1978’s The 36th Chamber of Shaolin sped Shaw Brothers wu xia into a new and vibrant era, thanks to a uniquely tight structure and strong plot that contrasted the usually loose, almost improvised-seeming narratives of many such chop-socky epics. Indeed, rumour of long standing held that Shaw’s films were written in the course of production, which helps account for the often jarring shifts in tone and focus in some of their classic productions. And then there was the amazing spectacle of motion and charisma that was fresh star Gordon Liu Chia Hui. Clan of the White Lotus, along with other Shaolin-themed Shaw films like The 36th Chamber and Executioners of Shaolin (1977), helps form a more or less chronological, semi-contiguous saga, depicting the efforts of the Shaolin monks to fight off the invading Manchus, being betrayed and having their temples destroyed, and the vengeful aftermath. In particular, of course, there is the recurring villain now well-known to Western audiences, Bak Mei or Pai Mei, “White Eyebrows”, according to folklore one of the monks who betrayed the Shaolins to the Manchus, allowing them access to their temple. Pai Mei had been played in 1979 by Lo Lieh, a Thai-born action star, in Abbot of Shaolin, and in this, his directorial debut, he returned to the role.
Technically, the character called White Eyebrows dies right at the start of Clan of the White Lotus, when two Shaolin rebels, Hong Wending (Liu) and Hu Yiabiao (Ching Chu), find him gloating over the ruins of their smashed temple, and, working together, they defeat and kill him. The local governor, Kau Tin-Chung (Lung Wei Wang), who studied under him, has his vanquishers locked up with the other Shaolins, but the Emperor, having made peace with the rebels, releases the monks. Kau Tin-Chung, furious, arranges with White Eyebrows’ brother, White Lotus (Lo Lieh), who is in essence Pai Mei and certainly the basis of the mannerisms of that character as presented in Kill Bill Vol. 2, to have his private army of warrior followers ambush the newly released Shaolins when they’re still unarmed and ripe for slaughter.
Wending and Hu only escape this massacre because they meet up with Hu’s pregnant wife Mei-Hsiao (Ying Hung Wai, later known as Kara Hui) and his sister Ching-Ching (Ching-Ching Yeung), who have been keeping house nearby. White Lotus and his men quickly find them there too, and White Lotus kills Hu and Ching-Ching in quick succession when they take him on. Wending and Mei-Hsiao escape and find refuge with Hu’s brother Naicheng (Lam Fai Wong), a skinny, wimpy, scabies-afflicted labourer in a textile store. Wending, desperate to get revenge on White Lotus, soon begins to look for a form of fighting that will take down the amazingly skilled and seemingly impervious White Lotus.
Resembling The 36th Chamber, the structure of Clan details the hero’s learning humility and new kinds of discipline in order to reach his ultimate goal, except that here it also involves unlearning certain assurances and certainties. Like another early 1980s Hong Kong spectacle, Tsui Hark’s Zu: Warriors from the Magic Mountain, Clan of the White Lotus take delight in deconstructing rigid codes of gender and social role in such generic fare, for, in order to learn how to defeat White Lotus, Mei-Hsiao realises Wending needs to adopt the more supple, less forceful style of female kung-fu, for White Lotus has learnt to use the wind created by strong punches to propel himself out of harm’s way. She thus insists that Wending practise the elegant female style and also take up such womanly occupations as embroidery and caring for her child, to soften his hands, a regimen that soon sees Wending taking on distinctly effeminate affectations. Clan, then, reflects a specific version of how settled genres can, in their distinctive fashions, deal with social issues like contemporary feminism, gay awareness, and subsequent changes to masculine values, through such veiled metaphors. It’s also a snappy vehicle for some genuinely funny comedy, as when Wending demurs from delivering the correct hits to Mei-Hsiao’s crotch for propriety’s sake, in spite of her stern insistence that he fight her properly.
The same naughty comedy likewise runs through Wending’s encounters with White Lotus, particularly in the amazing finale in which Wending surprises White Lotus in the bath, forcing the old man to take a flying leap nude out of the water and get dressed whilst fending off his enemy. With even Wending’s new feminised technique failing to bring down the unstoppable monk, he next augments his style with acupuncture, endeavouring in their climactic showdown to paralyse his enemy with dozens of needles riddling his pressure points. And yet Lieh manages to keep the humour from interfering with the melodramatic immediacy of his tale, which is easily described as a variant on Scaramouche. A recurring gag, quoted by Tarantino, is the difficulty of striking White Lotus in the crotch, a stunt which constantly sees no result apart from his attackers getting their hands caught between his thighs.
Watching Clan’s amazing action and physical comedy sequences (choreographed by Lau Kar Leung) is truly revelatory: very few films even in this genre display such well-coordinated and athletic displays of action, from the slapstick of Wending forcing the reluctant Naicheng to help in his training, flipping head over heels on a chair, to the wild encounters with White Lotus’ two swordsman bodyguards, or the dazzling moment when he flicks his shoe up in front of his chest to block White Lotus’ exploding heart hit.
Lieh’s performance as White Lotus is brilliant physically and in his invocation of smiling, taunting arrogance is indelible: he and Liu best Astaire and Rogers for fluency and intricacy of motion, and he makes White Lotus one of the great villains of screen history as he dances blithely around his enraged attackers, mocking their skills and constantly reiterating his own superiority, or irritably telling off Wending for “peeping on an old man” as he tries to get his trousers on whilst engaging in a martial arts brawl. Liu keeps pace, even if it’s not a one-man show like The 36th Chamber, with a deftly funny performance on top of his genuinely breathtaking skill. Although they don’t get too much to do in what was still essentially a guy-dominated genre in spite of a proliferating number of heroines, Wai and Yeung are strong and saucy. Lieh makes excellent use of slow-motion shots to emphasise particularly brilliant moves, and although he doesn’t offer as much atmosphere as Cheh Chang or the rampant energy of Tsui Hark, the economic intelligence of the editing and staging here is strong indeed. In the church of Hong Kong
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