Director Chor Yuen takes one of many stabs at the literary works of wuxia novelist Gu Long with this colorful, yet stale movie adaptation. Starring non-martial arts actor Lau Wing and popular television actress Wong Hang-sau, this swordplay fantasy leans heavily towards Shaw Brothers’ increasing interest in producing stagy martial melodrama.

The plot centers on a martial arts tournament where the stoic Purple Robe Duke (Yueh Hua) competes annually with the nefarious Fire Demon God (Lo Lieh), who always loses. This time, the Purple Robe Duke is poisoned from an attack by the Samurai Killer (Yuen Wah) beforehand, forcing him into a state of secluded meditation in an underwater chamber to slow the poison’s effects. His chief student Bai Baoyu (Lau Wing) sets out to retrieve an antidote, but must outwit and outfight forces intent on stopping him in time for the Purple Robe Duke to recover and compete in the tournament.

There were some great martial arts movies being produced in the early ’80s, including a new generation of swordplay film led by the likes of The Sword and Duel to the Death. These were films that pushed the boundaries of fight choreography and style. In contrast, The Spirit of the Sword represents a “circling the wagons” approach where Chor Yuen is working with well established filmmaking techniques and conventions at Shaw Brothers to produce a film geared towards fans of wuxia novels and related drama, rather than serious kung fu action.

Despite the efforts of talented stunt performers and coordinators like Yuen Bun and Yuen Wah, the action is a regrettable throwback to the pre-Bruce Lee and Lau Kar-leung days where fight choreography was second to campy special effects and simplistic intrigue. Chor dishes out clouds of ice emitted from palms, fire-breathing staves and exaggerated swordplay to recreate the esoteric abilities of literary swordsmen and women dreamed up by Gu Long. All the while, a rather smarmy Lau Wing waltzes through typically gaudy and artificial sets, while his costars bound in and out of the narrative without generating any sparks.

Perhaps the one bright spot is the appearance of Yuen Wah, who in the ’80s was emerging from his long tenure as a highly acrobatic stunt double to become a movie star himself. Although his role as the Samurai Killer is brief, quirky characters like this led to even more memorable performances in films like Dragons Forever and Kung Fu Hustle, where his combined comedic and physical talents could shine.

I’d argue that The Spirit of the Sword is one reason why Shaw Brothers fell apart as a filmmaking unit in the mid-’80s. They had all the resources to make quality martial arts movies with international appeal including engaging source material, big name stars, top stunt crews, and the industry’s biggest and best production facility manned by experienced crew. But what they lacked was vision beyond the swordplay sagas and kung fu actioners they had been producing for the past twenty years. Rather than attempt to advance the art as their chief rivals at Golden Harvest were doing, they sunk further into their increasingly cheap studio style and abandoned filmmaking for television production where longer-running series could tell the same complex wuxia stories for less money.

Chor Yuen was one of Shaw Brothers better wuxia film directors, but his most daring and exciting work was well behind him by the time The Spirit of the Sword arrived. It didn’t help that his action choreography was falling behind the emerging “wire fu” dynamics of fresh talent like Ching Siu-tung or that his leading man was hardly suitable to replace aging screen icons like Ti Lung and Yueh Hua in physical skill or charisma. As such, this film is a minor footnote to the career of arguably Hong Kong’s most prolific and talented wuxia filmmaker.

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