Wang ming sha xing (1973) User Reviews (3)

Stranger comes to town and makes everything right.

[ckormos1 · 6/10 · 11 June 2019]

The movie is tagged with the Ocean Shores logo but the quality is superior to the usual VHS release so I suspect this digital version was from an early laser disk. The dialog is dubbed into English.

It opens with our hero on the road to a town where some laborers expecting to be paid were murdered instead. He is accused of the murder but the villains then just drive off. The plot is the standard son out to revenge the murder of his father plus throw in the bad guys trying to take over the town and the evil Japanese dealing opium. The characters never develop more than one dimension and the pace, despite expository dialog, moves along. The fights are mostly brawls with little or no trampolines and wire work.

It all comes down to the final fight and the challenge of making it still interesting. Good use is made of a working mine location and the sequences are dangerous simply because of where the fighters are standing. The actors get their good clothes all filthy and roll around and even swim in the mud. The ground fighting lacked any submission techniques or such and was really just for the filth.

Overall, I rate it just slightly above average for the year and genre and for the fans of this genre only.

Good action, but the rest's routine

[Leofwine_draca · 5/10 · 20 March 2018]

THE DESPERATE AVENGER is a typical Taiwanese kung fu film from 1973 complete with a provincial setting and lots of bad guys. The plot defies description but follows the usual route which sees opium smuggling at the forefront and some dastardly Japanese behind all the subterfuge. The young Chinese men are upstanding and heroic and fight back. The good news is that this film has fairly decent fight scenes which make strong use of the low budget. Unfortunately, in between such moments, things slow down to a real crawl and there's a lifeless feel to the production. The lack of quality cast members doesn't help much either.

Desperate Avenger 1973

[jddog130 · 5/10 · 24 March 2015]

Imagine this.. a movie about Chinese, Japanese and opium.. now that is rare..... of course...... I'm being Sarcastic !

In the early days of the Republic of China there's a feud between two families. Half of one is siding with the Japanese and the other is nearly wiped out.

Our hero is here to spy on the opium ring and thank a man for helping his father once. Although usually referred to as "Desperate Killer" in the movie, our desperate avenger ends up wreaking havoc on the murderous traitors.

I would say that this is for die hard fans of kung fu movies. I remember seeing this on "black belt theater" many, many years ago so when I saw this again the other day, it added to my excitement factor.

I'm sure others will come along and give it a poor score and review but like I said before, this is for die hard fans that like and miss these '70s flicks.