Killer Darts

Killer Darts (Zhui Hun Biao) (1968)

Runtime: 84 minutes (at least that's the version I saw)

Directed by: Meng Hua Ho

Starring: Ping Chin, Hua Yueh, Siu Hung Cham, Pei-Shan Chang

From: Shaw Brothers

I'll be honest here, I picked this movie as a random YouTube user has up a bunch of obscure Shaw Brothers movie and noticed this was one of them, and to be frank the title made me laugh... a movie called Killer Darts! I then read the plot description and it sounded interesting to me. Via Letterboxd:

“They brutally killed his wife, wiped out dozens of his innocent people, and burnt his entire village down to a charbroiled crisp. Now, master Liou Wen-lung (Fang Mien) is out for revenge. Armed with a near-invincible sword style and a pack of killer darts, he heads out to settle a 10-year old grudge with the cold-blooded evildoers. Joining him is his son (Yueh Hua), an orphan named Yu Sien (Chin Ping) and his trusty servant.” That is part of it. There's also how Liou used to have a student but the student was banished after he tried raping a woman, and he did kill her and her husband; that's how the orphan Yu Sien became an orphan. It's no surprise that as the kids become adults the ex-student would reappear and he would meddle in things, especially considering that there's also a love triangle with Yu, the son and another young lady.

The movie moves pretty fast, for the most part. I mean, the opening scene is the village being burned down and all that carnage happening. They did not waste any time getting to it. I was always interested in the film. The story was pretty cool and I was never bored by it... and I enjoyed the action scenes too. Note that there's no martial arts to speak of. Rather, it's a traditional wuxia movie. 

Besides the title darts (which don't appear all that often) there's the third lady in the love triangle being great at archery, and there's plenty of action with swords. It's filmed pretty well and there's nice long shots, both in distance and duration. The sword stuff is especially pretty cool. There's one bit where in one steady shot the hero kills like 25 guys in 15 seconds with his sword. That was pretty great. There are bitchin' moments throughout and at times you do see a good amount of blood. Hell, someone cuts off their hand up to their wrist to avoid the effects of the killer dart, and later on you see him with an Iron Fist; it wasn't the RZA who came up with that idea on his own.

Overall, for a movie I picked out just for its title, I was pleasantly surprised I enjoyed it as much as I did. Exploring the obscure Shaw Brothers catalogue may be a lot of fun for me. I'll be back tomorrow night.