Following the success of King Hu’s Union Film Company production Dragon Inn (1967), Taiwan cinema produced a series of wuxia films – period pieces with plenty of swordplay. Many displayed acrobatic performance skills in fantastical historical settings, wowing audiences with their sheer energy.
This August, HOME presents a film season of sword-wielding warriors and epic wuxia action with Flying Fighters of Taiwan, and extension of their ongoing Taiwan Films season.
This short sub-season of wuxia films brings together some of the most notable titles of the era, reclaiming them from the fuzzy images of home video and putting them back on the big screen where they belong, including a brand-new restoration of Joseph Kuo’s Swordsman of all Swordsmen (1968) courtesy of the Taiwan Film and Audiovisual Institute.
Other films include A City Called Dragon, a great example of the Union Film Company’s approach to the wuxia, and The Ghost Hill which introduces a range of outlandish enemies, which along with its beautifully realised production design, locations, weapons and action choreography, make it one of the most unforgettable entries in Taiwan’s contribution to the early 1970s wuxia cycle.
