Sword With No Name Review

• 3rd Sep 2010

Asian cinema is literally crammed full of historical epics and there’s a lot Hollywood can learn from Asia in regards to filming major battle scenes and keeping the viewer riveted emotionally with the drama aspect of the narrative too. Cine Asia have put a few of the better titles out in recent years. This Korean release from Kim Yong-gyun, the director responsible for the Korean hit horror movie The Red Shoes, shows that there is room yet for more offerings in this genre.

TSWNN is set in the latter part of the Joseon Dynasty, a five century long period of Korea’s history. It’s the 19th century and a young woman of noble birth is destined to become the controversial and legendary national heroine, Empress Myeongseong of Korea. During her perilous journey cross country to meet her destiny, she encounters an infamous peasant bounty hunter who becomes her protector. Their friendship develops and this sets the scene for the forthcoming political intrigue and confrontation that threatens not just their relationships, but their lives and the fate of Korea itself.

The story is deep, involved and characters are developed well. The viewer needs to pay attention in order to accurately study the characters and their relationships with each other; who’s plotting against whom, etc, but this it to be expected when watching an historical epic. Performances are up to par too; both the main protagonists play their parts with the required conviction that is needed when dealing with characters not entirely fictitious. From a production value point of view, the film more than stands up for itself from the titles, to the score and the locations – the film looks great. Not quite a Hero or House of Flying Daggers degree of beautiful, but there’s nothing that’ll make you want to switch off. In all aspects, this film visually and aurally excels.

So why am I not completely intoxicated by this film? I think, personally, the action scenes are lacking in any real depth and scale. Most of the fight scenes are one on one, extremely short and when they occur, the viewer is lifted outside of the environment into a CGI arena where the duels take place. At times, the resulting scenery is nothing like where the characters originated. The CGI is done very well, but to me it was like the scenes are spliced from the film and thrust into a Tekken style computer game. I can see what the director is up to: he wants the adrenaline to surge during the scene and increase the pace of the film while the fight is active. In an action movie the way the fight scenes are shot would work well and be intensely satisfying, but in this movie I believe it was a mistake to leave the down to earth, biopic feel of the movie and turn to fantasy – one can’t have it both ways without messing with the credibility of the movie.

All in all, The Sword with No Name is entertaining and well worth the watch, even if slightly marred by the way the action scenes unfold. You will feel for the characters at times and care about what happens to them. I would however recommend the viewer watches this film as an action epic with a deep storyline, rather than an historical epic with some good action. If one views it with the latter in mind, they will be disappointed.

The Sword With No Name is scheduled for release on 20th September 2010 on DVD and Blu-ray.

Dan Beadle