In the mainland film market in the 1980s, the best-selling films were martial arts films.
The popularity of "Shaolin Temple" in particular has driven the trend of mainland studios competing to shoot martial arts films.
It is against this background that many veteran directors in the Mainland have followed the market's call and switched to shooting commercial and entertainment films.
Among them, the most impressive ones are Zhang Zien from Western Film Studio and Li Wenhua from Beijing Film Studio.
The former participated in the shooting of martial arts films such as "The Hero of the Yellow River" and "The Whip of God" in the 1980s, while the latter filmed classic martial arts films such as "Invincible Yuan Duck Legs" and "Suoming Xiaoyaolou", because they were all very popular. , so it was once known as: , the best-selling director of the North Film Studio, .
Let's just talk about Li Wenhua's masterpiece of martial arts film, "Invincible Couple's Legs", after the release, let primary and middle school students all over the country start to imitate the magic skills in the film, so far many people are in the movie " just use your legs to draw circles on the ground. The invincible mandarin duck legs that can enhance the skill of " have a deep memory.
There is also "Xiaomingxiaoyaolou". The film boldly imitates Hong Kong and Taiwan martial arts films and draws on a lot of suspenseful styles of Gulong martial arts. The plot of the whole film is bizarre and twists and turns. It can be called a reversal from the beginning to the end. The revenge of the chivalrous girl is the main line, but the plot integrates the curious plot of brother and sister orthopedics, which can be called , a cult classic of domestic martial arts films.
The above two movie fans have written before, and today I will introduce another masterpiece of martial arts film directed by Li Wenhua.
Compared with the above two works, this film is even more famous, but the most worth mentioning is that this film is a rare film with the villain as the protagonist among the domestic martial arts films at that time. The killer and his brutal killing and encirclement of the green forest and the process of acting as a hawk dog, even the villain protagonist had the last laugh at the end, which can be called anti-routine martial arts film .
If you're an older audience, you've probably guessed the movie's title.
In this issue of "'s forgotten domestic genre film ", let's review this alternative domestic martial arts film 34 years ago -
"Golden Dart Huang Tianba"
Golden Dart Hero
The film was shot in 1987 by the North Produced by the studio.
DirectorLi Wenhua is a veteran director of the Beijing Film Studio. He entered the industry as a photographer. As early as the 1950s, he had shot classic movies such as "Early Spring in February" and "The Red Detachment of Women". After transforming into a director, With the film "Tears" won the Ministry of Culture Outstanding Film Award.
Entering the 1980s, he followed the market trend to shoot commercial entertainment films. Since martial arts films were the most popular at that time, Li Wenhua was commissioned to shoot the martial arts film "Golden Dart and Yellow Heavenly Bastard" for the Beijing Film Studio. Unexpectedly, the film was a great success as soon as it was released. According to the record in the "Chinese Film Yearbook": In that year, the number of copies released reached 285, and the distribution revenue was as high as 12.9 million, ranking fifth in the domestic movie box office list of in 1988.
The screenwriter of the film is Zhang Xian, a famous writer. In 1981, he won the Best Screenplay Award at the 2nd China Film Golden Rooster Award for his film "The Forgotten Corner of Love". Costume commercial martial arts film.
The story is based on the koan novels in the Qing Dynasty. The protagonist Huang Tianba is the protagonist in "Shi Gongan". It is said that there is someone in history, and he is indeed loyal to the Manchu court and has made meritorious deeds. The official residence is the second rank, and he joined the Eight Banners to become the bannermen. After Yongzheng ascended the throne, he was transferred to the Qing Dongling to be the general soldier of Malan, and his descendants became the bannermen of Huling.
The Huang Tianba in the Taiwanese drama "Shi Gong Qi Case"
The legendary story of Huang Tianba spread among the people, to a large extent thanks to the merits of traditional drama and storytelling, it was adapted into a movie as early as 1928, 1962, 8 years old Jackie Chan starred in the movie "Big and Small Yellow Tianba" as a child star.
