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Released by: Lionsgate
Released on: August 14, 2012.
Director: Xu Haofeng
Cast: Yu Chenghui, Song Yang, Zhao Yuanyuan
Year: 2012
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The Movie:
Alright, I'll admit I'm guilty of being white with this one.
To me this was a confusing, boring but pretty-to-look-at Chinese martial arts movie that featured some martial arts. Writer-Director-Editor-Fight Scene Choreographer Haofeng is as obsessed with telling his story as his primary young protagonist but with so many different characters' various pasts coming into play it becomes a fairly confusing mess of a story. And, unfortunately, there's not enough action to propel the rest of the film.
The story primarily revolves around one young master and his attempts to gain credibility for a near-blasphemous weapon that's Japanese in its design origin. He and his commander, trained by the respected General Qi head to the city street where all four dominant martial arts schools are located. Defeating all these schools will allow one to open a new school. Why these guys are so obsessed with proving the worth of this sword is beyond me and never explained (again - cultural?).
After their initial defeat, though, the young master escapes and pretends to be a Japanese pirate, forcing the city's martial artists to confront him on his docked ship. I guess it's easier to blame the Japanese? In any event, the young master “trains†a young dancer in a technique to defeat them all so she holds the scabbard from behind a curtain on the boat and beats up everyone that approaches.
Meanwhile, there's an old master, Qiu, who goes off to the mountains, then comes back to fight the Japanese but he's old and has some drama with the head of the four schools, Master Que. Lots of talking about that and martial arts ensues. So, it's a martial arts movie that decides to talk about martial arts. Cough.
While there are some comedic elements that work well here - primarily around the dancers and the anti-pirate squad - the levity only helps point out the flaws of the overall film: Storylines intersect but without any clear protagonist or goal or point it's very confusing and muddled.
So perhaps I'm missing out on something here by not being Chinese? That's gotta be it, right?
Audio/Video/Extras:
While the film itself is rather a mess this disc from Lionsgate is of top-notch quality. The 5.1 Dolby Digital soundtrack (for both English and Mandarin) rumbles exceptionally well, giving the moody scenes much more weight and impact. Likewise, the 16:9 fullscreen image is pretty flawless and while some night scenes get a bit buried in shadows and background darkness nevertheless shows off the high quality cinematography nicely. English and Spanish subtitling options are available along with a scene-selection area as well.
The Final Word:
While The Sword Identity is beautifully shot and well-acted it's seemingly disjointed multiple plotlines crash together in an unsettling mess of drama and comedy that just never quite finds the target.
