Two Great Cavaliers
Director: Yang Ching-chen
Year: 1978
Rating: 7.5
Not that these older
kung fu films are all the complicated, but I have to admit that keeping track
of the characters can make your head spin. It’s like a revolving door at
a department store with a new character popping out every few minutes to
do battle. Fortunately of course, for the
most part most Angela Mao fans are not watching these films for the plot
– and if it is a good one – well that is just an additional bonus. The main
focus is how much fighting time does Angela get, how big is her role and
how does she look – because these can be dramatically different from film
to film. Though she was a big star in her time, she often got stuck in films
that just wanted to use her name – and then made little use of her.
This film is a solid entry into the Angela Mao filmography based on the
criteria mentioned above. There are a few main characters in this one, but
Angela’s screen time is certainly the equal of anyone’s. She is involved
in at least five fights that I recall and she looked very agile throughout.
She provides some terrific moves – a wonderful backwards somersault, a kick
over her shoulder, a rapid series of swinging leg kicks to an enemy’s face
and walking across some wooden posts with death only a slip away. I should
also mention that even with my very low quality video transfer – she looks
quite lovely.
The film has the basic Mings versus the Manchus scenario – and a member
of Angela’s clan has gotten hold of a list of rebels and the Manchus want
it back. Sung Wa hides the list in a tree, but is badly poisoned. Angela
and a few of her other clan members receive word about this and need to fight
their way back to the headquarters to provide the antidote to the poison in
time. And I mean fight as they are dogged the entire way back and the film
is nearly a non-stop fight at times – but slowly the members are getting killed
one by one. The beginning of this
one is a bit odd in regards to Angela - as we first sight her galloping across
the plains on a horse - jumping off in a small town and joining the other
members of the clan - very Angela like. But then the man she secretly loves
(John Liu) shows up with his new fiancee and Angela goes into a bit of a
scorned woman sulk - not very Angela like - but she snaps out of it whenever
there is fighting to be done! A good
flick – the fighting quality seemed pretty high to me – but the actual transfer
quality of the film made it a bit of a chore to watch at times. Oh, for the
day when someone makes an effort to restore her films.
