Rating: 
Summary: The greatest Chinese martial arts movie ever!
Review: "Swordsman II" kicks off one year after the events in "Swordsman", although it is not necessary to watch the first movie in order to appreciate its sequel. Both movies are adaptations of Louis Cha's novel, "The Hero who Laughs at the World" ("Xiao Ao Jiang Hu"), although extensive changes have been made to the original story. Most of the main characters from the first movie return but are replaced with different actors. In "Swordsman", the leader of the Huashan clan sacrificed many of his disciples in order to obtain a sacred martial arts manual called the "Sacred Flower Scroll". Disillusioned by his betrayal and by the constant power struggles in the pugilistic world, his remaining disciples, including eldest disciple Ling Huchong (Jet Li) and daughter Yue Lingshan (Michelle Reis) decide to retreat to the Ox Mountain for a life of seclusion. Unfortunately, the Scroll has fallen into the hands of a power-hungry warrior called Tongfang Bubai i.e. "The Invincible Dawn" (Brigitte Lin). Dawn has captured the father of Ling's old flame, Ren Yingying (Rosamund Kwan), and usurped his position as leader of the Miao tribe. He now plans to march north to the Chinese capital with a troop of 300,000 to overthrow the Ming Emperor. Ling agrees to help Yingying rescue her father, and the last of the Huashan disciples are again drawn into a deadly power struggle. "Swordsman II" is absolutely the best martial arts movie ever made. Jet Li is at his charismatic best and is far better as "the hero who laughs at the world" than Sam Hui was in "Swordsman". Ling is not a perfect person - in fact, he is a drunkard and a womaniser, not the best of role models - but he is also upright and loyal, and Jet Li plays him with such good humour and optimism that we easily forgive Ling's flaws. The three lead actresses who play Ling's love interests also give wonderful performances - not to mention they are amongst the prettiest faces in the Hong Kong movie industry. Michelle Reis (who takes over Cecilia Yip's role in "Swordsman") is excellent as the naïve, jealous and tomboyish Lingshan, whom Ling treats as his "little brother". Rosamund Kwan is also great as the world-weary Yingying, who would love nothing more than to leave for a life of seclusion with Ling but remains tied to her father and her people. But the greatest accolades must go to Brigitte Lin for portraying a complex (and male!) character, the Invincible Dawn, a villain for whom audiences could feel empathy. Dawn starts off as a man (Brigitte Lin's voice was replaced with a man's voice in the early parts of the movie) but becomes increasingly feminine as the movie progresses, for reasons revealed later in the movie. He sacrifices everything for power, not for himself, but for the sake of the oppressed minorities he leads. He is quite invincible, except for the fact that he lets his heart and emotional attachments get the better of him during a crucial battle (note: this movie is actually a disguised gay romance!! *grin*). Brigitte is wonderfully icy cold in some scenes but also remarkably vulnerable as the lonely and misunderstood villain in others. So successful was Brigitte (who was a popular actress in romance movies in the 1970s) at portraying Dawn that her acting career, in the doldrums since the 1980s, was spectacularly revived. She later reprised her role as Dawn in the audaciously spectacular but silly sequel "The East is Red". Two other supporting cast members deserve mentioning - Fannie Yuen as Blue Phoenix, Yingying's lieutenant and confidante, and Candice Yu as Dawn's lovely concubine. Fannie was so good as the vivacious Blue Phoenix in "Swordsman" that she was the only character not replaced with another actor in "Swordsman II". Candice, a great favourite amongst Asian TV audiences in the late 1970s and early 1980s, was drawn out of retirement for a cameo in this movie. And finally, while the fight scenes in "Swordsman II" do not have the poetic beauty of those in "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" nor the authenticity of those in "Iron Monkey", it uses wireworks to excellent effect. After over a decade, "Swordsman II" is still the definitive martial arts movie yet to be topped by another. Zhang Yimou's "Hero" comes close, but not nearly enough. Tsui Hark (the producer) and Ching Siu Tung (the director) are still my favourite Hong Kong movie makers.