"The Big and Small Yellow Tianba" starring Jackie Chan and Sammo Hung
The "Golden Dart Huang Tianba" filmed in the mainland is a work that is quite faithful to the original setting, and the main plot structure comes from the novel "Shi Gong An" The "Evil Tiger Village" section of the book tells the story of Huang Tianba, a robber from the Green Forest, who was recruited by Shi Shilun and joined hands to exterminate the Evil Tiger Village.
The story takes place in the Kangxi period of the Qing Dynasty.
It is said that there is a vicious tiger village in the territory of Yangzhou Prefecture. There are four green forest heroes there. They are called He Tianbao, Pu Tiandiao, Wu Tianqiu, and Huang Tianba. Relying on a kung fu to fight against the government, he became a tyrant.
But not long after the good days of the "little four hegemony", they were encircled and suppressed by the newly appointed prefect of Yangzhou, Shi Shilun.
Shi Shilun, known as "Shi Qingtian", was an honest official and repeatedly solved strange cases, so he won the hearts of the people. Under Shi Gong's leadership, he finally captured He Tianbao, the leader of the Four Hegemons, and then ordered him to be beheaded to the public.
However, on the day of the execution, He Tianbao's fourth brother, Huang Tianba, rushed into the court single-handedly to save the elder brother.
Huang Tianba's father, Huang Santai, is a well-known figure in the arena. He is the chief dartist of the seven southern and northern sixty-three provinces. He is well-known in Green Forest and is invincible in his golden dart skills. Practice martial arts.
The daring and talented Huang Tianba rushed into the court with a sharp golden dart in his hand, but there were too many officers and soldiers. In the end, Huang Tianba failed to rescue him. .
That night, the reluctant Huang Taiba wore night clothes and ventured into Shi Shilun's mansion again, wanting to assassinate.
When Mrs. Shi saw that the assassin wanted to kill Shi Gong, she tried to stop her plea, and argued that Shi Shilun was a good official who loved the people like a son.
Huang Tianba was hesitating, just at this moment, another masked woman suddenly broke into Shi's house, and actually came to assassinate.
The absurd thing is that the masked woman actually said nothing and mistook Huang Tianba, who was also masked, as a lackey of the Qing soldiers. The two fought because of this, and the fight was surrounded by officers and soldiers.
Huang Tianba had no choice but to show his golden dart stunt. He used darts to knock off the opponent's veil. It turned out to be a beautiful woman.
The two sides exchanged identities. The woman turned out to be the daughter of Zhang Guilan of the Fenghuang Village. Tyrant meet.
The two did not know each other, but at this time the officers and soldiers had come to round up, and the two were in a tough fight.
During the melee, Huang Tianba saved Zhang Guilan's life from the officers and soldiers, and risked his life to cover her breakout, but he was arrested.
Shi Gongsheng interrogated Huang Tianba. Huang Tianba would rather die than give in, and his subordinate suggested that Huang Tianba should be executed.
's subordinates did not understand Shi Gong's approach, Shi Gong explained:
This is a hard-to-find plan, and it is better to be kind than to use force for such people in the arena who are not afraid of death.
Huang Tianba returned home, his father Huang Santai is now critically ill, before the sickbed, Huang Santai instructed his son:
The hero of the green forest will not end in a good life, he should correct his evil and return to the right as soon as possible, and plan his career and career in the right way.
It turns out that 20 years ago, when Huang Santai was out as a ranger, he came across Emperor Kangxi who was hunting.
At that time, the emperor was chased by a tiger, and Huang Santai threw out a golden dart to kill the tiger and rescued him, so he was rewarded with a yellow jacket.
On the day of Father Huang's funeral, the officers and soldiers suddenly came to the door, under the pretext of returning Mrs. Huang's relics, but in reality they wanted to arrest Huang Tianba.
Huang Tianba was invincible with both fists and four hands, and was eventually arrested by officers and soldiers, and he was about to be escorted to the capital for inquiries.
Unexpectedly, during the escort, the officers and soldiers suddenly encountered an ambush. A group of masked men rushed out and rescued Huang Tianba.
Huang Tianba was taken to a nearby mountain by the masked men, and he saw Shi Gong, the mastermind behind the scenes.
All of these are tactics Shi Gong used to recruit Huang Tianba. He deliberately caught Huang Tianba first and then rescued Huang Tianba.
