Life Gamble

Hong Kong premiere: February 22, 1979
Director: Chang Cheh
Stars: Chiang Sheng, Fu Sheng, Kara Hui, Ku Feng, Philip Kwok, Lam Fai-Wong, Lau Wai-Ling, Li Yi-Min, Lin Chen-Chi, Lo Meng, Lu Feng, Suen Shu-Pao, Bruce Tong, Johnny Wang, Dick Wei, Shirley Yu
Story Overview: A precious jade ornament has been stolen by a gang of bandits led by four assassins. They have decided, instead of selling the jade and splitting the proceeds, to gamble for it, winner-take-all. So they come to the king of gamblers to run a game for them, but news of the theft has gotten out, and an array of crooks, heroes, and lawmen come looking for the treasure.
My Nutshell Review: That little précis sounds simple enough, but there are a lot of smaller stories happening within the big one. To quote my own Letterboxd review from my first watch: “When people dismiss kung fu movies as having dense, inscrutable storylines full of shadowy subplots, shifting loyalties, and too many characters, this is the kind of movie they’re talking about.” This thing has a very involved plot. It all fits, it all ties together, but there is a LOT of it. The cast in this is huge, full of nearly every important actor in the Shaw’s stable at the time (cast lists in the future will generally not be as long as that above). Each has his or her own moment and most have their own plotlines. All are dangerous in their own ways, and the body count gets really high. For these reasons it has become my favorite Shaw Brothers film, and the one I’m most eager to share, mostly because it deserves a lot more fans than it has, but in part because it ought to be quite a challenge.
My Flickchart Score: 96% (What’s This?)
Watch it on Amazon Prime here.

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In-Depth Synopsis: We open with a shot of a blacksmith hard at work in his shop. This is Qiu Zi Yu, played by Philip Kwok. A warrior enters, who we learn is Mo Jun-Feng, played by Lo Meng. He is dressed, as Lo’s characters tend to be, in clothes that show off his well-muscled torso; Lo definitely came from the Bruce Lee school of body sculpting. Mo asks Qiu to make him some new weapons, which he calls “swords” but westerners would call them knives or daggers. More on this in the next section, but for purposes of this recap, the weapons he (and later Fu Sheng) use in the film will be called daggers unless we’re quoting dialog directly.

Qiu Zi-Yu (Philip Kwok) and Mo Jun-Feng (Lo Meng)

Qiu refuses, and in fact claims that he is not Qiu Zi-Yu at all and doesn’t know how to make weapons. Mo doesn’t believe him, and threatens to kill Qiu’s apprentice if he doesn’t get his way. But Qiu shrugs him off, asking, “Would Mo Jun-Feng, a swordsman of great repute, do such a thing?” Mo releases the apprentice as a carriage draws up before the shop.

Chiang Sheng as Xiao Tang

The carriage is driven by Chiang Sheng playing Xiao Tang, the “Deadly Whip” or (in the English dub) Whipper Tang. He asks Qiu to look at a wheel on the carriage that seems to be broken; Qiu confirms that it is and tells Tang that it’ll take at least a day to fix. Tang shrugs and opens the door to the carriage to reveal its passenger, Xiao Qiang (Lin Chen-Chi). She doesn’t waste eyesight on Qiu, merely asking him to fix the wheel quickly, and turns her attention immediately to Mo.

Lin Chen-Chi as Xiao Qiang

She says that she’s heard there are many people looking to kill him, but he scoffs. She goes on that of course he has his legendary seven deadly daggers, and that “It’s rumored that Mo Jun-Feng’s sword and Xiao Qiang’s smile are the deadliest weapons,” but goes on to mention a rumor that he has lost his daggers, and without them he’ll surely die if his enemies find him. Furthermore, he is wasting his time searching for Qiu, which she explains by means of a flashback.

“It’s rumored that Mo Jun-Feng’s sword and Xiao Qiang’s smile are the deadliest weapons”

Three years earlier, Qiu made a special sword for Yan Zi-Fei (played by Lu Feng, the fourth Venom we’ve met out of five characters so far!). Qiu brought the sword to Yan, who then attempted to kill rather than pay him. Qiu was badly wounded but escaped, and since that day he has refused to have anything to do with martial arts. “There is no Qiu Zi-Yu now,” she says, “I am the only solution to your problem.” She has a business proposition to make to him, and if he’ll be her partner in the venture, she’ll see that he gets his seven deadly daggers back. The two walk away arm-in-arm with Tang looking on disapprovingly, though nothing ever comes of that look.

We cut to the Fu Lai Inn, where we see Xiao Qiang and Mo in private consultation. Unbeknownst to them, they are watched by a sneaky-looking old man. This is Cui Miao-Shou (Lam Fai-Wong), a master pickpocket who (it turns out) is the one who stole Mo’s daggers. He helpfully shows them to the audience while hiding them away under his pillow. Meanwhile, Mo asks Xiao Qiang what she has in mind, and she says “Besides killing, what do you know? What else would I know?” 

Cui Miao-Shou (Lam Fai-Wong) listens in

A second flashback introduces the four targets, a fearsome group of bandits. Their chief is Jin Ba, played by Dick Wei, whose weapon is a massive mace that the movie insists on calling a hammer. Also in the gang are: Cheng Zhang Po, the Silver Leopard (Suen Shu-Pao), who wields twin shields with razor-sharp edges; Wu Hao, the Little King Kong (bit of an anachronistic name), who uses his great strength and muscles so hard that swords can’t hurt him as his only weapons; and Zhen Liu-Zhang, the Golden Hairpin (Lau Wai-Ling), so called because she can throw her poison-tipped hairpins with great accuracy. I submit that it’s excessively dangerous to stick poisoned hairpins into one’s own hair, but her life is her own.

