Chivalrous swordsman Jun-zhao (Kiu Chong) goes in search of a fugitive named Li Yueh (Jimmy Wang Yu) in order to reunite him with his love, Liu Xian (Chin Ping). Though the two men meet and become loyal brothers, Li does not reveal his true identity until Jun-zhao’s life is endangered by swordsmen from Flying Fish Island who are looking for revenge.

The ties of chivalrous brotherhood are as strong as ever in Chang Cheh’s world when he crafted The Trail of the Broken Blade in 1967. Though the film appears to be a tragic romantic saga, like most of Chang’s subsequent films the male bonding dominates everything. The film is also dominated by the previous generation of swordplay films and is thus slower in pacing, grievously simplistic in dialogue and characterizations, and lacks the edge that made so many of Chang’s other films gutsy and exciting despite their flaws.

Jimmy Wang Yu plays Li Yueh, a swordsman who kills an official for wrongfully executing his father who was a general fighting the Japanese. He becomes a fugitive, giving up his prestigious lifestyle to become a lowly horse stall worker. Several years later, Fung Jun-zhao, a noble swordsman from Wu Tang thwarts an attempt by a member of the notorious Flying Fish Island family from taking advantage of a young woman named Liu Xian. Mortally wounded, the attacker returns to the island and his brethren vow to get revenge. Meanwhile, Jun-zhao is invited to stay with Liu’s family and teach advanced swordsmanship to her. He develops a strong attraction towards her, but she declares her love for Li who she hasn’t seen since he went into hiding. Because he is a righteous man, Jun-zhao puts aside his feelings and goes in search of Li in order to reunite the lovers. The two men meet and immediately strike up a lasting friendship, but Li keeps his true identity secret by professing to have no martial arts skill. But when men from Flying Fish Island come looking for Jun-zhao, Li steps up to aid his friend. Believing his life as a fugitive from the law to be an unjust burden for Liu and wishing to protect Jun-zhao, Li goes to Flying Fish Island and confronts their army and eventually the master known as Black Net Devil (Tin Fung)

There’s nothing wrong with a little romance in a violent swordplay film, but Chang gets a little carried away with this one. The problem is too much time spent on characters valiantly denying their true feelings in a overly dramatic love triangle. Even worse, it is really a love pentagon! Chiao Chiao plays daughter of a casino owner who falls for Wang Yu and tries to keep him separated from Chin Ping. All the while, a pathetic Fan Mei-sheng follows her around like a puppy dog. It starts to remind me of one of those teen angst-filled anime series like Tenshi Muyo where the show teases you with a little action and flashy animation, but ultimately flakes out. Interestingly, the end of the film made me think of the love shared by Chow Yun-Fat and Michelle Yeoh’s character in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. More specifically, this film could almost be an early prototype for Ang Lee’s prequel.

Most of the actors’ performances are easily forgotten, but Kiu Chong (The Knight of Knights) stands out. He reminds me of Kwan Tak-hing who played Wong Fei-hung for years. They both share a quiet authority and elegance that makes them well-suited for portraying the noblest of heroes. Kiu’s martial arts performance is nothing special, but then this film came out before the demand for more realistic action pushed filmmakers to improve the choreography. The wire-fu is laughable by today’s standards, especially when Jimmy Wang Yu is seen floating awkwardly up on a wire at the beginning of the film. The swordplay is slow and methodic until the end when Wang Yu starts cutting down bodies by the dozen. The conclusion sees the body count rise quite high and the blood to be spilled liberally, but still not as fiercely as the magnificent destruction wrought by Wang Yu in Chang Cheh’s Golden Swallow. More disappointing is a lack of balls out intensity. After wading through too much unnecessary dialogue and contrived hand-wringing there just doesn’t seem to be a justifiable driving force for all of the bloodshed that finally erupts. This is one of the frequent problems of old school and even more recent swordplay films. The best excuse writers can come up with is simply to have heroes die with the highest kills on their belt. Honestly, I found myself feeling sorry for all the poor saps in gray uniforms who fell like firewood. They didn’t stand a chance against Wang Yu and yet they just kept on coming. Wang Yu himself doesn’t possess the badass attitude here that he is remembered for and it is greatly missed for that is his only selling point as a martial arts actor. He does get to show off his very real swimming prowess as he swims to the Island and fights baddies in the water. But the scene ends poorly with Wang Yu shooting out of the water and onto a sailboat in a reverse-camera trick that looks horrible.

An action highlight, apart from the finale is the initial stand-off between Kiu Chong and Chen Hung-lieh, who is backed up by four brutish fighters led by Wu Ma. They begin with a series of tests to prove their martial abilities. It is all trickery, like when Kiu presses dice previously sliced in half back together with two fingers, but is as essential to swordplay as gadgets are to James Bond movies. The encounter heats up with a probing series of jabs as Kiu and Chen begin a slow dance of simple, yet perilous sword handling. Sadly, there really isn’t enough of this type of action to satisfy.

The Trail of the Broken Blade could be fairly labeled quaint as a martial arts film. The hammy melodrama, rough swordplay wire and editing effects, and mostly unremarkable martial arts are amusing at best and likely to illicit jeers in several places. This and all of Chang Cheh’s other pre-Venoms era films take themselves too seriously. This is tolerable when the film is either extremely over-the-top or at least filled with quality action, but this entry fails to fully deliver on either front. The film is worth a look for anyone interested in swordplay with a soap-opera flavor, but it is certainly not essential viewing.

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