Not only that, Shi Gong also told Huang Tianba that he was grateful for Huang Tianba's kindness to his brother, so he specially ordered a tomb for He Tianbao, the leader of the Four Bulls, to be reburied on this hillside.
Shigong's behavior finally convinced Huang Tianba, Huang Tianba also obeyed his father's will, gave up his green forest status, and joined Shigong, and was named a lieutenant by Shigong's side.
At the same time, after Huang Tianba was recruited, his two sworn brothers, Pu Tiandiao and Wu Tianqiu, also received news. They were shocked when they learned that the sworn brothers Huang Tianba had defected to the government.
Not long after, Huang Tianba was ordered to escort 30,000 taels of official silver to Beijing, passing through Phoenix Mountain on the way.
Coincidentally, Huang Tianba, who rarely traveled far away, met Zhang Qi and Zhang Guilan and their daughters from the Phoenix cottage who came down the mountain to loot.
However, Zhang Guilan said that since she left the house that day, she has secretly admired Huang Tianba, who is highly skilled in martial arts, and still misses him very much.
I didn't expect that the two would become enemies when they met again, which made Zhang Guilan feel very conflicted.
Huang Tianba also has an admiration for Zhang Guilan, but at this time one is a soldier and the other is a thief, making it inconvenient for him to express his sincerity.
Fortunately, Zhang Qinian took the initiative to give way to Huang Tianba's silver car to save his daughter's grace.
Huang Tianba and Zhang Guilan parted ill, and a pair of children in the rivers and lakes became strangers from now on.
The story is divided into two parts, Shi Shilun was commended by the imperial court for his meritorious deeds in collecting silver, and is ready to go to Beijing to accept a summons.
On the way to Beijing, Shi Shilun rested at a tea stall on the way. Unexpectedly, the stall owner turned out to be two brothers, Pu Tiandiao and Wu Tianqiu, pretending to be brothers. The purpose was to kill Shi Shilun and avenge He Tianbao.
The officers and soldiers were unprepared, and in the end Shi Gong was kidnapped and brought back to the Evil Tiger Village.
Huang Tianba did not follow Shi Gong to Beijing. After hearing the news, he planned to enter the Evil Tiger Village alone to save Shi Shilun from danger.
Seeing the two brothers, Huang Tianba planned to persuade them to let go of Gong Shi and submit to the imperial court together.
But both of them hated the government very much, and they were going to kill Gong Shi in front of Huang Tianba's face.
The three brothers' negotiation broke down, and Huang Tianba confronted the two brothers alone.
At this time, Zhang Guilan and the officers and soldiers entered the Evil Tiger Village. It turned out that Zhang Guilan couldn't let go of Huang Tianba, so he followed the officers and soldiers who came to rescue Shi Gong and broke into the Evil Tiger Village to rescue Huang Tianba.
Under the siege of officers and soldiers, Evil Tiger Village was wiped out, and Gong Shi was rescued.
The rescued Shi Gong gave Huang Tianba an order: the weeds must be cut down.
The reason is that the imperial court does not trust Huang Tianba, who was born in Lulin, and if he wants to prove his innocence, he must completely sever ties with Lulin. The implication of
is that is to force Huang Tianba to kill his two brothers, .
Although Huang Tianba can't bear it, he has been loyal and righteous since ancient times, and he finally fought with his two brothers to his death.
Huang Tianba was superior in the end, and with the golden dart in his hand, killed his two brothers.
Huang Tianba's second sister-in-law saw that her husband was killed by a sworn brother, and she felt pain in her heart, and asked Huang Tianba if he had any conscience.
Huang Tianba faced his second sister-in-law who had been very kind to him since childhood, so he had to kowtow and confess his guilt, but he did not expect -
He pretended to admit his mistake, but took the opportunity to pick up the sword on the ground, killed the second sister-in-law, and set it on fire Evil Tiger Village.
At the end of the movie, Huang Tianba, who had done a great job in exterminating the Evil Tiger Village, won the emperor's edict and reward.
It's just that the film has another line of subtitles:
Huang Tianba exchanged the blood of his adopted brother and sister-in-law for the flower ling on his head, but this eagle dog is destined to have no good end...
The story of the movie came to an abrupt end. end.