Dick Wei as Jin Ba

The four have robbed a caravan that was carrying the He Huan Jade, an ornament said to be worth half a million silver taels, maybe more to the right buyer. Wu Hao wants to sell the jade and split the profits, but Cheng points out that the caravan belongs to the Nan family (okay, we can argue about this interpretation in the next section...for right now just go with me), who are the leaders of the martial world in the north. The oldest son, Nan Yu, is “great in kung fu,” and would make a dangerous enemy. Cheng and Jin Ba don’t believe it’s worth it, even for over 100K taels apiece. So Zhen has a suggestion: they’ll gamble for it, winner-take-all. She suggests the Golden Lion, Mao Kai-Yuan, the king of gamblers. He owns a famous casino in Guangdong, but lives at a resort (in this small town we’ve been in the whole movie) called the Lion Rock, where he’s semi-retired. They agree to meet there to gamble for the jade, with Mao overseeing the game. And yes, this raises certain questions, and again, we’ll discuss them in the next section.

Zhen Liu-Zhang, the Golden Hairpin (Lau Wai-Ling),

Wu Hao, the Little King Kong (Bruce Tong),

and Cheng Zhang-Po, the Silver Leopard (Suen Shu-Pao)

Back at the Fu Lai Inn, Mo says that there’s no job to be done, since the four bandits will kill each other for the jade however the game turns out. However, Xiao Qiang says that actually Mao will find a way to keep the jade for himself, which is why she needs Mo’s help. Meanwhile, the eavesdropping Cui thinks aloud that whoever wins the jade, he himself will take it.

Johnny Wang as Mao Kai-Yuan, the Golden Lion, King of Gamblers

Now we cut to the Lion Rock, where we get to meet Mao, played by Johnny Wang. We first see him using a domed box to roll a die, and learn that the box is rigged so that the die will come up showing whichever face he chooses. While he’s testing the box, Peng Shuang Shuang (Shirley Yu) enters. She’s known as the Killer Goddess, and is apparently a madam or something very much like it, though the movie never goes into much detail on this. Mao is arranging for Shuang Shuang and some of her girls to act as hostesses and servers for the big game, and she flat-out asks him whether he’s planning to steal the jade from them. She says that she’ll want to be paid up front for her services, and Mao says he’ll have his banker write out the check, but she demands payment in silver. When he asks why she doesn’t trust his check, she says “It’s not that. But if the issuer dies, then I can’t cash it.” She leaves, with Mao watching her suspiciously on her way out.

Shirley Yu as Peng Shuang-Shuang, the Killer Goddess

He gets up and goes into a hidden room behind a false display case. There we see his adopted son/personal assassin Yun Xiang (Fu Sheng), casually clipping the buds off of a vase of flowers by throwing knives at them. Yun acknowledges that, on the night of the game, he’s to ambush Shuang Shuang as she leaves and kill her. But he, like Shuang Shuang, demands payment in silver, and for the same reason. But he wants it immediately, and when Mao asks why, Yun says it’s because Mo and Xiao Qiang suddenly came to town, and he’s afraid he’s running out of chances to ask Mao for money.

Yun Xiang (Fu Sheng) clipping some flowers

Cut to the home of Yan Zi-Fei, where he stands on a veranda hearing the taunting laughter of a woman. Xiao Qiang enters, accompanied by Tang. Yan knows who they are and asks what he can do for them. She tells him that Qiu isn’t dead, but that he’s given up martial arts and lives in her town. Yan is happy with this, since it means that Qiu will never make a sword like his for anyone else, but Xiao Qiang says that she needs Qiu to do something for her and therefore needs something to ease his anger. We know, of course, that what she means is that if she can avenge Qiu, he might be willing in return to make Mo’s daggers for him. Yan and Tang have a brief but athletic battle that ends when Tang manages to tie up Yan’s sword arm so that Xiao Qiang can step in and cut off his right hand, after which Yan escapes howling into the night.

Yan Zi-Fei (Lu Feng) and the folks who have come to steal his hand.

The next day she arrives at Qiu’s blacksmith shop, where he tells her that the repairs to her carriage will cost one tael. But she wants to talk another deal, and asks the cost of Mo’s daggers. He repeats that he doesn’t make blades. She says that she has the cure for what made him leave the martial world, and gives him Yan’s hand. But he tells her, as he told Mo, that Qiu Zi-Yu is long gone, that the man before her is a simple blacksmith, and to please stop hassling him. Mo, who has been watching this exchange, tells Xiao Qiang to leave Qiu alone. This is our first hint that Mo is more than a thug, and rather has qualities at least resembling honor and empathy. He wants his daggers, but respects Qiu’s decision and understands that it comes from deep feelings. So the conspirators walk away. But hey, there’s an extremely ragged bum hiding in the shadows, and...holy hell, it’s Yan! How has he become so bedraggled overnight? He looks like he’s been sleeping under a bridge for the past five years.

“I’m sorry. I’ve already answered your three questions.”

Anyway, Yan has three questions for Qiu.
First, has Xiao Qiang been there? (Yes.)
Second, what did she bring you? (Your hand)
Third, you hate me, don’t you? (No)
“No?” says Yan. “You were almost killed by me. The sword I used to pierce you is your masterpiece. You have lived as a hermit from then on. Why don’t you hate me?”
“I’m sorry. I’ve already answered your three questions.”

Now four generic, identically-dressed bravos enter the shop. They ask Yan to leave so they can talk business with the blacksmith, and Yan looks as though he wants to fight them, but upon raising his arm remembers that he has no hand there (though we can see his fingers inside his sleeve...the cameraman wasn’t paying enough attention that day) and slinks away. The leader of the four bravos tells Qiu that Master Nan (the Nan Yu mentioned earlier by the bandits) wants to speak to him. Qiu refuses to leave his forge. The bravos seem to intimate that they will use violence if necessary to bring him to Nan Yu, but Qiu says he won’t go even if they kill him. Just when it starts to look like they might be willing to do that, Wu Hao walks into the shop (man, this place is jumping today!). The bravos pay no attention to him. Wu Hao asks if Qiu sells rakes, and Qiu points to the wall on one side. Wu Hao picks out a rake and easily kills the four bravos with it. He taunts Qiu, saying that Qiu claims he will make no weapon, but the rake seems pretty deadly. Qiu suddenly attacks Wu Hao with his sledgehammer and trashes a pretty fair section of the shop before Wu Hao points out that the hammer, too, is a weapon. Qiu casts it aside and starts to fight hand-to-hand, but Wu Hao says that for a master like Qiu even the fist is a deadly weapon. Qiu asks who Wu Hao is, and with some prompting remembers hearing about him. Wu Hao says that he can't remain a hermit forever, and starts to suggest that he might make...but Qiu interrupts him, and throws a punch which Wu Hao meets with his own fist. The two strain against each other for a second, then laugh and part. I’ll have a lot to say about this scene in the next section, but for now we’ll let it go.

