Blu-ray Review: Lau Kar-leung’s The 8 Diagram Pole Fighter on Arrow Video

In the formidable stable of action directors who Shaw Brothers Studio employed throughout the 1970s and ’80s, perhaps the greatest was Lau Kar-leung. Having previously established himself as the studio’s finest martial arts choreographer, Lau began to helm features in the mid-’70s and produced a string of classics, most notably the wuxia staple 36th Chamber of Shaolin, that blended complex choreography, bullishly confronted themes, and antic comedy. His penultimate film for the studio, 1984’s The 8 Diagram Pole Fighter, is simultaneously the culmination of his work for the studio and the biggest tonal departure from it.

The film, a retelling of the historical legend of the Yang warrior family’s massacre at the hands of political and dynastic enemies, contains none of the lightness that leavened the mood of other Shaw movies. For one, the film’s opening action sequence is a grisly affair, with the Yang patriarch and five of his seven sons torn to shreds in an ambush led by Yang family’s court rival, General Pan Mei (Lam Hak-ming).

Even the two sons who survive, 5th (Gordon Liu) and 6th (Alexander Fu Sheng) Brothers, are left shattered: The latter flees home driven insane by his trauma, while the former retreats to a mountaintop temple where he desires to fully divest himself of his now-ruined life and devote himself to Buddhism. Soon, though, it becomes clear that the pole-fighting techniques that he learns as a monk are meant to be put toward revenge, not self-improvement.

The directness with which 5th Brother admits his violent aims roots the film’s depiction of the irreconcilable contradiction in Buddhist monk teaching, between the complex and violent martial arts that disciples learn and their supposed philosophical belief in nonviolence and emotional remove from the physical world. The abbot (Phillip Ko-Fei) who takes 5th Brother under his tutelage stresses the temple’s nonlethal teachings, saying that if wolves attacked them, they would not kill the beasts but rather break their teeth.

Yet as 5th Brother points out, the ostensible high-mindedness of this method is little more than a delayed death sentence for a predator that can only survive with its fangs, thus giving the monks a false sense of nobility. And when our protagonist does seek his revenge, the carnage he wreaks on his foes is positioned fatalistically as an affirmation of the Buddhist need to live in the material world while repudiating its notions of being unaffected by it.

If this unsentimental, cynical view of the purpose of martial arts breaks with even the darkest Shaw movies, The 8 Diagram Pole Fighter is nonetheless thrilling in the intricacy of the action choreography and Lau’s confident, intuitive direction. By virtue of his years as a stunt coordinator, Lau knows exactly where to place and move the camera, as well as when to cut to best accentuate the action while keeping the overall arc of motion coherent. The use of spear and pole weapons calls attention both to the surprisingly delicate manner in which fighters wield rigid staffs, as well as the fleet footwork they use to dodge each other’s attacks. Thus the camera frequently tilts slightly to move down from the collisions of weaponry to follow the flowing, balletic motions that duelists use to curve and weave around one another.

The fluidity of Lau’s direction comes to a head in the climax, maybe the all-time greatest action scene in a Shaw Brothers movie. The sequence starts with bamboo shoots being launched into soldiers like cannonballs and somehow gets increasingly violent as more and more fighters join the fray. The finale contains so many moving parts that Lau’s ability to place every element in the frame in logical relation to the others borders on the miraculous, especially given the breakneck tempo of the fighting. And yet, as thrilling as Gordon Liu’s dynamic motion and the larger group sparring are, the film never loses hold of its dark worldview. No sooner is victory attained than the hero walks off into the sunset, not to rousing music but the eerie howling of wind roaring over a desolate patch of mountainside.

Image/Sound

Arrow Video continues its recent spate of revelatory presentations of long-neglected kung fu classics with this disc, which is sourced from a 2K restoration. Colors show a significant boost from the 2010 DVD release from Dragon Dynasty; the bright reds and yellows of monks’ robes practically jump off the screen, and the borderline-surreal backdrops like the abstract, fog-laden battleground that opens 8 Diagram Pole Fighter show off newly psychedelic shades of red and purple. Detail is crisp throughout, barring the occasional moment endemic to the negative in which the film’s focus at the edges goes soft. Arrow includes lossless mono tracks for the original Cantonese and both the Mandarin and English dubs, all three of which sound clear and free of hiss, pops, or other artifacts common to wuxia movie releases.

Extras

On his audio commentary, critic Jonathan Clements dissects 8 Diagram Pole Fighter in thorough detail, even providing helpful translations of and details about some of the Buddhist texts written on walls. A new interview with critic Tony Rayns covers the film’s folkloric origins as well as its initial box office reception in Hong Kong and China, while stars Gordon Liu, Lily Li, and Yeung Ching-Ching reminisce about the making of the film in a series of archival interviews. Alternate opening credits are also included, as well as a short tribute by the Shaw Brothers Studio to Alexander Fu Sheng, who died in a car accident during the filming of 8 Diagram Pole Fighter. Film critic Terrence J. Brady contributes a booklet essay that breaks down the film as it relates to the careers of Lau and the main actors, particularly Fu Sheng.

Overall

One of the Shaw Brothers Studio’s greatest masterpieces lands on Arrow Video boasting a revelatory audio-video presentation and plethora of informative extras.