Rating: 
Summary: Another Miramax hackjob - Get "Swordman 2" instead
Review: ..."Swordman 2" is actually the 2nd film of a trilogy, and also the best one of the three. It is a delightful, hilarious, over the top, kung fu swordplay fantasy film. There are superpowered heroes and villains flying all over the place. If you like that sort of thing (as opposed to realistic martial arts) then "Swordman 2" can not be beat for sheer entertainment.Unfortunately, Disney/Miramax has completely ruined this film. They have added an atrociously amateurish English dub. Where do they find these voiceover "actors"? They must all be infomercial rejects. Perhaps they are Harvey Wienstein's relatives. Who knows? In any case, they are bad. Bad. And 9 minutes of footage have been cut from this movie. That is almost 9% of the movie. Imagine watching a movie and every ten minutes someone grabs the remote control and turns off the TV for the next 60 seconds. That's what Disney/Miramax has done with this DVD... And of course, this DVD only has the horrible English dub track and the edited/censored/ruined version of the film even though it is easy to include multiple audio tracks and even multiple versions of films on DVDs... Fortunately, the original "Swordman 2" is also available on DVD right here from Amazon for around the same price. Do yourself a favor: go up to the area of the "Product Details" area which says "Other Formats" and click on the link that says "DVD". This takes you to the listing for "Swordman 2" - the complete, unedited, original language, subtitled version of this film. Please avoid this ... and instead buy his classic "Swordman 2".
Rating: 
Summary: Awesome sword play. Jet Li needs to play a Jedi.
Review: Although there was a lot of string work, it was used pretty well in this movie. The sword play in this movie was awesome. As always, Jet Li shows a strong presence on screen. George Lucas should watch this film and consider him to be a Jedi.
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Summary: AVOID "JET LI COLLECTION" DVDs -- DUBBED AND HEAVILY CUT.
Review: Another instance of a perfectly good HK film being unnecessarily hacked up, repackaged, reformatted, and retitled for American audiences. The entire run of the "Jet Li Collection" DVDs are just plain awful in terms of everything except image quality. Buena Vista (Disney/Mirmax) regularly cuts a considerable amount of footage out of the original movies, rescores them, and for some bizarre reason refuses to offer the option of subtitles, only a very cheesy English Dub. No widescreen option, either. I would recommend avoiding ALL foreign DVDs distributed by Buena Vista, because you are getting an incomplete, censored, altered, and improperly titled version of the film by a company just trying to milk a hot trend for quick cash. In the particular case of this movie, 10 minutes have been cut all together, which you can see clearly by comparing the technical specs here with those of the imported "Swordsman II" DVD (which, incidentally, is the *actual* title of this movie.) The import versions of these movies sometimes have their own failings -- mediocre image quality and/or clumsy subtitling are the most common problems -- but if you want to see the *real* versions of these movies, I suggest you avoid Buena Vista's releases at all costs, until they start releasing the films as they were intended to be seen.
Rating:
Summary: Mindy's Review
Review: as a Big Brigitte Lin Chin Hsia fan. this movie is great cause it help boost her career up a bit more. this movie is great compare to part 2 (the east is red) the swordplay in this movie is GREAT! (by Jet Li) (but Brigitte with her cool FLYING Nee.) wow...... they dubble Brigitte's voice with a man's voice witch i would say it works haha =)...... it shows that theirs many heros in this movie...... i have no clue who's the surpeme in this movie (but which it will always be Brigitte (asia inc.) ) this shows Brigitte transform from a man to a woman...... well yeah this movie is GREAT! must see...... Mindy Yang
Rating:
Summary: Best Jet Li movie yet
Review: Best Jet Li movie Yet, nice cast, very nice fighting scenes, espeically you got to see Jet Li using Sword (away from his usually bare hand comabat) Excellent Video and sound transfer Horrible English Translation
Rating:
Summary: Excellent movie but boycott Disney/Miramax/Buena Vista...
Review: DO NOT BUY "Legend of the Swordsman" by Buena Vista. This is an edited and English dubbed version butchered by this studio. Buy ONLY the original HK version "Swordsman II."
I'm going to pass on some valuable info to my fellow Hong Kong movie buffs. Do yourselves a favor and visit www.Goodwillco.com - they are a terrific Canadian distributor of original HK version dvds. "Dream Lovers" is only about $7-$8 USD. Most of their HK titles fall within this price range. "Hero" now at theatres starring Jet Li, Maggie Cheung, Tony Leung is also available for this price. Their service is outstanding. You can pretty much find any title with original Chinese audio and English subtitles.