“So, you don’t make weapons, huh?”

As Qiu starts to clean up the mess, he’s approached by a man in very fine yellow silk robes. This is Lord Nan, Nan Yu, played by “guest star” (I always wonder what that means in movies) Li Yi-Min. Nan Yu has some business to discuss (who doesn’t today?). He tells Qiu about the jade, how his family runs the security company that was transporting the jade when the bandits stole it. The bandits must be watching him, and he’s afraid that if he tries to take the jade back openly there will be a battle and many will be killed. So he wants Qiu, who has no ties to him, to get the jade back quietly. He makes a little speech about weapons being used properly and how Qiu’s decision to leave the martial world is a waste, but Qiu turns him down.

Qiu Zi-Yu refuses to help Lord Nan Yu (Li Yi-Min)

We cut to a tavern to find Mo getting drunk alone in a corner. Shuang Shuang approaches him and we learn that the two have a history together. Shuang Shuang says that she was with him before he was a famous hero, and now that he has lost his daggers she has come back to him, so he should know he can trust her. She tells him to come to her at the inn at midnight.

Oh yes. She is absolutely to be trusted.

Now back to the blacksmith’s. Qiu is underneath the carriage repairing the wheel and a young woman crawls under the carriage to speak to him. This is Xiao Hong, played by Kara Hui. They seem to know each other well and to be friends. Qiu asks why she’s come and she says that her father brought her, and that he’s waiting for them inside. So Qiu walks inside to find Ku Feng as Chief Constable Xiao Zi-Jing. These two also clearly have known each other for a long time. The Constable says that he has come to beg Qiu to accept Nan Yu’s request for assistance. He says that he has a plan to attack from both outside and inside to get the jade from the bandits.

Ku Feng as Chief Constable Xiao Zi-Jing

Cut to a very short scene in Shuang Shuang’s room, where we see her and Mo beginning to undress, then cut away immediately to the two of them walking through town. Chang Cheh always seemed to be very uncomfortable with sex. Anyway, as they walk, Shuang Shuang is telling Mo that Xiao Qiang can’t help him much, but that she can get his daggers for him. He says he’ll help whoever helps him, and she says she must leave now “or someone else will be jealous.” She then goes to Cui’s room, where we learn that in fact she hired him to steal the daggers in the first place. He gives them back, and asks “What about the reward you promised me?” while slipping his arms around her. Thinking he means to be paid with sexual favors, she pushes him away saying “It’s not the kind you have in mind,” but in fact he only made that move to steal her money, which he then shows to her. This, I suppose, is just to establish how smooth a thief he is, and fair enough.

We skip ahead some length of time, to find her lying on her bed when Tang suddenly enters her room. He uses his weapon to slash down the silk hanging over her bed and to tear her dress, and warns her to stay away from Mo. She says that she must have a man, and if not Mo then who? She rises and walks to him, pulls his robe open, and he thinks “Oh, this is turning out better than I thought!” She tosses the whip aside, he embraces her clumsily, she slips a knife attached to a fine chain out of her sleeve and kills him.

And there’s my favorite Venom gone half an hour into the film.

She’s standing over the body, just pulling the knife out of his guts, when in walk the Constable and Xiao Hong. Shuang Shuang says that she guesses she’s dead now, but the Constable points out that his report could say that she murdered him in self-defense as he attempted to rape her. She says, “I see. My fate depends on you. What do you want?” and he tells her: he wants to infiltrate the game by having his daughter pretend to be one of Shuang Shuang’s girls. Shuang Shuang agrees, and the Constable says he’ll take care of the body.

I'm not sure you want to trust your daughter’s welfare to this woman, chief.

Meanwhile, in the restaurant of the inn, Qiu is sitting and having a drink with the town’s doctor (Cheung Hei). The doctor is saying that the sick old man in the next room (who turns out to be Cui) seems to be perfectly alright but still claims that he can’t get out of bed, which we assume means that he’s trying to avoid meeting Mo, when Xiao Qiang comes in. She asks Qiu to find Tang for her. Then Yan comes down the stairs laughing and calling for wine. He’s happy because Tang is dead and he’s just seen the body. He asks Qiu to come discuss something with him privately. They walk into the alley and Yan begs on his knees for help. He’s realized the error of his ways and wants to start over and find redemption. But he can’t grow a new hand. He needs Qiu to make one for him. Qiu agrees, and tells Yan to give him three days, but in return Yan must do something for him that might be dangerous. Yan says he’ll do anything Qiu wants.

So earnest, so desperate.

If he wasn’t played by Lu Feng, I might believe him, too!

Now there’s a brief sequence of Shuang Shuang training Xiao Hong to be a good server, which amounts to nothing. But immediately afterwards we see Xiao Hong walking in the garden, where she’s found by Yun. He clearly falls for her in a big way right off the bat, though it isn’t clear at first whether the feeling is mutual or she just realizes that he might be a valuable ally inside the Lion Rock. Anyway, they have a short conversation during which he admits that he’s a killer, and where she intimates without flat-out saying that she’s an orphan, like him, which makes him feel protective of her. She tells him that she’ll be the only girl present in the room once the game starts, and he begs her to ask Shuang Shuang to use someone else because it will be too dangerous, but she points out that if she doesn’t do it one of the other girls will have to, and how could she ask someone to face danger she feared to face herself? Yun is impressed, and swears that he’ll watch over her during the game. She tells him that he’s a better person than he thinks he is, and gives him one of the flowers from her hair.

Hooked.

