FLYING DAGGER (1993) succeeds where other Hong Kong wire-fu comedies failed (e.g. HANDSOME SIBLINGS, ROYAL TRAMP I & II) and creates an exciting and consistently funny fantasy with imaginative action scenes, well-developed gags, attractive romantic entanglements, and expert effects. The storyline creates enough dramatic tension to keep viewers engaged throughout, yet the tone is light enough to allow for an abundance of gags to arise naturally from the action and for the actors to clearly have a great deal of fun with their roles.
The plot has to do with the efforts of two teams of bounty hunters to track down and capture the male-female pair of wanted criminals, Nine-Tails Fox and Flying Cat. The rival bounty hunters--the male team of Big Dagger and Little Dagger, and the female team of Big Bewitchment and Little Bewitchment--wind up pairing off romantically, the `Big' partners with each other, and the `Little'-younger-- partners pairing off as well. They soon join forces to catch the criminals who, in turn, side with the bounty hunters when it's determined the wanted parties have been framed by Master Lui, the warlord who had hired Big and Little Dagger in the first place. The heroes travel to a series of inns, where they get into various fights and meet up with an ally or two, culminating in a big battle with Master Lui and his pair of super-powered henchmen.
There are a lot of sophisticated special effects for a film of this type, including the creation of a disembodied hand (recalling Thing from the Addams Family films) which at first antagonizes the heroes and then joins them to help out. (The hand was chopped off a villain named Never Die.) The gags are plentiful but all make dramatic sense and seem to have been thought out ahead of time rather than made up on the spot, which so often seems to be the case with HK comedies. Flying Cat's `Replay Machine' is especially clever.
The action scenes, directed by Ching Siu Tung (CHINESE GHOST STORY, SWORDSMAN II), are all exciting and enjoyable. There may not be much actual kung fu, but there are a lot of swirling garments and fabrics and breakaway walls and rooftops. Also, Nine-Tails Fox, really does have a tail the length of nine fox tails-and uses it to great effect--and Flying Cat really fights like a flying cat.
The attractively-photographed cast is a Hong Kong fan's delight, with action star Tony Leung Ka Fai (DRAGON INN) proving himself equally adept at comedy and the beautiful and versatile Sharla Cheung Man (ROYAL TRAMP) delightful as his rival/lover. Top HK stars Jacky Cheung and Maggie Cheung are both very funny as Nine-Tails Fox and Flying Cat and participate fully in the action scenes. (Fans of Maggie will never forget her Flying Cat routine here.) As the exceedingly cute younger couple, Jimmy Lin and the adorable Gloria Yip bring a high degree of youthful charm to the film. Comic actor Ng Man Tat pops up as a sympathetic innkeeper. Kung fu great Lo Lieh makes a cameo appearance as `Death in One Bout.'
The film was directed by Chu Yin Ping and scripted by Wong Jing, whose own directorial efforts tend to be more slapdash than this. The cinematography, production design and music are all top-notch. This is an extremely good-looking and -sounding film and one that warrants multiple viewings.
