Song of the Assassins
Director: Daniel
Lee
Year:
2022
Rating: 7.5
Aka - Code of the Assassins
To some degree, this film is why I have
some hesitation in watching modern wuxia produced in China. They are overflowing
with CGI like a Halloween bag with candy at the end of a night of trick or
treating. The saturation of it can be overwhelming even though done quite
professionally. They also tend to lack much personality and take themselves
much too seriously. Yet they can also be spectacular and epic unlike few
film industries can be anymore. I am never entirely sure what is CGI with
Mainland films because they can still afford to have hundreds of extras and
build lavish elaborate sets. This film contains all of that - the good and
the bad - but it is astonishingly cinematic with a few action set-pieces
that will curl your toes and the decor and sets are stunning and creative.
In many ways it is a traditional period
wuxia with a wonderfully complicated twisty plot of palace intrigue, betrayals,
conspiracies and outsized ambitions - but then it introduces aspects that
are close to steampunk designs, in particular in the final fight. It is directed
by Hong Konger Daniel Lee who has some fine films on his resume - What Price
Survival, 14 Blades, Black Mask - and a few that get few shout-outs. He likes
to bring in a few Hong Kong veterans and here he has Kenneth Tsang, Ray Lui,
Norman Tsui and Yuen Cheung-yan. The rest of the cast are mainly Mainlanders
though and the film was shot in Mandarin. Tsang and Tsui sadly passed away
since this film. Two of the great ones.
It takes a while before you have any clue
what is going on as it brings in numerous characters and sub-plots faster
than a speeding bullet. The general setting though is that there are two
rival Kingdoms - South Pagoda headed by Meng Xu (Ray Lui still looking amazingly
young) and his concubine Lady Fleur (Ma Xiao-qian). And the East Mulberry
Kingdom ruled by Lord Chai Sheng (Kenneth Tsang) with his brother Prince
Rui and his General Zhao Cheung (Jack Kao from Taiwan). In the middle of
these two Kingdoms sits Ghost Valley - an army of assassins run by Golden
Mask - their mission is to try and bring peace to the land by selected killings.
Blue Asura is one of the top four
assassins - played by William Feng Shaofeng - he lost an arm years before
to his lover - and had it replaced by a mechanical arm that Q would be envious
of. It has loads of secret weapons and contraptions built into it. He joined
Ghost Valley as a boy for one reason - revenge. His father hammered out a
map to buried treasure on the orders of an unknown person - and then this
person killed the father and the entire clan. The map went missing for years,
but now has shown up with the Governor of a small province. And everybody
wants it.
From this situation it explodes into multiple
action sequences, murders and conspiracy built on top of conspiracy. Blue
Asura finds a woman Shengsheng (Gina Jin Chen) right after she has assassinated
a man with the old hairpin trick. Right into his head. She too is from Ghost
Valley but who sent her. Other assassins show up but who sent them. Blue
Asura tries to figure out who is behind all this - but as long as they keep
having fight after fight, we don't really care. He teams up with the lovely
Shengsheng and gives her a kiss and all I could think of was that the last
guy she kissed ended up dead. She is also a master of the mask technique
being able to impersonate anyone. Handy, if she isn't trying to kill you
because basically everyone is trying to kill someone.
The film has some nice twists and turns
and surprises, but it is the wonderfully inventive action choreography that
you will carry home. Tsui, Kao, Lui and Yuen all get their moment to shine
in an action scene along with others that have names like Mountain Ghost,
Music Assassin and White Judge. Not to leave out the white Four Warriors
from the West who are built like John Bunyan and carry enormous clubs. But
like so many of these Mainland wuxia films it has no emotional ballast -
there is no beating heart - but it sure is pretty to watch.