Back to Mao’s sitting room in the Lion Rock, where a servant is announcing that Mao has a guest: Mo Jun-Feng. Mao tells the servant to give him a minute and then show the guest in, and slips into the hidden room to talk to Yun, who he finds mooning over the flower Xiao Hong gave him. He tells Yun to kill Mo when Mao gives the signal (he’ll blow on his tea). Then he comes back out to meet Mo. The two sit at the table and Mo informs Mao that he knows about the game and suspects Mao’s intention to take the He Huan Jade for himself. Mo says that he wants a cut, and Mao offers him a chance to retract that statement. After all, Mo has lost his blades and is vulnerable. Mo says in return that Mao has an equally useless swordsman, which I think means he knows that Yun is watching them but that’s not really clear. Anyway, Mo then says that he’s found his daggers. Mao asks to see them, but Mo refuses. Mao can gamble that he’s lying, if he likes (BURN!). Mao decides not to give the signal to Yun, and Mo leaves.

Two dangerous men, each plotting (and threatening) the death of the other.

But so polite about it!

Yun is annoyed that he didn’t get a chance to test himself against the great Mo Jun-Feng in combat, and gets even more annoyed when Mao says he didn’t give the signal because Yun would have been killed. So he leaves by a side door and accosts Mo as he exits the house. Yun says that Mo is a famous swordsman and that Yun would like to be more famous, so Mo suggests that Yun must kill more people than he has. But Yun points out that he could also do it simply by killing Mo. The two begin a battle, each knocking the other’s knives out of the air, until Mao appears and breaks it up. He says he doesn’t want anyone to be hurt. Mo points out that, while Yun is Mao’s man, he and Mao have no relationship, so why does he care if Mo is hurt? Mao says “I want to be your friend,” and sends Yun back into the Lion Rock. He asks Mo to keep an eye on Xiao Qiang, and when Mo points out that she’s difficult to control, Mao gives him a pill that, he says, will knock her out.

Five Fingers of Death!

On the way back to the inn, Mo walks by the blacksmith’s shop just as Qiu is finishing Yan’s hand. He is hurt by Qiu’s willingness to make a weapon for someone else after Mo accepted his explanation for refusing to make weapons with good grace. He threatens that if Qiu refuses his next request, he’ll kill him. Qiu still refuses, so Mo attacks with three of his knives. Qiu easily catches them with the iron hand, and then breaks them all in half. He says that he’ll replace them, and Mo says he wants to be Qiu’s friend. It is too dangerous to be his enemy.

“Why this impetuous use of weapons as soon as we meet?”

While Mo is doing all this, Mao goes to the inn to see Xiao Qiang, and now we see that he’s smarter than the people he’s conspiring against. First he sends a mook in to kill her, and of course she makes quick work of him. This is just a test to make sure she can take care of herself. He asks for her help during the game. When she asks what’s in it for her, he says that she can have the jade as well as the Lion Rock and all his assets. In other words, he wants to marry her. As a sign of good faith, he warns her that Mo is not to be trusted, and to prove it he warns that he plans to poison her so she can’t interfere in the game. So of course, when Mo shows up a few minutes later (after Mao has gone), she finds the pill, and hits a pressure point on Mo’s neck, sending him into a coma.

“Xiao Qiang’s smile is deadlier than Mo Jun-Feng’s sword.”

Finally, the bandits begin to arrive at Lion Rock. Cheng and Jin Ba sit and talk, and Cheng points out that Zhen and Wu Hao (who appear to be lovers?) arrived early and may have been plotting against them, but Jin Ba doesn’t believe him, or at least claims not to. So Cheng takes advantage of a quiet moment to get Mao alone and propose an alliance against Jin Ba. Later we see a look pass between them that makes it appear that they’ve reached an agreement.

Back at the inn, Qiu finds the comatose Mo and wakes him by hitting a different pressure point. At this point Mo admits that Xiao Qiang’s smile is in fact deadlier than his daggers. Soon after this he realizes that Xiao Qiang has actually stolen his daggers again, so that he won’t be able to take part in any activity at the game. But Qiu has made three to replace the ones that he broke, so he isn't completely empty-handed, and the two separate, Mo to go to the Lion Rock, and Qiu to meet Yan and give him the new hand.

Yan is delighted when he sees what the hand can do. It has five functions, but Qiu only shows him the first four: it’s a hardened fist for close combat, it has claws so as to act like a knife when needed, it can catch or deflect the enemy’s weapon (as we saw Qiu do to Mo), and it can fire darts itself. He will teach the fifth function after Yan has provided the help he promised: provide backup as he raids the Lion Rock to take the jade and return it to its rightful owner.

Ancient Chinese sexual harassment.

Back at the Lion Rock, the guests have noticed Xiao Hong, accepted her as one of Shuang Shuang’s girls, and made creepy comments about her having to “service” Jin Ba after the game, which is just about to begin. This is where the knowing look between Mao and Cheng takes place, which Wu Hao and Zhen seem to notice and confer about. Man, the intersecting treacheries are getting deep now. Shuang Shuang collects her pay and leaves after warning Xiao Hong that she’ll be alone now and beyond her protection. Yun follows her out but, instead of throwing his knives into her, merely tosses her his flower, telling her that she lives only for the sake of Xiao Hong.

Which you would think would inspire her to be nice to Xiao Hong, wouldn’t you?

(SPOILER ALERT!) It doesn’t.

Now at last the game begins. The four bandits come and sit along one side of a large table, with Mao across from them. Mao offers to let them test his equipment to make sure everything is above-board, but Jin Ba says that if they didn’t trust him they wouldn’t have let him run their game, making Jin Ba the dumbest person in the movie. They lay down the ground rules; the table is draped with a cloth made of four equal sections, and each section has its own color and a word stiched onto it. Each player will pick one of the four possibilities, and the winner (determined by die roll) gets the jade.

Worth it?

They bring the object out to admire it, and set it on the table in front of Mao. We also learn that Jin Ba’s yellow-clad hired thugs are guarding the door so that nobody can get in. The players choose which result will win for them. Jin Ba chooses White Tiger, the black section with white writing, and stabs his “golden hammer” into the fabric. Cheng chooses Green Dragon, the green section with black writing, and stabs one of his shields into that. Wu Hao chooses Zhu Mun, the gold section with black writing, and bangs it with his fist, saying that he never uses weapons. Of course, we know this isn’t true since he used a rake to kill the bravos at the smithy, but I guess he was trying to make a point then. That leaves Gui Sun, the red section with gold writing, for Zhen, and she stabs one of her hairpins into it. Cheng remarks that between Wu Hao’s skills and Zhen’s poison, he and Jin Ba couldn’t compete if it came to fighting.

