After seeing Andrew Lau’s The Guillotines, martial arts fans who were drawn in by marketing that promised steampunk-inspired lethal weaponry and wild wuxia action may be left wondering, 'What just happened?’ This long-delayed epic kicks off with a giddying mix of special effects and wire-work, but settles into a patchy story of dynastic intrigue and caste division that only occasionally employs the whizz-bangery many will be expecting.
a patchy story of dynastic intrigue
Supposedly based in fact (though no historical records officially exist), 'The Guillotines’ are a legendary team of assassins who serve the Manchurian emperor Yong Zheng during the Qing Dynasty. When Zheng’s successor, Qian Long, ascends to the throne, The Guillotines are given a new mission: exterminate Han Chinese descendants who pose a threat to the political status quo. Tormented, the team performs their duties diligently but leader Leng (Ethan Juan) struggles with an increasingly heavy moral heart.
Their reputation for impenetrability comes unstuck when they come face-to-face with Han rebel Wolf (Huang Xiaoming), a charismatic leader and a mystical warrior who successfully breaks down The Guillotines. Leng’s love interest, fellow Guillotine Musen (Li Yuchun), is captured and the team set out to rescue her from Wolf’s distant outpost, a type of Shangri-La where Han Chinese villagers live in blissful, cult-like harmony.
Meanwhile, Imperial Commandant and Leng’s childhood friend, Du (Shawn Yue), begins a two-fold reign of terror in his own quest for Wolf and to fulfil the Emperor’s directive to kill off the remaining Guillotines. (Some scenes involving the cold-hearted Du’s ruthless extermination of Han sympathisers are very unpleasant.) The three paths of the protagonists are destined to cross, and predictably, in the kind of operatic bloodbath finale that befits the over-the-top nature of the genre.
Clearly a commentary on the shifting status of rule in modern day China, the prolific Lau’s latest is nevertheless an obtuse work that buries much of its subtext and historical relevance beneath overstated dramatics and cacophonous staging. The film positively overflows with slow-motion sequences in what appears to be an effort by Lau and his experienced action film producer Peter Chan to impose a sense of grandeur. There are some undeniably spectacular vistas in The Guillotines, its locations and sense of scale recalling classic westerns such as How the West was Won and The Wild Bunch, but the heavy-handed melodrama never soars quite so majestically as the scenery.
The Guillotines displays all the usual thematic traits fans have come to expect in Hong Kong action epics (Lau’s own Infernal Affairs films being amongst the best of them): family conflict, specifically between brothers, and the inherently soulless, corrupting nature of power. The director, usually so assured with these elements, stumbles in putting it all together. (Further evidence perhaps of editing struggles and the film’s delayed release – principal photography finished over a year ago). The 3D conversion is at the low-end of current standards, with the picture often dark and blurry.
