The Legend of the Shadowless Sword-Own it on DVD August 12th, 2008
- Publisher: New Line Home Video
- Price: $17.99 on Amazon
- Rating: R (for violence)
- Run Time: 116 minutes
- Genre: Kung Fu
- Starring: Lee Seo Jin, Yoon Soy, Lee Ki Yong, Shin Hyun Joon
- Special Features: Character Introductions, Behind the Scenes Featurette, Picture Gallery, Music Video
It’s 927 AD. Korea is in trouble. The ruling dynasty has been toppled by the Killer-Blade Army. The one man that can return the country to its former glory, Prince Jung-Hyun, has been exiled. Soha (a powerful soldier) is sent to find Jung-Hyun and return him to his rightful thrown. The journey back home is not as easy as thought. The Killer Blade Army has sent several dangerous assassins to stop Soha and Jung-Hyun dead in their tracks. Will the kingdom returned to it’s former glory or will it fall into darkness?
To be brutally honest I think this might be the first kung fu movie I have ever seen. I just have never been that interested in the genre. Why don’t I just say that The Legend of the Shadowless Sword doesn’t help me get into the genre. I personally didn’t enjoy it that much. If I had to break the movie into one sentence I would have to say: It has some decent action sequences mixed with an extremely stupid story.
Obviously I won’t leave it at that since that wouldn’t be much of a review. You can probably tell from the sentence though that I personally didn’t really enjoy The Legend of the Shadowless Sword. The main reason why I really didn’t like it was the story. It seemed very rehashed and was also pretty stupid in my opinion. Add to that the fact that the whole movie is subtitled (it is a Korean movie after all) and you can probably tell why I didn’t enjoy it that much. The plot really ruins the movie in my opinion.
I try to add some positives to every review that I write and despite a terrible story (in my opinion) there are some positives in this movie. First there are some decent action sequences in the movie. Since this is a kung fu movie you would expect quite a bit of action since that is a staple of most kung fu movies. A warning to parents though is that this is a R rated movie and has some violent scenes which include quite a bit of blood. The only thing I would like to know is why does every kung fu movie need to have flying/gliding characters. Kung fu movies are obviously not supposed to be realistic but I want to know why every kung fu movie needs to include flying.
As far as acting is concerned it is pretty hard to judge since this is definitely the first Korean movie I have ever seen. The acting isn’t terrible but I wouldn’t say it is great either.Then there are the special features. You get quite a few on this DVD but they are all in Korean so you need to read the subtitles.
So I personally didn’t really like The Legend of the Shadowless Sword. I thought the plot was pretty stupid which pretty much ruined the whole movie for me. The only thing that redeemed it was some of the action sequences which weren’t bad. Since I am not a kung fu fan I would encourage people to take that into consideration when you look at my review. If you like either foreign film or kung fu movies you will probably like the Legend of the Shadowless Sword quite a bit and should think about picking it up.
My Rating: 
Kung Fu Fans: 
This Blog was most helpful, your ideas are straight to the point, and the colors are cool too.