Holy Flame of the Martial World

A latter-stage fantasy from Shaw and it's a real hoot. A youthful Max Mok plays an upstanding hero raised by Phillip Kwok, playing a legendary figure with an impressive "ghostly laugh" technique. There's plenty of back story in the tale of separated siblings, rival clan leaders, power-hungry megalomaniacs, revenge and magical weaponry. The pacing is super-fast and this one's chock-full of wacky special effects and even crazier fight scenes that take wirework to the next level. It's cheap at times, extremely cheesy and thoroughly cheerful with it; what's not to love?!

Because of some of the plot beats present in Holy Flame of the Martial World, you might expect it to be a straightforward martial arts movie. This is because it contains main characters who are out for revenge, a magical object/MacGuffin that many of the characters are after, and people needing to participate in training montages around the halfway point in order to be stronger for the final action scenes.

However, the way Holy Flame of the Martial World plays out makes it very much unlike your average martial arts movie. It has some wild fantasy elements, it doesn't take itself very seriously at all, and it's all edited and paced together in a way that's so quick I sometimes felt overwhelmed. It feels like the horror-comedy Hausu/House if it also had action sequences, with frantic and very goofy scenes that make for great entertainment.

If anything, it might have been too much of a sensory overload for me, but I wasn't expecting it to be so crazy. If I'd had known, I probably wouldn't have watched it right before bed. Being a little more alert might not have made it make perfect sense (maybe it's not supposed to), but it might've helped a little.

Oh well. It was still a very fun watch, and certainly one of the crazier martial arts movies I've seen during my latest binge (might even be more flat-out ridiculous than Super Inframan, but I also don't find it quite as charming as that sci-fi spectacle).

Wild fantasy wuxia flick from the eighties. It checked all the boxes for a good kung fu flick: Revenge, training sequence, soap opera twist, vivid florescent 80's colors (I think I saw some headbands & leg warmers on a few female fighters). What a great walk down memories from my childhood.

Set bound martial arts / magic kung-fu insanity. Flying remote controlled swords, a woman who shoots explosive rays from her finger, the ghostly laugh power. At one point there is a fight with a corpse / mummy that speaks English! A lot of skeletons are tossed around. Overall the film moves along at a good clip but it really exists in an alternate universe. If strident unreality is not your thing avoid this film at all costs.

Some of the "outdoor" scenes seem to have been shot in a small garage. You can see the wall painted sky blue only a few feet away from the actors. It is a little confusing as the lead good guy "The Phantom" and the lead bad guy "The Monster" resemble each other.

Regardless, I enjoyed the film.

Having watched many a Shaw Brothers, there are some I love for the action, some for the choreography, some for the story-telling and some for the humor; but this this I love for being their version of 'Plan 9 From Outer Space'.