It is evident in Long men kezhan, that King Hu was departing from Western narrative conventions. So much information is given at the opening of the film establishing the historical and sociopolitical coordinates that it is almost impossible to digest all of it; many heroic characters die at the end after facing seemingly insurmountable odds; both are situations that were unfamiliar to spectators of Hollywood entertainment. Also, stylistically, Hu elaborates and extends the build-up to confrontations in the inn, and ‘plays’ even more with shot composition and rhythmic editing, especially highlighting the importance of the look. We begin to really feel the intensity of a character’s gaze. Here the female star, Shangguan Ling-feng, gets top billing and, like Zheng Peipei she cross-dresses, posing as Zhu Hui, the ‘brother’ of Zhu Ji (played by Shue Han). Following the aforementioned introduction, Hu provides a stunning fifteen minutes of exterior cinematography, where every shot is beautifully staged and composed and where the colorful, historically accurate costumes are set off against a muted, grayish, rocky landscape. Even more striking is the scene where Zhu Hui returns to the inn and fights Mao Zongxian (played by Han Yingjie), the agent of a eunuch (characters who recur often in Hu’s films). With arrows flying through the air and acrobatics made even more dynamic and exciting through the full width of the widescreen frame and editing on the pulse, at the instant something or someone touches the frame edge – what David Bordwell terms the “glimpse” – Hu establishes himself as the true ‘master’ of cinematic action. In addition, Long men kezhan is the film which most obviously develops the principles and effects derived from Beijing opera. Long men kezhan had a record-breaking run of 105 days in Taipei, topping all Hong Kong and other films at the Taiwan box office, becoming the most successful Chinese-language film till then, on the island; it was also enormously successful in South Korea and Southeast Asian territories, and eventually triumphed in 1968 in Hong Kong […].

Peter Rist, King Hu. Experimental, narrative filmmaker, in Cinema Taiwan. Politics, Popularity and State of the Arts, edited by Darrell William Davis and Ru-shou Robert Chen, Rout-ledge, London-New York 2007