Usually Tsui Hark does a good job in directing action movies, but it seems that he tried to bite off a bit too much off the cake with this particular project. Why? Well, because the movie in its striving to be an epic swordsman's tale, just turned out to be a mediocre story that wanted to accomplish too much and delivered very little.
This is a wire-fu movie in all of wire-fu's glory. Is that bad? Well, not necessarily, however, the extended usage of the wires in the movie ended up being a bit too much as people were constantly in the air and all over the place. It just seemed too strained.
The fighting and martial arts was right on the spot, though. Thumbs up on that part. They managed to pull that off quite nicely. However, and yes there is a however here as well, there was just too many weapons breaking into pieces and flying all over the place, but miraculously most people were able to parry all these projectiles. Again, it ended up being too much and too forced. Personally, I ended up being irritated at this, as just about every person in the movie was a martial arts 'superhero' of sorts, capable of performing grand stunts or blurring maneuvers with weapons.
Story-wise, then "Flying Swords of Dragon Gate" wasn't overly impressive. The story was easy enough to follow, but Tsui Hark tried to implement a bit too many angles on the story, adding too many different elements of people with various backgrounds and reasons for being at the inn. Which ultimately, and sadly, turned out to be a little bit of a jumpy and not overly continuously well-told storyline.
As for the people hired to portray the various roles, then they had managed to put together a rather good ensemble of Chinese cast. There were some good performances, both acting-wise and martial arts-wise.
If you enjoy these Chinese tall stories of epic battles, sword fights and martial arts, then you might find some enjoyment in "Flying Swords of Dragon Gate", although I will say that there are far better and more impressive movies out there in the same genre. This is not Tsui Hark's best work, far from it actually.
This is a wire-fu movie in all of wire-fu's glory. Is that bad? Well, not necessarily, however, the extended usage of the wires in the movie ended up being a bit too much as people were constantly in the air and all over the place. It just seemed too strained.
The fighting and martial arts was right on the spot, though. Thumbs up on that part. They managed to pull that off quite nicely. However, and yes there is a however here as well, there was just too many weapons breaking into pieces and flying all over the place, but miraculously most people were able to parry all these projectiles. Again, it ended up being too much and too forced. Personally, I ended up being irritated at this, as just about every person in the movie was a martial arts 'superhero' of sorts, capable of performing grand stunts or blurring maneuvers with weapons.
Story-wise, then "Flying Swords of Dragon Gate" wasn't overly impressive. The story was easy enough to follow, but Tsui Hark tried to implement a bit too many angles on the story, adding too many different elements of people with various backgrounds and reasons for being at the inn. Which ultimately, and sadly, turned out to be a little bit of a jumpy and not overly continuously well-told storyline.
As for the people hired to portray the various roles, then they had managed to put together a rather good ensemble of Chinese cast. There were some good performances, both acting-wise and martial arts-wise.
If you enjoy these Chinese tall stories of epic battles, sword fights and martial arts, then you might find some enjoyment in "Flying Swords of Dragon Gate", although I will say that there are far better and more impressive movies out there in the same genre. This is not Tsui Hark's best work, far from it actually.