Qi Ji Guang

THE GREAT GENERAL is a Taiwanese historical epic with a lot of heart and not so much action, unfortunately. The film has been marketed as your typical kung fu movie in the west, however there isn't a great deal of martial arts in the film whatsoever and the fights are limited to just a couple of battle scenes.

Instead this is a grand old-fashioned war movie done on something of a small budget. However, the budget is enough to outfit the cast in a series of sometimes spectacular clothing and armour, and there are enough extras to convincingly portray the situations depicted. The tale in a nutshell is about a Ming emperor battling Japanese pirates on China's eastern coast.

Halfway through the production, the film descends into melodrama when the general's own son suffers a humiliating defeat, the punishment for which is execution. A huge moral dilemma fills the rest of the running time, occasionally marked by overacting on the part of the female characters but at other times well achieved and quite moving. THE GREAT GENERAL offers something a little different from your usual eastern action movie and thus should be commended for it.

Although there are some satisfying fight scenes in this film, potential audiences should be warned that this is really more of a historical drama than an action film. It concerns a Ming Dynasty Viceroy who raised a private army to fight off Japanese pirates in his region. In doing so, he committed his army to the most rigid military discipline - which leads to the terrible moment when he must decide to execute his own son for disobeying orders.

Although the mood, the cinematography, general design and acting approach are all of a type with Hong Kong cinema of the 1970s (best known for the 'chop-socky' school of kung-fu movies), there's a real effort to push the envelope of quality for these various approaches. The acting is theatrical but energetic, there are occasionally fine touches of cinematic style, as with the scene with the bereaved mother, and my bare-bones report of the plot doesn't indicate the interesting twists and turns concerning a traitorous general.

Overall, a fine attempt to overcome the conventions of the era. Not a great film, but on the whole a respectable study in the burdens of the ethical exercise of authority.