Guest Anonymous Posted July 27, 2015 Share Posted July 27, 2015 I just watched these 3 movies the other day. There was not any archery in it or any arrows. Why were these movies called The Brave Archer then? Anyone know. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member Hei Meigui Posted July 27, 2015 Member Share Posted July 27, 2015 I just watched these 3 movies the other day. There was not any archery in it or any arrows. Why were these movies called The Brave Archer then? Anyone know. The alternate title is Kungfu Warlord, is a 1977 Hong Kong film adapted from Louis Cha's novel The Legend of the Condor Heroes. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Legend_of_the_Condor_Heroes http://wuxia.wikia.com/wiki/The_Legend_of_the_Condor_Heroes Understanding those novels helps put everything in context and may make more sense. I haven't seen the films yet I can't wait. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Anonymous Posted July 27, 2015 Share Posted July 27, 2015 Really? I saw them on El Rey uncut. They showed them all 3 in a row and I watched them. There was no arrows or archery. They are basically fantasy style chinese stories. A bit weird on the story line since they go one way then completely throw out that former story and go to another story line. It was kind of annoying but was ok. I am not big into the fantasy wuxia stuff at all. I find it boring most of the time. But this had enough "real" Kung Fu and it was interesting. It had a good love story and some fun stuff. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member AlexanderFu Posted July 27, 2015 Member Share Posted July 27, 2015 If you want to see the archery part of the story, watch the 1983 series 'Legend of the Condor Heroes' - it goes into more detail than the movies did. There is quite alot of plot that the movies skipped like the part where Guo Jing learned archery from Zebe in Mongolia. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Anonymous Posted July 28, 2015 Share Posted July 28, 2015 If you want to see the archery part of the story, watch the 1983 series 'Legend of the Condor Heroes' - it goes into more detail than the movies did. There is quite alot of plot that the movies skipped like the part where Guo Jing learned archery from Zebe in Mongolia. I thought this movie was going to be an awesome battle and war movie about ancient China. Like some brave young archer shoots arrows but gets overtaken or seperated from the others and has to fight behind enemy lines and uses awesome kung fu plus archery. But I was wrong...it was just a weird fantasy movie with a lot of nonsense stuff, but it was still ok. So many things happen in the movie it is hard to keep track or remember what all happened. I just remember they had the awesome plot of 2 babies sperated at birth and trained in different styles who I thought would meet later and compare kung fu and have a reunion but they just skipped it over! Like threw it out and went another direction. Some weird claw lady is pissed her weirdo murdering husband was killed in self defense. Then some marriage deal and m,emorizing poetry. Uuugh this stuff....I just dont like this wuxia stuff much. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SMK Posted July 28, 2015 Share Posted July 28, 2015 I thought this movie was going to be an awesome battle and war movie about ancient China. Like some brave young archer shoots arrows but gets overtaken or seperated from the others and has to fight behind enemy lines and uses awesome kung fu plus archery. But I was wrong...it was just a weird fantasy movie with a lot of nonsense stuff, but it was still ok. So many things happen in the movie it is hard to keep track or remember what all happened. I just remember they had the awesome plot of 2 babies sperated at birth and trained in different styles who I thought would meet later and compare kung fu and have a reunion but they just skipped it over! Like threw it out and went another direction. Some weird claw lady is pissed her weirdo murdering husband was killed in self defense. Then some marriage deal and m,emorizing poetry. Uuugh this stuff....I just dont like this wuxia stuff much. I agree as far as the films not being so easy to follow. I was quite lost myself when watching The Brave Archer also via El Rey. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Anonymous Posted July 28, 2015 Share Posted July 28, 2015 I agree as far as the films not being so easy to follow. I was quite lost myself when watching The Brave Archer also via El Rey. Those movies felt like they tried to put every kind of story into one giant story. It was crazy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member Hei Meigui Posted July 28, 2015 Member Share Posted July 28, 2015 I haven't read the books but they are even more complicated. There are so many characters and subplots. I even had a older woman who used to run this shop that sold movies and Chinese books and stuff tell me how complicated it was even for them!. She sold me a copy of the three kingdoms TV series and she said she had to watch it several times! She was around 60 and had grown up there with all these stories!! I was reading about some of the English translations of the books and some of the translators left out things like all the different nicknames or courtesy names the characters had because it could be some confusing to have some one go by different names. Think about how some of the movies we watch may have had 3 or four alternate titles, as well as that being the case with the actors. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrator KUNG FU BOB Posted July 28, 2015 Administrator Share Posted July 28, 2015 I have to admit, I couldn't get into THE BRAVE ARCHER either. I thought it was because I was watching a full-screen, edited English dub. Many years later when IVL released the SB films on DVD I picked up not only the first film, but all of it's sequels, assuming that in it's original form it would all make sense. I barely made it through the first film, and found it quite an unpleasant chore. