodied symphonic work that is at times richly thematic and at other times aggressively dissonant. It’s a rare treat to hear such a tailored soundtrack for a martial arts movie when in most cases lesser films from the ’70s in either Taiwan or Hong Kong too often relied on recycled stock music from international sound libraries or unlicensed scores from popular Italian and Hollywood films.
On a side note, eagled-eyed viewers may notice future TOUCH OF ZEN star Hsu Feng making her unremarkable screen debut as one of the nameless Yu children being targeted by the eunuch. She only appears in several brief shots. After A TOUCH OF ZEN, Hsu became Hu’s most frequent leading lady. She appeared in THE FATE OF LEE KHAN, VALIANT ONES, RAINING IN THE MOUNTAIN, and LEGEND OF THE MOUNTAIN.
My only complaint with this movie and it’s a small one is in how little we get to see Bai Ying’s excellent performance as the villainous eunuch. I’ve always liked him as an actor but this performance easily provides one of the best villain roles in martial arts cinema. It’s up there with Pai Mei, Invincible Asia and all the rest. Bai Ying’s Tsao Shao-chin is the Darth Vader of the wuxia genre. A smart filmmaker would take this character and create a prequel to tell his story. The challenge would be in finding the right actor to match Bai Ying’s performance, or with luck, surpass it.
by Mark PollardRelated Topics:
Bai Ying • Dragon Inn (1967) • eunuch • Han Ying-chieh • King Hu • Polly Shang-kuan • Shih Chun • swordplay • Videos • Wuxia
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