“There’s a fierce tiger at Mount West, its body white as snow.”

Incidentally, how do you play a four-option game with a six-sided die?

Mao shakes the box, opens it, and announces that White Tiger has won. Jin Ba jumps out of his seat in surprise, and when he does Cheng slashes him with his shield. The wound is not serious, and Jin Ba turns, binding the shield with one hand while raising his hammer to strike with the other, but Mao does some sort of open-palm strike on his shoulder blades. He collapses onto the table, blood running from his mouth, and Cheng finishes him with his shield. Zhen asks why he has done this, and Cheng says only that “he harbored ill intentions.” When she points out that Jin Ba has had the jade all along and could simply have run off with it, Cheng argues that the other three would have tracked him down if he had. Now, with his thugs guarding the door, he thought that he could have them all killed if he failed to win the jade outright. But Cheng has made other plans: he opens the door to show that Jin Ba’s yellow-clad thugs have been killed by Cheng’s green-clad thugs (thank goodness for color-coding). Mao’s grey-clad thugs then remove the bodies of Jin Ba and his men.

Silver Leopard 1, Jin Ba 0.

Nobody to blame but himself, really.

They prepare to roll the die again, with each player keeping his or her same bet. Zhen asks whether, if she or Wu Hao win, they can expect to be killed as well. Cheng points out that she and Wu Hao are together, and he would have to fight them both alone, and that in fact he’s worried that if Green Dragon is the winner they’ll murder him. She says that he wouldn’t be alone, since it looks like he and Mao have an understanding, but Mao claims that he jumped in only because Jin Ba dishonored the game (which, incidentally, does not seem to be the case). As long as the rules are followed, he says, he will stay neutral. Mao rolls the die again, and once again White Tiger wins. Everyone, including Cheng, is surprised. He says that, since nobody won, they must roll again, but Mao disagrees. He has an explanation which seems to mean that, since none of the players won the jade, the game goes to the house, but that isn’t at all what he actually says. None of them are lucky enough to beat him, since he is after all the King of Gamblers, and they might as well just accept that and leave Lion Rock with good grace. If they do, they’ll be allowed to leave alive.

Mao rises to go, asking Xiao Hong to bring more tea for the guests. Cheng reaches for the jade, and the two begin to fight. Xiao Hong slips out the back while this is happening, and we see Mo and Shuang Shuang waiting just outside the open door to the garden, apparently invisible to the people in the room. Meanwhile, Zhen grabs the jade, saying that the Golden Lion’s fist and the Silver Leopard’s shield are strong kung fu, so they are leaving. Cheng asks, “Did you forget I still have my six men outside?” but Mao laughs. “Jin Ba has eight men, you have six. How could I forget?” Zhen and Wu Hao open the door, revealing that Cheng’s green-clad thugs have been killed by Mao’s grey-clad thugs, led by Xiao Qiang, whose laugh we once again hear before we see her.

Xiao Qiang raises her ring, which we see has a needle sticking from it. It fires from the ring and strikes Cheng in the back, leaving him open to a fatal attack from Mao. He asks Zhen to return the jade, and she walks back to the table, saying that money comes and goes. But as she places the jade on the table she grabs the hairpin that she had previously used to place her bet, and throws it, striking Xiao Qiang, who collapses. Mao grabs the jade and makes to escape, and Zhen tells Wu Hao to stop him. While they fight, she steps over to the dying Xiao Qiang and taunts her: “I hear Xiao Qiang’s smile is famous. Can you smile now?” But Mo has (belatedly) seen enough; his thrown dagger hits Zhen’s spine even as she speaks.
 

The moral of the story:

Don’t gloat ‘til you’re sure you’re gonna make it yourself.

As Mo strides slowly, confidently in from the garden (Shuang Shuang disappearing from behind him as he does), Mao calls to his thugs, “Kill them all. No one leaves here alive.” Mo draws his two remaining daggers and throws them simultaneously with one hand, killing two of Mao’s thugs, but the other six charge him. Now he must fight bare-handed, which of course he does very well also, but he’s still in bad trouble. Xiao Qiang tells him that since he avenged her by killing Zhen, she will return his daggers to him, and pulls those she stole from her cloak.

Honorable?

Now that he has all seven daggers, he makes quick work of the thugs, and places his special (so far unused) seventh dagger back in its sheath. He begins to retrieve the other six, but before he can a door opens and Yun enters. A brief conversation ensues, during which we understand that Yun, who has all his daggers, would easily kill Mo if they were to fight at this moment. Yun can’t let him kill Mao, but if Mo will leave now, Yun will duel him properly some day. Mo agrees and turns to go.  

Mao, hearing this, tells Wu Hao that he should be fighting Mo to avenge Zhen rather than pestering him. Wu Hao agrees and attacks Mo. Xiao Hong returns with the tea, and Yun runs to her to make sure she’s okay. They watch as Mo and Wu Hao fight, and Yun tells Mao to leave and he’ll keep an eye on those two. But Xiao Hong wants the He Huan Jade, so Yun tells Mao to leave it. Mao smirks and walks away with the jade; Yun draws one of his knives but can’t throw it. “I know that Mao Kai-Yuan is not a good man, but I can’t kill him myself,” he tells her. But as Mao reaches the door, Qiu and Yan appear, and Xiao Hong says, “I don’t think it’s necessary.”

Mao and Yan begin to fight. Mo rolls clear of Wu Hao, grabs a dagger from the body of a thug, and throws it. It hits Wu Hao square in the chest but simply bounces off. “I practice the Iron Clothing kung fu, and hence I’m the only one in the world who doesn’t fear your dagger,” Wu Hao says. But Yan fires a dart from his iron hand, and it pierces Wu Hao’s flesh. “Wu Hao,” Qiu says, “your Iron Clothing kung fu can protect you from daggers thrown by man, but not those shot by machine.” Wu Hao dies, and Qiu scolds Yan for being too quick to kill. Mao, meanwhile, looks at the newest corpse and realizes that Yan can kill him this way, too. Yun, recognizing danger, draws a dagger, but Xiao Hong restrains him, saying that Brother Qiu is the only good man present, and Yun again puts the dagger away.

