It starts with people running around in the dark. The Red Lantern gang is robbing, raping, and murdering. The police have guns but seem ineffective. The gang detains the opera troop. The Madam reminds them they claim to rob the rich and give to the poor but it seems they have forgotten their mission statement. Jimmy Wang Yu gets her point and escorts the lady to the performance. Yes, he is smitten.
The plot of Madam's abduction defies any reality but nevertheless she is abducted. Jimmy's first fight is a brawl at the opera and the furniture is reduced to kindling. The plot continues with Madam changing Jimmy from a bandit to a patriot.
The story takes place in the warlord period of China in the early 1900s so firearms are historically accurate. I always complain that firearms and martial arts should not coexist in movies. At about the 45 minute mark the first gunfight happens and the counter attack is bows and arrows.
My copy is a typical VHS transfer that plays on a HDTV as a square picture. The resolution is comparable to standard DVD. It is dubbed in English by the A team of voice overs.
After breaking his Shaw Brothers contract and going to Taiwan, Jimmy got busy and made about a movie a month between 1971 and 1972. For all those movies to be good would be impossible. I give him credit for at least half of them to be above average for the year and genre. This is not one of the better ones. The military characters are more stupid than bad guys. The story does not hold my attention. The action involving the guns is "Bang, you are dead" and nothing more. The martial arts is all brawls but that's okay because Jimmy does brawls better than anyone. This movie is simply for fans of Jimmy who want to watch all of his movies to say they did, like me. I rate is just below average for the year and genre.
