Customer Reviews

Dance of Death [VHS]

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Mulan, Michelle Yeoh, and Cynthia Rothrock all walk in the shadow of Angela Mao. In "Dance of Death" Angela Mao (Mao Fu Ying) is surrounded by Hong Kong's top action talent, both on-screen and behind the scenes, in this cinematic aphorism for all the best in kungfu movies. This splendid martial arts film is a comedy first, but with sufficient dramatic intrigue to pull you through to its rewarding concluding battle. It was filmed at the height of her 10+ year history as an action star. The choreography by Jackie Chan, credited as Chen Lung ("Dragon Chen"), is a master work, providing a look at Chinese wushu (martial art) culture that is irreverent yet affectionate. This movie also provides lessons about the traditional tales of women as heroes in Chinese culture. Please read on to learn more about how to watch and appreciate this film - some guidance is useful.

Media notes: letterbox format. Cantonese with English and Chinese sub-titles.

The premise: Angela plays a free-spirited itinerant who comes upon two old men battling in an abandoned courtyard. Neither seems to be able to get the advantage of the other. Eavesdropping, she learns they have been meeting every 5 years to "compare skill" and still they can't reach a conclusion. They are "playing" their kungfu and attempting to trick each other, and the harder they contrive, the sillier they get. As we'll soon learn, Angela has need of the skill she sees they have: she's seen the cost of inferior kungfu skills. She ingeniously contrives a novel way of having them settle their argument. She'll learn both their martial arts skills, and try them out herself to see whose is most effective. See the movie to see the trials she puts her teachers through while sand-bagging them on whose kungfu is best.

Guidepost #1: Only you and I know our heroine Fei-Fei ("Fly Fly") is a woman. She wears men's clothing, so no one in the film catches on, ever. No woman in China could wander about freely as does the itinerant Fei-Fei, hence the man's clothes. But we know, and that's all there is. There is no "gosh, there's a romantic woman underneath" ploy as in Michelle Yeoh's spectacular "Wing Chun" (I'll soon review this film as well). She makes her friends, endures tragedy, learns her skills, and takes her revenge without yielding to any gender stereotype.

Guidepost #2: The story is told using an opening sequence where she spies on her prospective teachers and contrives to get them to teach her kungfu, followed by a poorly integrated flashback to when she rescues and befriends a proponent of "5 Styles" kungfu. She inadvertently leads the minions of the evil Ma Fa-chun to her new friend and his school, leading to the slaughter of all the 5 Styles "family". The flashback then ends with her agreeing to undertake the harsh training it takes to become proficient in kungfu and take her revenge on Ma Fa-chun and the 100 Birds school.

Guidepost #3: The martial arts action in "Dance of Death" is filmed in long continuous choreographed sequences where the players match moves as if in a chess match. Lovers of dance will delight in the interplay of skill, played at a speed we can visually comprehend. One could learn from this movie. If your taste runs towards brutal beatings, maimings, and improbable strength or technique, there is nothing here for you. The choppy editing used in Jean-Claude Van Damme's movies as a substitute for martial arts play is absent. This is art of kungfu on film, not the art of film editing.

Guidepost #4: This is kungfu played for fun. The 5 Styles refers to the basic animals Dragon, Tiger, Snake, Crane and Leopard. I have seen authoritative counts of as many as 300 distinct Chinese martial arts styles. 5 Animals Style is the one kungfu system from the real world used in this movie. The rival systems, as best I can determine, are all from the fertile imagination of Jackie Chan. Ma Fa-chun, our prime villain, is a proponent of the improbable Up-turned Horse Boxing style. Jackie succeeds in lampooning the 5 Animals style and the stodgy approach to teaching he probably suffered through in Chinese opera school, while at the same time conveying the essence of the oral and physical tradition that underpin it. The martial and acrobatic skill shown here are very real, and very much an art. No other culture in our world has developed the art of movement to this level - they "sing" with their bodies. Fei-Fei, her teachers, Ma Fa-chun, his son, and the hilarious character "Bird Egg" all demonstrate physical fluidity that is rarely seen even today. Also, don't miss the highly unusual technique demonstrated by Bird Egg in his second battle with Fei-Fei. Very offensive. The viewer should also note the poetic names given the various techniques used by the martial artists. Common to traditional Chinese martial arts teaching is the use of poems to accompany a sequence of movements and aid in its memorization and comprehension. Included in these poetic references is the movement "Mu-lan pulls the bow", and a few others invoking the legendary Fa Mu-lan.

"Dance of Death" was filmed in 1980, and I was fortunate to see it one of the three theaters in Boston's Chinatown that offered kungfu movies at the time. Being congenitally Caucasian, me and my kungfu buddies went into these theaters without much of a clue as to what we'd see. Our guiding principle was "if its not in the poster, it's not in the movie". In this case, we got everything in the poster and more. We reaped one of our greatest rewards of our movie-viewing treks. I was in the theater every day till its run ended. I made an ill-considered vow then that someday I'd have a copy of this movie: thank you Amazon.com for making this come true.

I've seen kung fu movies where The actors sort play or dance around but most of the time it leads to a more serious confrontations. In this movie it never did. This was more of a kung fu Ballet than a martial arts movie. I love Angela Mao Ying but boy this movie is not one of her best.

I have long been a fan of Angela Mao, but her grace, artistry and skill in this film is breathtaking. The film itself is a lighthearted delight. A few of the subtitles were hard to read, and a dubbed version would have been perferable so that your eyes would never have to leave the action. This is still a wonderful film.