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member Lady Jin Szu-Yi Posted July 28, 2015 Member Share Posted July 28, 2015 I was only able to get through Brave Archer 1-3 recently. It took me many tries over the years (originally started about 8-9 years ago.) The English dub is pretty awful and makes that harder. While characters do drift in and out and are replaced, the biggest issue for me is Fu Sheng. I know his character is supposed to naive and not as smart as everyone else, but you could tell he was going through the motions and his performance often kills my interest... but Niu Niu thankfully more than makes up for that. All that said, it is tough going. There are parts that are slow / uninteresting and mildly confusing. Me, I watch because I'll eventually get to little bit of fun stuff with the Venoms, especially Lo Meng and Lu Feng. Ti Lung's former emperor gone monk was interesting too. Not sure I could ever get through the books (even if they were translated into English) given the size of the cast and some uninteresting subplots, but I consider it a small victory that I actually like the core story and was finally able to understand the Shaw version anyway. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Anonymous Posted July 28, 2015 Share Posted July 28, 2015 I have to admit, I couldn't get into THE BRAVE ARCHER either. I thought it was because I was watching a full-screen, edited English dub. Many years later when IVL released the SB films on DVD I picked up not only the first film, but all of it's sequels, assuming that in it's original form it would all make sense. I barely made it through the first film, and found it quite an unpleasant chore. FINALLY!! Someone agrees with me!!! Some of these fantasy type movies that critics hail as some legendary movie or epic masterpiece really honestly sucks in my opinion. Mot wuxia to me is soooooooo boring. An it never makes any sense. A lot of time kung fu movies make absolutely no sense to me. But some do make sense but I have to literally focus 100% effort on every second of the movie to understand everything that is going on. Sometimes it is like, "Wait why are those 2 fighting again??? Let me rewind and find out why he is now fighting that guy." I honestly DO NOT like the brave archer movies much but I watched it but can I tell you what its about? Not really. I can say oh 2 guys separated by some bad king at birth, then a murdering guy an a weird wife with claws is upset her husband died, then this one fighter from one clan wants to marry this hot rich girl who pretends she is an orphan boy, but then they have to memorize poetry and answer questions and trick guardians of a path and there are poison trees in a maze....but I cant really say much else. There are a lot of other movies like this. I think most wuxia films are fort the artsy fartsy type of people who are asian obsessed and not really into the martial arts aspect. Usually girls like this more than guys because there is more romance or emotions (which never make sense to me). I am just glad Brave Archy was not 100% wire work. I honestly hate wire fu, but I can let it slide for movies like Fist of Legend. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Anonymous Posted July 28, 2015 Share Posted July 28, 2015 I was only able to get through Brave Archer 1-3 recently. It took me many tries over the years (originally started about 8-9 years ago.) The English dub is pretty awful and makes that harder. While characters do drift in and out and are replaced, the biggest issue for me is Fu Sheng. I know his character is supposed to naive and not as smart as everyone else, but you could tell he was going through the motions and his performance often kills my interest... but Niu Niu thankfully more than makes up for that. All that said, it is tough going. There are parts that are slow / uninteresting and mildly confusing. Me, I watch because I'll eventually get to little bit of fun stuff with the Venoms, especially Lo Meng and Lu Feng. Ti Lung's former emperor gone monk was interesting too. Not sure I could ever get through the books (even if they were translated into English) given the size of the cast and some uninteresting subplots, but I consider it a small victory that I actually like the core story and was finally able to understand the Shaw version anyway. I literally watched all 3 of these movies in a row without stopping. Luckily I recorded it on direct tv and skipped the commercials and could also rewind certain parts. I did notice this movie had like EVERYONE in it. Even Li Yi Min was in it and other guys I noticed. Most of the time El Ray shows all of the most boring kung fu movies and not the best badass fighting stuff. Also it seems they ONLY are showing shaw brothers movies and never other companies. Oh but they showed a couple jackie chan of course. And every commercial is like THE KUNG FU EPIC blah blah and its like seriously? I remember they were raving about 14 Amazons an I seriously thought that movie was also incredibly boring. Ya sure a red shoe gang of chicks and then only ONE betrays and WHO IS IT?? I could care less. Also I dont want to read martial arts stories in books. I want to watch them so I am not interested in chinese novels or whatever. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member KenHashibe Posted July 29, 2015 Member Share Posted July 29, 2015 Fu Sheng shoots one arrow when he's first introduced in the first film. Other than that, I don't know why it'd be called The Brave Archer. Am I the only guy who actually likes this movie? I don't think it's a masterpiece. Probably not in my Top 20 SB movies, but still, I thought it was a really fun movie. I do understand why people don't like it though since the story is a bit confusing, but I was able to understand what was going on after I rewatched it. I'm still satisfied every time I watch it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Anonymous Posted July 29, 2015 Share Posted July 29, 2015 I don't even remember the arrow....and he never even mentions being an archer either even if he does shoot an arrow. They need to make a new movie called Brave Archer and it will be about a young archer in the army of the Ming Dynasty who gets trapped by monguls or some raiders from the west and he uses his archery skills and military kung fu behind enemy lines and saves China. THAT would be rad. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member KenHashibe Posted July 29, 2015 Member Share Posted July 29, 2015 I don't even remember the arrow....and he never even mentions being an archer either even if he does shoot an arrow. Other than that one arrow, they never mention anything about him being an archer or learning archery. This is actually a question I asked myself after watching the film. Anyway, go to 0:23. They need to make a new movie called Brave Archer and it will be about a young archer in the army of the Ming Dynasty who gets trapped by monguls or some raiders from the west and he uses his archery skills and military kung fu behind enemy lines and saves China. THAT would be rad. You just gave me an amazing mental image of what that film would look like! That sounds pretty awesome! I'd watch that. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Anonymous Posted July 29, 2015 Share Posted July 29, 2015 Oh ya he DOES shoot an arrow! But its so short nobody is going to remember that! Yeah wouldnt that be a sick movie? Like he is an archer in the army and has some armor on and stuff. It could be a war battle movie with tons of martial arts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member venom10463 Posted August 12, 2015 Member Share Posted August 12, 2015 I enjoyed the first entry in the Brave Archer series, and when I discovered there were three other films in the series, I sought out the rest. However, this was before Celestial and the only copies available were full screen with embedded overlapping English subtitles. Besides the first being a favorite of mine, I thought part 3 was just as good because of Lo Mang's Iron Palm technique. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member Michael L. Posted August 13, 2015 Member Share Posted August 13, 2015 I think those are the version I saw, with the original film subtitles in traditional Chinese characters with almost word for word English subtitles underneath (basically English words using Chinese grammar) back when I was really working on my Mandarin. More fun than text book, but not my favorite films. It seems so incredibly hard to make a decent film or even film series based on wuxia novels. There are a few good TV shows because they have the time and format to develop the complicated the stories... but other than Crouching Tiger (which I really like), it is hard for me to think of a successful film that adapts a wuxia novel but it is easy to think of several awful ones... even though they have big stars and decent directors. Kung Fu Cult Master, I am looking at you! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member Bus Posted August 13, 2015 Member Share Posted August 13, 2015 I don't think they really were doing much planning they just brought together their cast of actors together with not much story Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member teako170 Posted August 13, 2015 Member Share Posted August 13, 2015 CC had actually shot over 18K feet of film but because of the limit posed by the showing times of the cinemas, he wound up cutting a lot out which made some scenes look hasty or lacking. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member Lady Jin Szu-Yi Posted August 13, 2015 Member Share Posted August 13, 2015 Thanks for that info, Teako. Considering how many characters / subplots are going on in the Brave Archer series, it is interesting to know that CC shot that much film. Shame a lot wound up on the cutting room floor. Adapting Wuxia novels, I can see where it can be troublesome, especially when you compare that process to adapting trilogies or complicated books like the Dark Tower series here. That said, now that I've read the source material for Swordsman and Enchantress, I really like the film and the novel. On rewatch I noted the movie has more from the novel than I expected and it does some good tweaks too. Sure, it omits some great characters and a few good moments, but I think that was pretty successful. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Member theThirdMaster Posted September 30, 2015 Member Share Posted September 30, 2015 Just watched this for the first time a few weeks ago. I really enjoyed it. Everyone is hating on wuxia, but I don't mind a little story and character development to go along with the action. I don't think this movie was trying to take itself to seriously, and for that I thought Fu Sheng was a good choice. The story is basically a romance, although that aspect of it doesn't really become apparent until a good ways into the movie. But everything you see, the subplots jumping around, the characters blind perseverance, all lead to the main character learning the skills he needs to win the girl in the climax. There's really not a lot of fat on the movie. Take anything away and the ending doesn't really make a lot of sense. And I thought the romance worked very well, which is kind of surprising for Chang Cheh. You're lucky to even see a female in most of his films from that era. This movie works best if you just kind of go along with the plot, but enjoy the characters and the adventure of the journey. I'll agree it jumps around from one subplot to the next, but that's kind of what adventure movies do in general. I guess some might find it confusing, I didn't find it all that hard to follow (subtitled). I get much more lost trying to follow other wuxia like Gu Long adaptions (which I also love), or even some Chang Cheh movies like Ten Tigers of Kwangtung. Plus it had a fun psychedelic drum solo. And the sets were positively breathtaking. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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