What do you know? No more bandits!

Qiu says that he wants to bet with Mao. Winner gets the jade, loser dies (finally the Life Gamble of the title!). Mao returns to his seat and once again places the jade on the table. Qiu comes and sits across from him, with Yan at his shoulder, training the iron hand at Mao. Mo and Yun approach and sit at either end of the table, to act as witnesses. Mo thanks Qiu for his daggers, and Qiu says he’s pleased that they were used to rid the martial world of bad elements.

CAUTION: Life Gamble in progress.

Mao slides his box across the table like before, so that Qiu can inspect it. Qiu pulls a small iron plaque from his pocket, with writing on each side.

Finally, a game in a Shaw Brothers

movie that I can understand!

He informs us that one side says “life” and the other “death.” Mao says, “You really want to gamble with me? You know that you will lose. Who doesn’t know that I am the gambling king?”
“Look carefully,” Qiu responds. “This iron plaque has two sides. Let me put it into the box. You open it. If the word ‘death’ faces you, you die. Otherwise, you live.”
“Qiu Zi-Yu, will you keep your word?”
“If I don’t, there are witness here. Well, do you want to bet?”

Of course Mao does, so Qiu removes the lid, places the plaque, replaces the lid, and slides the box back across. Mao picks up the box and shakes it, but soon realizes something is wrong. He presses the hidden button several times. Mo asks why he doesn’t open it. Mao places the box back on the table as if to open it, but then leaps for Qiu with the same claw motion he used to kill Cheng. But a dart from Yan strikes him between the eyes and he falls.

Cheaters never prosper. I mean, eventually.

Yun rises, as if to avenge his boss, but Qiu opens the box, showing that the plaque says “death.” Mao had lost. Yun asks how he won, and Qiu explains that the side that said “life” had a small nail in it. When he placed it in the box he stuck the nail into it so that it couldn’t turn over. Mao was out-thought for the first time in the film and died for it. Qiu announces his intention of returning the jade to its owner but says that if Yun would prefer, it could be given to Xiao Hong (who has been watching from the side this whole time). Qiu reaches for the jade, but Yan aims the iron hand at him and warns him not to touch it. He plans not only to take the jade, but to murder Qiu. Yan thinks the hand will give him power to rule the martial world, and he won’t take a chance of Qiu making another, better one. Qiu warns him that he doesn’t know the fifth function of the hand yet, but Yan says he isn’t greedy, and is satisfied with four. While he’s talking, Mo manages to get to his daggers, and throws three at Yan, who simply catches them and breaks them into pieces. Yun goes to draw, but Yan tells him that catching daggers is one of the hand’s functions, and that now no one can fight him for the jade.

Evil dude, but man, you got to respect that mustache.

But Mo draws his special seventh dagger and throws it, and it turns out that it is actually several very slim daggers in one sheath. Yan catches one, but the others pierce his abdomen. “This is my last dagger,” he says. “No one sees it and lives.” But Yan, though badly wounded, still has life enough to fire his last two darts. When he tries, they backfire into his chest and throat. He lives long enough for Qiu to explain the fifth function: after two darts are fired a switch must be flipped, or the last two will kill the user, a booby trap in case Yan turned out still to be false.

“Curses! Foiled by my own betrayal!”

He had a tough movie, but he did kinda deserve it.

Qiu thanks Mo for saving his life, which of course he didn’t, but it’s the thought that counts. Qiu also points out that, by throwing his last dagger, Mo has given up his chance to obtain the He Huan Jade. Mo again starts to retrieve his daggers, and once again Yun stops him. Mo must wait ‘til Yun and Xiao Hong have left with the jade to re-arm himself. Yun picks up the jade, wraps it in a yellow handkerchief, and gives it to Xiao Hong. They turn to leave, but a knife flies in from off-stage, attached to a fine chain.

It’s Shuang Shuang, coming in from the garden. She twitches the weapon so that the chain wraps around Xiao Hong, and she holds the knife to her throat. She apologizes to Xiao Hong, then tells the room that she’ll be leaving with both her and the jade. If anyone tries to stop her, she’ll kill Xiao Hong. Otherwise, she’ll leave her safe and alive at the Fu Lai Inn. She doesn’t want to hurt her, she says, both because she likes her, and because she doesn’t want to make an enemy of the Constable. She also tells Mo that he gets no share in the loot; she’s done enough by returning his daggers to him.

Lady, you are making a ton of very dangerous enemies here.

Both Qiu and Yun back down, but Mo doesn’t care about Xiao Hong and reaches for a dagger, prepared to throw. Yun now takes aim at him, saying that he can’t allow Xiao Hong to be hurt. If he’ll let the ladies go, Yun will allow him to pick up all his daggers and they’ll fight from even footing. So, after the two dancing around each other for quite a long time, the duel is finally going to happen. Yun keeps Mo covered until the ladies are gone, then they prepare to fight.

Those are Johnny Wang’s feet on the table there. I always suspected that the worst thing

about working for this studio would be extended fight scenes like this.

The ones who die first prob’ly have to show up and play dead for days while they finish filming!

Qiu throws the die to start the duel, and the first dagger slices it in half. The two dodge each other’s daggers or knock them out of the air until each is down to his last one. Mo throws and, just as with Yan, the last dagger splits into several blades in the air. But this time, all the blades stick to Yun’s last dagger, which flies true and mortally wounds Mo. Yun explains that the last dagger is a magnet, and Mo dies. Qiu says over his body that he was a hero after all.

