Set during the Ming dynasty this film opens with the theft of the 'Sunflower Manual' from the Imperial Palace. This, it turns out, is a martial arts manual giving details of a powerful secret technique. Now just about everybody appears to want the scroll. The scroll is hidden under a waterwheel and two students of the Mount Hua Sect, Linghu Chong and Yue 'Skinny Boy' Lingshan, are asked to inform the son of the man who took it. They will encounter many dangers including from some of the people they thought they could trust most.

I would usually describe the plot in a bit more detail but to be honest I was a bit confused a fair amount of the time… strangely this wasn't much of a problem as this film is all about the action and the action rarely stops. There is a lot of wire-assisted martial arts, fights involving mystical powers, poisoning and even a fighter who produces snakes from her sleeves! In in brief lulls between the action scenes there are some amusing moments, many involving the existence of a second scroll which merely contains the lyrics to a song the protagonists learn along the way. There is also the running gag that nobody apart from Linghu realises that 'Skinny Boy' is actually an attractive young woman! While this is mostly light hearted there is some spilt blood and, in the film's most disturbing moment, the sight or a recently removed eyeball! The cast do a solid job, most notably Samuel Hui and Cecilia Yip as our two protagonists; the rest are pretty impressive too and appeared to be having a good time. Overall I'd certainly recommend this to fans of Wuxia films; it may be a little confusing at times but is still a lot of fun.

These comments are based on watching the film in Cantonese with English subtitles.

The first in an epic Wuxia trilogy, Swordsman was a major success on its release in 1990 and spawned two sequels (which helped to boost the careers of Hong Kong superstars Jet Li and Brigitte Lin).

I, however, found the film to be a passable affair, spoilt somewhat by a meandering storyline, a rather overlong running time and a visual style which often left me scratching my head as to what exactly had just happened. In true Wuxia fashion, the emphasis is not on realism, rather on aesthetic value, and fights scenes become chaotic colourful whirlwinds of limbs, smoke, and clothing; whilst this looks impressive, it is also very hard to follow.

Also rather hard to follow is the storyline; at first I was doing OK, but as more and more characters were introduced, I became lost as to who was doing what and why. The basic premise is that there exists a scroll—The Prized Sunflower Volume—that promises "supernatural powers to see through things and to let out power over great distances", thus assuring its owner supreme martial arts powers. When the scroll is stolen, a power hungry eunuch realises the importance of the document and employs his best men to try and retrieve it. It's at about this point I got a bit lost plot-wise (I partly blame this on watching the film whilst suffering from the flu and partly on the film just being plain confusing).

Swordsman features a terrific cast: Sam Hui, Cecilia Yip, Jacky Cheung, Lam Ching-Ying, and one of my personal favourites of HK cinema, the great Yuen Wah. However, their combined talents do little to improve the movie. Yuen Wah, in particular, is completely wasted; his impressive martial arts skills are hardly used at all. Instead, he is required to leap about on a wire a bit, laugh maniacally and wave his hands at the good guys (supposedly fighting with his 'chi')—very disappointing! Its not that I disliked everything about Swordsman—any film which features killer bee kung fu, two headed snake kung fu, and an attack with a waterwheel can't be all bad—but given its reputation and the great cast involved, I was expecting the film to become an instant favourite of mine.

I was about to give Swordsman 6 out of 10, until I remembered the awful theme song 'Proud Laughing World of Martial Arts', which was repeated time and time again throughout the movie, ad nauseum. I'm going to deduct a point for that...

THE SWORDSMAN is one of those wirework-heavy Chinese fantasy-action films that were all the rage in the 1990s. I'm not a great fan of the sub-genre; give me the good old-fashioned kung-fu comedies of the 1970s over these any day. This one is pretty typical of the genre, as it has a hugely over-complicated plot with silly story lines and a cast of far too many interchangeable characters, many of whom could have been excised to give the movie greater clarity. Old Hong Kong film staples are thrown into the mix, from cases of mistaken identity to women posing as men and mysterious, mountain-dwelling heroes, but sadly it's all very uninteresting and there's nothing here I could get worked up about. And this is from a FAN of Chinese cinema.

The cast is pretty meagre and seems to be made up of comedy actors attempting serious roles, in the likes of Jacky Cheung and Sam Hui. Nobody stands out, aside from Yuen Wah who has a ball as another over-the-top villain and who dies after a killer bee attack this time around! The female characters are undeniably irritating (Brigitte Lin and Cecilia Yip, I'm talking about you) and the only decent acting of note comes from a pair of cameos by old-timers Lam Ching-Ying and Wu Ma, who share a touching scene together on a boat. Even worse, the fight scenes are nothing to write home about, with poor direction and confusing choreography throughout. The whole film has a cheap, slapdash feel and although it's regarded in some quarters as a classic – and was popular enough to spawn two sequels – I'd readily pick the likes of MOON WARRIORS over this tat any day.