Michelle Yeoh is a daring adventurer, singlehandedly destroying a village of men who try to cheat her of twenty tael (although she uses a lot of footwork), and flying her yellow biplane around to win aerial combat against a Japanese fighter plane; this is during the Second World War. Her grandfather sends her on a mission to rescue Prince Youda of a city where the Japanese wish to set up a poison gas factory. She mistakes wanderer and con man Richard Ng for the agent she is supposed to meet, but soon settles out that it is actually Tung-Shing Yee. Meanwhile, Chindy Lau is in love with the timid Youda, played by Lowell Lo. When Lo refuses to order the deaths of the three leads, Miss Lau rouses the people of the city to revolt against the Japanese. This results in a big battle in which it looks like a company of mortar men and ninjas attack Fort Zinderneuf from THE LAST REMAKE OF BEAU GESTE.
Miss Yeoh is the star, but clearly the producers thought she was not strong enough to carry the movie by herself, so they got involved in a lot of elaboration which works very nicely. She still loks great running, and her martial arts are very good to watch, but Ng steals the show with his con man character, and the final battle is a lot of fun to watch. There's a lot of anti-Japanese sentiment, still de rigeur in Chinese movies, but with a hint that things can work out in the end. Lots of fun.