Yun asks how Qiu knows Xiao Hong. Qiu says that he has known her for years, and that she is like a sister to him. Then Yun asks why Shuang Shuang mentioned the Constable, and Qiu tells him that she is his daughter, and that they are working with him to try to get the jade back. Yun is surprised that Xiao Hong lied to him, but Qiu points out that she was working undercover, and it might not have been wise to tell the truth. He believes that she will tell him the truth in the future. But for now, Yun must go to the inn to make sure she’s safe, while Qiu figures out how to get the jade from Shuang Shuang.

We see the women arrive at the inn. As they go upstairs, Cui comes down and, of course, steals the jade from Shuang Shuang as he passes them. When they get to Shuang Shuang’s room, the Constable is waiting. She attacks him with the knife, but he casually takes it from her. She tries to run, but Yun is behind her on the stairs, dagger drawn. They all go into her room and the Constable demands the jade, but she discovers that it’s missing. To be safe, Xiao Hong takes her behind a screen and searches her, but of course it isn’t on her. The Constable asks whether she had time to hide it, or if they met anyone on the way, and Xiao Hong remembers the old man on the staircase. Of course, while all this is going on, Xiao Hong also apologizes for lying to Yun, who says he doesn’t blame her. By this time, it’s pretty clear that even if she was using Yun at first, she has since fallen for him.

Awkward introduction, right?

“Dad, this is a my new boyfriend, a professional killer.

Honey, this is my dad, the chief of police.”

He seems strangely fine with it, though. Is he in a hurry

to get her out of the house? Does she eat a lot or something?

Meanwhile, Cui is in his room admiring the jade when Qiu enters. I have no idea how he knows that Cui has the jade, but he does. Qiu says that he will take the jade by force if he has to, and it’ll be easy, but if Cui will turn it over peacefully he won’t tell where he got it. Cui hands it over, and Qiu declares his intention of taking it to Dong Gang, where he can hand it over to Nan Yu.

This guy is playing way out of his league.

Cui is packed and leaving when the Constable, Xiao Hong, and Yun arrive. They demand the jade, and Cui tells them that Qiu has taken it already and is on his way to Dong Gang. The Constable tells him to go catch up with Qiu and ask him to bring the jade back, so that the case can be properly closed. Cui goes, and there’s a brief conversation between the Constable and Yun about the possibility of Yun and Xiao Hong having a life together, which isn’t very interesting but is interrupted by a scream from Shuang Shuang upstairs. She comes out onto the landing with an arrow in her back and dies. Everyone races upstairs to find a man in grey assassin’s garb ransacking the room, but he jumps out the window. Yun wants to chase, but the Constable stops him. No point catching the murderer, they need the guy who sent him, who obviously still thinks Shuang Shuang has the jade (I do think that catching the murderer might make it easier to find the employer, I must say). He suspects who the employer is, though, and it’s a man both mighty in kung fu himself and with many followers. So Yun and Xiao Hong are to remain at the inn while he gathers his soldiers.

Oh good, a happy ending.

Wait...there are still ten minutes left?

Cui apparently knows a shortcut to Dong Gang and arrives before Qiu. There he finds Nan Yu instructing his soldiers that the man they are about to fight is a master of many different styles of kung fu and every weapon, and they must be brutal to defeat him. Cui runs back to the inn and tells Yun and Xiao Hong this news, and wondering why the soldiers were wearing masks. Then we cut to Qiu returning the jade to Nan Yu. Then back to the inn, where the three figure out that Nan Yu means to kill Qiu, that he had the jade insured for 100K though it’s worth half a million at least, and that Nan Yu seems to think that no one but Qiu knows that the jade has been recovered, so if he kills Qiu he can keep both the jade and the insurance. Yun sets off to warn Qiu and help him if he can.

Now we see Qiu walking back to town, when he’s suddenly ambushed by several archers. He dodges, catches, or deflects most of the arrows, but three do pierce him. He attacks and beats a few of the archers and the others run away. He calls out, “Nan Yu, I know it’s you now. You needn’t pretend anymore.” He breaks off the arrows and hits three pressure points on his own abdomen as Nan Yu steps out of hiding.

Nan Yu tells Qiu that he knows that the arrows have pierced vital organs, and that although his knowledge of chi has let him slow the bleeding, he must die eventually. Qiu agrees but says that first he will kill Nan Yu and retrieve the jade. “Not necessarily,” Nan Yu replies, and calls out his eight killers. These men attack Qiu with short spears, and he fights them first with whips that had been wrapped around his torso like suspenders, and then with a pair of two-section staves that we might as well call nunchaku. Once Qiu has killed or disabled these guys, Nan Yu approaches to fight with a pair of short, one-handed halberds. This fight does not go on very long before Nan Yu realizes that he’s overmatched and calls out his four tigers. 

I don’t know how effective this would be, but it’s certainly pretty.

These are four guys with spears that, it turns out, are also flagpoles (presaging The Flag of Iron for Shaw Brothers fans). One flag is white, one green, one red, and one blue. Nan Yu’s halberds turn out to have small yellow flags in them, and he uses those flags to direct his tigers as if he was sending messages in semaphore. The tigers fight in formation, seeking to obscure Qiu’s vision with their flags or even to bind him with them. They are finally able to distract him to the point that Nan Yu can kill him, memorably stabbing him through the white flag and spraying it with blood.

Meanwhile, and too late, Yun arrives on the scene, taking out Nan Yu’s guards left and right until he sees the flags over the next hill. He runs up to find Qiu dead on the ground. He scolds Nan Yu for killing a man who trusted him and was trying to do the right thing. Nan Yu says that he couldn’t escape the deadly flag formation, and wonders whether Yun will be able to, either. Yun draws and throws dagger after dagger, and each is caught or deflected within the waving flags. Finally he has thrown the last one, and Nan Yu advances to kill him. 

You know you deserved that, right, ya sneaky bastard?

But then Yun takes the scabbards that carry the daggers and throws them; it turns out that they are also metal, and also razor-sharp. The much heavier scabbards slice right through the flags and kill Nan Yu. As he falls, we see the Constable, Xiao Hong, and Cui approach with a few dozen soldiers, who round up the tigers. Yun takes the jade from Nan Yu’s body and Xiao Hong runs to him. ANOTHER SHAW PRODUCTION.