Don't buy any American studio dubbed or edited versions!!! Always read the packaging carefully - don't judge by it's cover. Boycott Disney and their subsidiaries such as Miramax/Dimension films and Buena Vista until they SHOW RESPECT for Asian cinema. Don't throw your hard earned money away and allow studios to treat YOU THE MOVIE FAN with disrespect! They are buying HK catalog titles and butchering by editing and English dubbing. They edit and dub because they wrongly believe American audiences will be less accepting of viewing HK films with original Chinese audio and English subtitles. Talk about racism and insulting the intelligence of American movie-goers!!! Disney is also purchasing HK titles to keep in storage without release. By doing so, Disney can keep the original HK studios from releasing these titles and have a monopoly on the catalog. Fans are left unable to own their favorite HK films. These studios do not care about art or movie fans by their disrespectful treatment of the original versions...all they care about is MONEY! Talk about DisNazi tactics! If Sony Pictures can release "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" with Chinese audio and English subtitles both at movie theatres and DVD, then why can these studios not do the same?? "Crouching Tiger" grossed over $125 million alone at the box office. But Disney still thinks American movie-goers are narrow-minded and ignorant. And Disney probably thought their release "Freddy Got Fingered" was the highest expression of the movie art form. The studios know that DVD is a top money grossing format and can save any box office bomb from total annihilation. Miramax is making minor improvement - they did release "Iron Monkey" in original audio and subtitled. However, they could not keep their hands from EDITING this great film. They thought it was too long! I believe fans deserve to see the uncut original version regardless of length. Did we not sit through 3 hrs of "Titanic" and almost 4 hrs of "Dancing with Wolves?" both box office blockbusters. So why the double standard with HK films?
Visit the WEB ALLIANCE FOR THE RESPECTFUL TREATMENT OF ASIAN CINEMA to sign the petition to Miramax. Read all about our mission. I gave you a summary of what is happening to the HK movie catalog. Over 13,000 signatures have been collected. We need all fans to help save the original HK studio versions and preserve our rights as fans to see the original cut as intended by the filmmaker.
Rating:
Summary: What were they ON when they liked this movie?
Review: Don't believe everything you read. I bought this movie due to the hype of several Amazon member's reviews that claimed this movie was better than Crouching Dragon, Hidden Tiger. They were wrong. There were about 3 fight scenes that were fairly interesting (and that was due to the mood and environments, not the actual fighting itself), the rest tanked big time. The plot was ridiculous: a man seeking ultimate power chops off his own manhood and has to become a woman to obtain it. The main good guy Jet Li falls in love with this he/she and is betrayed at every turn by this he/she. The story is confusing and choppy. At every turn you feel this movie could have achieved greatness, that they really tried, but at every turn you realize the writer & director must have been sipping too much wine before every day's shoot. I was very disappointed with this movie, and it will be hard for me to trust Amazon reviewers after this. The irony of this is, some of you will read my review and not buy this and might have liked it as people are so different. I myself did not, though, that can't be helped. If you want a good action movie with good fighting and great, moody locations, try Jackie Chan's Operation Condor.
Rating:
Summary: This is the dubbed version
Review: Dubbed and renamed. See the original Swordsman II instead.
Rating:
Summary: Must-Buy
Review: First of all, the movie. I started watching HK movies just a little under a year ago, and mostly because I was very impressed with Jet Li's performance in "Lethal Weapon 4" and "Black Mask," and thus wanted to see some of his earlier work. A year later, I have now watched over 80 HK movies since (all movies by Chow Yun Fat, Jackie Chan, Michelle Yeoh, as well as by those lesser-known (at least in the US) Brigitte Lin, Ekin Cheng, Aaron Kwok, etc.), and it was all because of this movie. Looking back, this movie was a terrific introduction to the HK swordfighting, fantasy genre. The fight scenes are spectacular and the cast is first rate (Brigitte Lin steals the show, though). The DVD? Yes, the subtitles are bad, but not distracting, and after a couple of viewings I followed the story easily (I absolutely HATE those VHS subtitles which are nearly impossible to read, especially against a white background). Plus, Director Tsui Hark's wonderful use of colors (contrasting blues, reds, yellows) can only be done justice by the DVD format. The sound is in Dolby 5.1, which helps, and the transfer is pretty good. The menus are also presented nicely, better than any other HK DVD made around the same time. Although this was the first HK DVD I purchased, it is still my favorite. Highly recommended.
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