Lau’s action extravaganza pits Chinese and Japanese martial arts against each other in a quest for legitimacy and personal dignity, disguised as an amusing marital conflict drama between a Chinese man and a Japanese woman.
Review #2,917
Dir. Lau Kar-Leung
1978 | Hong Kong | Action, Comedy | 105min | 2.35:1 | Mandarin, Cantonese & Japanese
PG (passed clean)
Cast: Gordon Liu Chia-Hui, Yuka Mizuno, Cheng Kang-Yeh, Ching Miao, Yasuaki Kurata
Plot: A Chinese kung fu master must salvage his honor after accidentally insulting the family of his new Japanese bride. With his loyalty—and marriage—on the line, the dishonored martial artist can only attempt to regain his in-laws’ trust by dueling with seven skillful Japanese ninjas.
Awards: –
Distributor: Celestial Pictures
Accessibility Index
Subject Matter: Moderate – Cultural Differences; Dignity; Marital Conflict
Narrative Style: Straightforward
Pace: Normal
Audience Type: Mainstream
Viewed: MUBI
Spoilers: No
Released in the same year as The 36th Chamber of Shaolin and Shaolin Mantis, Heroes of the East very much confirms what an action powerhouse of a studio director Lau Kar-Leung was in the heyday of Hong Kong martial arts cinema.
In Heroes, we don’t just get some of Lau’s most invigorating action sequences but also learn about the cultural differences between Chinese and Japanese fighting styles.
Best of all, Lau masks them under the pretext of a marital conflict drama between a Chinese man, Ho Tao (Gordon Liu with rare luscious hair), who weds a Japanese woman in an arranged marriage. This is Lau’s ‘Marriage Story’, economically and spectacularly reduced to spousal fighting of the highest order.
As the couple trade comical blows and kicks, each taking their verbal insults at the other’s inferior culture to prejudicial levels, the film turns the overblown drama into a fight for their lives when a mix of miscommunication, perceived disrespect and personal dignity causes the woman’s ‘side’ to turn up at the Chinese doorstep.
“I say Chinese kung fu is useless.”
That ‘side’, a motley bunch of Japanese fighters skilled in their respective discipline (ninjutsu, dojo, kendo, karate, judo, you name it…), seeks to challenge the legitimacy of Ho Tao—and all of Chinese martial arts history.
This is where Lau’s film compels even if it is structured rather simply as one 1v1 fight after another, a problem that plagued Lau’s messier Legendary Weapons of China (1982).
Ultimately, Heroes of the East is about mutual respect and treating each other as equals, much like how husbands and wives ought to behave. This is probably why the movie title is as diplomatic as it sounds.
Grade: B+
Trailer:
Eternality Tan 