The Tattooed Dragon

This Hong Kong martial arts film from 1973 was directed by Lo Wei, the man behind the Bruce Lee box office hit Fist Of Fury, to name but one example. While not exactly on a par with the Lee vehicle, THE TATTOOED DRAGON has plenty to offer, not least some seriously snazzy opening credits with a blaxploitation-style soundtrack, no doubt conquering the US market played a role in the decision.

We’re off to a no nonsense gung-ho start when our hero, the Tattooed Dragon (Jimmy Wang Yu), can be spotted running across some ancient ruins (or ancient temple ruins) although they don’t look particularly Chinese at all, rather they look Indonesian or Thai. Whatever. Soon, he sets his eyes on a group of shady looking individuals led by Yee-Ang (Simon Hsu) and before we know it, an almighty fight breaks out between the Dragon and Yee-Ang and his posse. As impressive as the high octane fighting sequence is, it’s also pretty run-of-the-mill (been there, seen that). No price for guessing who comes up trumps and to humiliate Yee-Ang further, Dragon relieves his foe of stolen money, to be more precise, we’re talking refugee funds. Well, Dragon may have come up trumps this first time ‘round but when, later on, he takes shelter in a nearby martial arts school where Lee-Ang and his men show up again - this time they injure Dragon by stabbing him in the leg with a pointed stick, hence Tattooed Dragon walks (and fights!) with a limp for the remainder of the film.

Meanwhile, not too far away, a young farmer by the name of Koon-Kit (Sam Hui), frolics about with his dog Lanni (a German Shepherd in case you are interested), as does Koon-Kit’s betrothed Ai-Chia (Sylvia Chang). When the pair visit Ai-Chia’s father in the village, he takes Koon-Kit aside and he wants to hear from him his plans for the future, as he hopes that Koon-Kit will marry Ai-Chia sooner rather than later (as does she). Unfortunately, Koon-Kit’s plan is rather hare-brained, what with breeding assorted animals on the farm first in order to get wealthy. When Ai-Chia’s father cynically remarks that it would take years to achieve even remotely success, the scolded future son-in-law goes into a sulk and walks away back to his farm. Later on, while walking along the river bank with dog Lanni and contemplating his future, he discovers the badly wounded Tattooed Dragon lying half in the water. Not sure what to do, Koon-Kit consults his buddy Kun-Li and they take the wounded Dragon to the cottage, where he is looked after by Ai-Chia.

Humiliated and angry about his defeat, Yee-Ang confesses to his dastardly crime boss Jun Lee Kwan (James Tien) what happened during the fight with Tattooed Dragon and that he took the stolen money from him. Surprisingly, Jun doesn’t seem to be that bothered (for now) as he has larger fish to fry: his plan is to open a casino in a the nearby isolated village (yes, the ones in which Ai-Chias father and Koon-Kit’s buddy lives) and by doing so, he hopes to distract the piss-poor farmers from working the fields and gamble away their possessions instead… Once they all are sky-high in debt, Jun will take their farms and stretches of land away. Yee-Ang is in charge of the operation and Jun promises him a 20% cut of the proceeds. Of course, the real reason is that said stretches of land are extremely rich in minerals, oh, what a cunning bastard Jun is!

When Tattooed Dragon gets wind of what is going on, he is on a mission to destroy Jun and Yee-Ang but before he succeeds, there’s plenty of drama, for example when Kun-Li becomes so addicted to gambling that not only does he neglect his wife and his children but mistreats them. Out of despair and no longer able to watch her children starve, Kun’s wife and the children march to the river and, rope around their waists, jump… This is a truly shocking and unexpected scene. At the same time, while the little group is walking to the river, a piece of soundtrack which clearly is a rip-off from Sergio Leone’s Once Upon A Time In The West (‘Jill McBain’s’ theme) accompanies the scene. When Kun-Li finds out about his family’s suicide, he is beside himself with remorse and other villagers also have a change of heart and walk out of Jun’s gambling den. But Jun and Yee-Ang won’t give up easily and the stage is set for an almighty showdown between the good guys and the bad guys…

THE TATTOOED DRAGON is available in 2K Blu-ray format and is presented in a Limited Edition (2000 copies) box set including collector’s booklet. Bonus material includes various audio options, audio commentaries and new discussion of the film with martial arts cinema expert Wayne Wong.