Review: This is a swordplay movie in a prewar setting (20`s or 30`s). One of the most remarkable things about the movie is the very lovely settings, it can almost be considered artistic just because of the beauty of the various scenery we see. The story is about two martial arts clans and about revenge, its not an uncommon story but they do a little twist on it with the son about to have revenge of his father without knowing it is his father. The story is straight forward but the first 15 minutes, till you get introduced to the characters, will be somewhat confusing. The rest of the story is simple to understand.

There were a few main characters but they were all pretty much plain. The characters were lacking a certain life, they were very ordinary. This is pretty much the down side of the movie, without interesting characters to keep the story alive with energy it lowered some of the good things in the movie. The actors and their acting were perfectly fine so it is not their fault that the characters were simply ordinary. Most of the focus of the movie was placed on Ning, this character had the most development in the story as his life turned upside down with the truth of his father eventually revealed. As for the rest, the development followed the actions of Ning.

Being a swordplay movie you'd expected a couple of swordfight scenes, don't worry your expectations will be met. The swordplay scenes were shot in a very artistic way, its like the scenes from a comic book or an anime. There was a lot of odd angle shots and fast camera movement, the effect is not half bad but the problem is you miss the clear view of the fight. You wont see many nicely choreographed fights except for a few moves, the rest you will have to imagine. On the other hand you have fights scenes in some pretty incredible settings, like on a snowy day in winter. All in all, the visual quality of the swordplay is nice but a connoisseur in swordplay might be disappointed in the lack of actual detail of the fight.