* * * * * * *

BEST THING ABOUT THE FILM:

I love that the movie more or less opens with the line, “It’s rumored Mo Jun Feng’s sword and Xiao Qiang’s smile are the deadliest weapons,” even though Yun Xiang’s daggers turn out to be just slightly deadlier. Xiao Qiang’s smile is pretty amazing, the way Lin Chen-Chi turns it on and off, how sweet it can be, and also how threatening, and her mocking laughter that announces her presence before we can see her. She’s my favorite thing in this.

WORST THING ABOUT THE FILM: Not to put down Li Yi-Min, who I have enjoyed in other pictures, but it annoys me that only four of the five Venoms are in this. Where is Sun Chien? Shouldn’t he have played Nan Yu? Not only would it have completed the participation of the Venom Mob in this movie, but I bet it would have made that final fight a little more interesting, as well.

THOUGHTS: I wonder if the NRA likes this movie, because of Nan Yu’s speech to Qiu about how a weapon is neither good nor bad but merely reflects the will of its user, so his refusal to make weapons is wasteful and pointless. But anyway, let’s talk about Nan Yu’s plan for a moment. First, is the jade his? That is said many times in the film, in both the English dub and the subtitles on the Cantonese dub. Or does he merely own the company that was transporting the jade, making him liable for its loss? That is also said in both versions of the film. Furthermore we learn that, while the jade is worth half a million taels or more, it is only insured for 100,000. And when Ku Feng’s character sends the thief after Qiu, he tells him that Qiu must bring the jade to him, so that he can have the owner retract the charge and close the case. I’m not sure, but that seems to indicate that Nan Yu, the person Qiu is going to meet, is not the owner.

It seems to me that it makes more sense for the jade not to belong to Nan Yu; he’s planning to pay a fraction of the jade’s value (assuming he has to pay the insurance himself, which is not necessarily true) and keep it for himself, and therefore must kill Qiu so that nobody will know he has it. Remember, it is specifically mentioned that he thinks nobody but Qiu knows that he’s brought the jade back. It would make less sense for this to be some sort of ancient Chinese insurance scam, which is what must be the case if Nan Yu is actually the legal owner. I think it’s better both logically and narratively if Nan Yu is legally responsible for the jade, but not its owner, so that’s the interpretation I’m going with. Anyone who would like to argue this, well, that’s what comments are for.

But that isn’t the main thing as far as Nan Yu is concerned. The problem I have isn’t his actual plan, it’s his plan as explained to Qiu. Why would a kung fu master who commands an army need to hire anyone to overpower four bandits? Remember, these are dangerous people, but they aren’t really top-flight fighters, more solid second-tier guys. Our main characters all seem to be convinced that any two of them can handle all four bandits: Xiao Qiang thinks she can do it with Mo Jun-Feng, as does Shuang Shuang; Mao thinks he can do it with Xiao Qiang; Qiu thinks he can do it with Yan. In the actual event, they all seem to be right: the only main character killed by a bandit is Xiao Qiang in a surprise attack from the seemingly defeated Zhen Liu-Xiang. So...Master Nan with his archers, his killers, and his tigers couldn’t have handled them? He worries that it might cause trouble with the clans, but it looks to me like there’s already trouble with the clans (I mean, they did steal the jade in the first place), and in any event isn’t it the same whether his agent is Qiu or his soldiers? He still will have killed the bandits and taken back the jade.

So that’s the weak point in the plot, in my opinion, and the only thing that really bothers me about the way the film plays out. Everything else pretty much makes sense. But that doesn’t mean I don’t have questions.
First, can a whip really block a slash with a sword? It seems like the blade would cut right through. Any weapons experts out there reading this who have some insight there? I should research this before I get to The Shadow Whip, but since I’m not too big a fan of that one, there’s plenty of time.
Second, I wonder why Wu Hao came to the smithy that one time, and killed those men. Did he want a weapon? He doesn’t use weapons (again, allowing for the idea that he only uses that rake to prove to Qiu that he does indeed make weapons). Was he just sounding him out to see whether he was likely to get involved, as a powerful fighter with the game happening virtually in his back yard? That might make sense, but in that case, it would be better not to antagonize him, wouldn’t it? And in any case, why do the two of them laugh like old friends after they fight? I seem to have missed the joke.
Third, if the bandits want to gamble for the jade, why not just do it? Flip a coin or something on the spot. Why introduce at least one other contestant, one much smarter than any of the bandits, and put themselves at his mercy? To say nothing of the fact that, by delaying and making arrangements with Mao, they give a dozen other people time to find out what’s going on and get involved as well. As soon as they all agreed to go to the Lion Rock, they were lost, and I feel like at least one of them ought to have realized it.
Fourth, well, it isn’t really a question, but I think it’s hilarious that, in the English dub, the guy who does Lu Feng’s voice (and I think Cheng’s as well) sounds exactly like a drunk Elisha Cook Jr. I sometimes watch the film in English just to laugh about that.
Fifth, the four bandits indicate that they fear Master Nan, who is “great in kung fu.” Is he, though? He does not, at any point, fight effectively. He merely commands men who do, and knows how to stand behind them. Qiu would have made short work of him if they’d met one-on-one.
Sixth, also not a question, just something interesting I found out doing some half-assed research: the sword/knife thing. Apparently, the Chinese word that is usually translated as “sword” means a weapon meant to stab, and a “knife” is a weapon meant to cut or slash with. So, Lo Meng’s daggers are swords because they're penetrating weapons, whereas a slashing weapon like a machete would be a knife even if it were three or four feet long! The confusion only occurs if words are being translated literally, rather than adapting the de facto meaning of the words. I just think that’s neat, assuming I’ve understood what I read correctly.

But all of that is just spice, really, because I do truly love this movie. I love the way different threads of loyalty and betrayal weave around each other. I love how, in a movie with so many characters, each one has his/her own story and motivations. Each has been led into this story by fate, and fate has plans for each of them. And I love that, in a genre where the story is too often just a framework to dangle action set pieces from, this one takes some time with the story it’s telling and lets the action serve that story. All of that is what makes this, for my money, the very best of the Shaw Brothers’ movies, and one any kung fu fan ought to enjoy.