This "Golden Dart Huang Tianba" is a follow-up work made by mainland film studios in the 1980s to imitate Hong Kong and Taiwan martial arts films.
Like many martial arts films of the same period, the film featured martial arts athletes with real kung fu.
The actor Wang Qun who plays the hero Huang Tianba was born in the famous Beijing martial arts team and is the senior brother of Jet Li. As early as 1979, he participated in the filming of the martial arts film "Treasures Outside the Wall". He is the first generation of Chinese martial arts star in . In the 1980s, he starred in many classic martial arts films, such as "The Thirteen Sisters of Chivalry" and "The Beggar". Wait, for young audiences, they may be more familiar with the martial arts drama "Tai Chi Master" starring him and Wu Jing.
The actor of the heroine Zhang GuilanChen Yongxia is also a kung fu master. She was born in a martial arts family and has practiced martial arts since childhood. At the age of 22, she became popular because of her role as the heroine Miao Cuihua in "New Fang Shiyu". She became a martial arts actress and starred in many classic martial arts films in the 1980s. In addition to this "Golden Dart Huang Tianba", there are also the heroine Chen Shimei in "The Beggar", and the heroine in "The Dust Girl Lu Siniang". The chivalrous girl Lu Siniang and so on.
As a martial arts film, the film combines elements such as classical koan cases, historical romances, and martial arts actions, and rarely uses the villain as the protagonist. Its anti-routine plot design once impressed the audience at that time. The story of the heroic hero of oppression turned into a discussion of the dilemma of loyalty and righteousness in the end, which is full of criticism and .
This is certainly worthy of affirmation, but it cannot be denied that the film itself has a flaw in the play. The
movie has a serious sense of fragmentation in the shaping of the protagonist Huang Tianba. The creator of not only wants to go against the routine, but at the same time does not dare to completely deviate from the setting and perspective of the original work, which eventually leads to the film's position is very contradictory , Just like the character design of the protagonist Huang Tianba, on the one hand, it emphasizes that Huang Tianba is excellent in martial arts and is a hero in the green forest, but on the other hand, he uses subtitles to assert that he has no good results after Huang Tianba's promotion.
Just watching the first half of the movie, Huang Tianba mistakenly befriended the Lulin robber, and finally, under the inspiration of Shi Gong, he turned his back on the evil for the people. In fact, there is no big problem for the movie to follow this line of thinking, it is almost a common plot mode of classical chivalrous stories.
Huang Tianba, who is highly skilled in martial arts, took revenge for his elder brother. In the opening scene of , the single-riding robbery field has set the style of the hero's appearance. The scene of riding over the cliff is even more handsome. The insolence and corruption of the officers and soldiers of the Qing court, for example, seeing the beautiful Zhang Guilan is like a molesting Qing soldier, and framed Shigong against Huang Tianba's Liang Jiugong and other villains, making it clear that he wants to make the green forest hero into a hero.
What is strange is that the film ends up superfluous, and defines Huang Tianba as a capricious villain who kills his brother and kills his sister-in-law. I still remember the scene where Huang Tianba sneaked and attacked the killer after his sister-in-law turned around. It's like the director got the wrong script, the good guys suddenly turned into bad guys, and then the bad guys killed all the good guys, as if for fear that the audience wouldn't understand, and directly used the end credits to confirm the protagonist's villain identity. The problem with the
film is precisely this. The screenwriter lacks a deeper inner shaping of the role of Huang Tianba, resulting in insufficient character arcs. Huang Tianba's transformation from a green forest hero to a tough villain is really unconvincing.
According to common sense, Huang Tianba inherited his father's legacy and gave up his identity as a green forest to join the imperial court. Therefore, it is inevitable that Huang Tianba will be captured, and his brother and sister-in-law will naturally become famous.
This is a more reasonable villain. Although it may not be liked by all audiences, it is more in line with human nature.
It is worth mentioning that the Beiying version of "Golden Dart" did not finish the story of Huang Tianba, but Changying Studio later made a sequel " Life-threatening Flying Knife ". Ba changed actors, and completely took the role of the villain, becoming a sinister and cunning eagle dog, and finally died under the flying knife. Unfortunately, the completion of this film is far less than the previous one, and the response is also more general.
