It starts with "Who are these two guys and why are they sword fighting?" The guy in black is a sore loser and strikes from behind when the fight was over. Their teacher was watching along with his daughter. After his punishment the loser rides off and teacher's daughter follows him. (I cannot discern their relationship.) The fighter in white returns and they fight again with the same result. Guy in black then falls off a seaside cliff. Everyone is upset about his death.
If you are a fan of these movies you are well aware that no character has ever actually died from falling off a cliff into water. Our guy is clinging to the side. He climbs up and finds a cave. After exploring he is thrilled to find a magic sword. Perhaps now he won't be defeated in every sword fight?
A big sour note in this movie comes straight from the title. The fighter does go mad. Unfortunately in all of these movies insanity is always portrayed as inappropriate laughter. My attitude is if that's the best you can do to show mental illness then don't show it at all.
My copy is a computer file that plays on a HDTV as a square shaped video the same as a VHS tape. There is no adjustment for the video so the sides are simply cropped. The dialog is Chinese, I do not speak Chinese, and there are no English subtitles. The audio quickly became unsynchronized so I ended up watching the movie muted. It was impossible to follow any of the drama because of this situation.
This movie is notable as Yuen Wo-Ping's first credit as action director. The action sequences are simply average for the year. The two male leads are dramatic actors who began their careers 10-20 years before martial arts movies gained popularity and have no fighting experience. The take away is - I can't say anything good about the fights but can't say anything bad either.
This movie would draw the attention of a hard core fan of martial arts movies of the golden age from 1967 to 1984. To that fan I can only recommend to try to find a copy in a language you can understand. Perhaps I missed something because of that but otherwise there was little here to hold my attention.
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