Ho, o Sujo

Classic Gordon Liu... not only does he wear a mustache, but his fight scenes are excellent.

If you are a Shaw Bros. or Gordon Liu fan, this one is not to be missed. This one is screened as a comedy with Kung Fu, not the other way around, and it is excellent.

This is one of the films that sears itself into your mind forever unless kung fu films are a real turn off. Even when it was only watchable in poorly centered TV prints the brilliance of the action shined thru. Filmed towards the end of the golden age of the Shaw Brothers Studios, Dirty Ho rates as the top of the genre. The way the fights are choreographed is mesmerizing and I have spent hours rewinding the scenes to see exactly how the director orchestrated the camera and actors. It incredible how the movement progresses. I defy anyone to come up with something as subtle yet outrageous as the wine scene or the antique scene. The scenes in "House of Flying Daggers" are quite impressive but everything is computer assisted exaggeration. Here the only tricks are what could be done with editing and camera movement (O.K. maybe a few wires). You can see that most of the work is being done by the highly talented actors.

When this is re-released, buy it!

I am currently watching every martial arts movie made during the golden age from 1967-1984. Watching in chronological order has given me a better insight into how these movies developed.

I have not been able to establish a definite date for the original theatrical release of "Dirty Ho", other than sometime between 1976 and 1979. Recently HKMDB added 8/4/1979 as the date but I can't confirm that at a second source. Until I am certain of a date I can't say for sure if some of the creative choreography first appeared in this movie. Regardless, the use of props, the "fighting while appearing to be stumbling", fighting by making the opponent look off balance, and using Kara Hui as a weapon, all this creative choreography of fighting without fighting was never or at least rarely seen before.

The title has always raised eyebrows. To clarify in Chinese the literal translation is "rotten head Ho". Ho is the character played by Wong Yu. The "rotten head" occurs during his fight with Kara Hui. He receives a scratch to his forehead during that fight. Initially, though superficial, the wound is very painful so he seeks medical treatment. The medical treatment only makes it worse. This was planned by Gordon Liu all along to lead to the character's metamorphosis.

A Shaw Brothers film from 1979. Leaning more into comedy, this kung fu'r, starring Gordon Liu & Wong Yue, finds Liu a royal on the run who fears for his life due to the machinations of one of his brothers. He meets up w/a con man/thief, Yue (in a funny bit they each try to curry the favor of some prostitutes w/an increasing amount of money then jewels) but soon enough Liu lets Yue into his secret & seeing his fighting prowess joins him in his quest to suss out the truth especially after Liu is stabbed in his leg forcing Yue to become his surrogate as his enemies come for him. The film is a delight reveling in the juxtaposition of the honorable Liu & scheming Yue but the time the final fight commences (w/Yue having to do the bulk of the combat), the masterful choreography shines. Also starring Lo Lieh (he & the other 2 leads were in Executioners of Shaolin together) as one of the assassins w/Kara Wai popping up as one of the prostitutes.

Felt like it was more concerned with comedy than action, and either the comedy didn't translate well or I'm just a bit out of it, because I didn't really understand a lot of the humour here (what I'm assuming was meant to be funny, that is).

If anyone knows what was up with those scenes where people were sort of sparring while conversing and also trying to make it look like they weren't fighting, I'd love to know. I just didn't get what was going on, truly.

Some of the more traditional martial arts scenes were satisfying, though. The last 20 minutes were particularly great (it even did the normal speed to slow motion back to normal speed technique decades before Zack Snyder popularised it).

Not bad overall, but I'm a little sad I didn't completely get or appreciate what it was going for at points.