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Finn Nicolas @ficolas.bsky.social · 2d

The Deadly Companions (1961)

Starting off with Sam Peckinpah’s first feature, something I’ve been meaning to watch for years now and have just never made the time for. Starring John Ford favourite Maureen O’Hara

Finn Nicolas @ficolas.bsky.social · 2d

Western Wednesday #39-43

My Blu-ray player has just decided to stop working and so I won’t be watching these Westerns I found in a DVD store in Nantes, and will instead just watch whatever shit I can find on Tubi

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Finn Nicolas @ficolas.bsky.social · 2d

The titular sword is a dark object, with evil intent forged into it, a powerful weapon that brings misfortune upon the one who wields it, making this almost the Wuxia equivalent of Winchester ‘73 or The Wild Bunch, stripping away the heroism and the glory from the violence that undergirds the genre

Finn Nicolas @ficolas.bsky.social · 2d

Li Mak-Jan (Adam Chen Siu-Chow), a young swordsman looking to prove himself, wants to duel the reclusive master Hua Quian Shu (Tien Feng). His travels bring him into contact with Hua’s daughter (Jade Hsu), as well as his childhood love (JoJo Chan Kei-Kei) and her sinister husband (Eddy Ko Hung)

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Finn Nicolas @ficolas.bsky.social · 2d

The Sword (1980)

Tam’s first feature, following several years of making social realist tv movies about the place of women in Hong Kong society (I need to get my hands on his Seven Women series). Beautiful, stately, modernist compositions with Tony Ching Siu-Tung’s King Hu on speed choreography

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Finn Nicolas @ficolas.bsky.social · 3d

This one starts off very goofy, but then there are huge tonal swings when Ko Tai Hoi starts kidnapping, sexually assaulting, and eventually murdering women. These scenes aren’t played for comedy, which is good, but their proximity to the slapstick goofs gets very jarring

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Finn Nicolas @ficolas.bsky.social · 3d

This first confrontation with Ko happens while Wong is writing. Ko insults him and the two duel with calligraphy brushes, each trying to write different words (“benevolence”, “kill”, “submit”, “death”) that express their feelings towards the other. Turns minor wrist actions into essential cinema

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Finn Nicolas @ficolas.bsky.social · 3d

Kwan Tak-Hing has a much smaller part in this than in The Skyhawk, but despite it being 5 years later he seems sprier and more engaged. That’s at least partially because Yuen Woo-Ping designs his one big fight scene around Kwan’s skills and limitations, rather than bringing in somersaulting doubles

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Finn Nicolas @ficolas.bsky.social · 3d

Lam Sai-Wing (Sammo), an overzealous and foolish Kung-fu student gets into trouble with Ko (Lee Hoi-Sang), his master’s rival. When Ko’s near-do-well son (Fung Hak-On) kidnaps Lam’s sister and frames Lam for killing Ko’s goddaughter, Lam trains with a drunken master (Fan Mei-Sheng) for revenge

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Finn Nicolas @ficolas.bsky.social · 3d

The Magnificent Butcher (1979)

The second movie where Sammo Hung plays the student of Kwan Tak-Hing’s Wong Fei-Hung, although this is an out-and-out Sammo vehicle in a way that The Skyhawk wasn’t. Very few people have ever been as good at playing incredibly confident idiot blowhards as Sammo

Poster for The Magnificent Butcher (1979)

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Finn Nicolas @ficolas.bsky.social · 3d

My favourite running gag is this guy who lives inside an urn and is summoned by the bad guy to do his bidding. He is able to pop all of his limbs back in and disappear, or move by rolling around, and he fights with a paper sword that acts like metal. Shu defeats him by convincing him he’s ugly

Brandy Yuen Jan-Yeung as Child in Urn in The Miracle Fighters

Brandy Yuen Jan-Yeung as Child in Urn swordfighting with Eddy Ko Hung in The Miracle Fighters (1982)

Brandy Yuen Jan-Yeung as Child in Urn facing off against Yuen Yat-Cho in The Miracle Fighters (1982)

Close up of Brandy Yuen Jan-Yeung as Child in Urn in The Miracle Fighters (1982)

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Finn Nicolas @ficolas.bsky.social · 3d

This one is so silly, even more so than a lot of the other Taoist action films I’ve seen. The bickering between the two elderly priests is especially fun as they each work to sabotage the other’s spells. Yuen Woo-Ping gets his whole family (The Yuen Clan) involved in acting and stunt performing

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