Line #41 Film/GoldenSwallow


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2	[[caption-width-right:350:I love it when DVD tells you ''right on the cover'' what you'll expect to see in the film itself!]]
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4	''Golden Swallow'' is a 1968 {{Wuxia}} MartialArtsMovie released by Creator/ShawBrothers, sequel to ''Film/ComeDrinkWithMe'', but this time the titular heroine (played by Creator/ChengPeiPei) takes a backseat to a whole new character: Creator/JimmyWangYu's Silver Roc, a mysterious swordsman and killing machine on a rampage across the clans of ancient China.
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6	Jimmy Wang-yu, then 25 years old and fresh off the recent success of Film/OneArmedSwordsman, is seen as potential star material by Shaw Brothers, and as such takes over the spotlight. His portrayal of Silver Roc (combined with his previous film, the martial arts classic ''The One Armed Swordsman'') would establish him as an icon in ''wuxia'' cinema, with various similar historical period film roles coming his way. Here, his presence is electrifying, chilling, and domineering, with few words spoken, simply through his stoic persona, makes him a fan-favourite.
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8	Following the events of ''Come Drink With Me'', the swordswoman Golden Swallow discovers someone from her past is back, someone whom she assumed was dead long ago, and is making a name of himself - and ''her'' - because of the scores and scores of dead bodies he leaves behind everywhere he goes. Her former protégé, Silver Roc, is bent on reuniting with her, just as Golden Swallow is engaged in a relationship with Iron Whip (Creator/LoLieh). And when Silver Roc's enemies catches up with him, making Golden Swallow and Iron Whip the target of assassins as well, the trio will have to team up and fight.
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10	… or, to be more precise, Golden Swallow and Iron Whip takes a backseat, and fight whatever morsels of leftover mooks Silver Roc forgot to kill during his massacres.
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12	----
13	!!The film contains examples of the following tropes:
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15	* BadassInDistress: Golden Swallow, in the opening scene, gets incapacitated and captured alive, until Iron Whip arrives to bail her out.
16	* CallingCard: Silver Roc, after killing hordes of bandits and enemy swordsmen, would leave behind darts in the shape of golden swallows on their corpses. This is what made Golden Swallow realized the mysterious Silver Roc from her past is coming back.
17	* CrucifiedHeroShot: [[spoiler: Silver Roc, combined with DiedStandingUp with [[DiesWideShut both eyes still open]], after killing the last 60-odd mooks sent to kill him]].
18	* CurbStompBattle: Nearly ''every'' battle Silver Roc gets involved in ends with him on the winning side. Its taken to ridiculous extremes in the lair battle where Silver Roc have to face 4 MookLieutenant sent after him... which he killed in 10 seconds flat. That scene is followed by Silver Roc entering an underground cavern, guarded by the 18 Guardians, the best of the EliteMook squadron... and Silver Roc kills them all in less than a minute.
19	* DramaPreservingHandicap: [[spoiler: Right before the climatic final battle, Silver Roc accidentally gets the tip of Iron Whip's... erm, whip, embedded into his chest, which makes him just vulnerable enough to finally die in the final showdown]].
20	* DeathOfAChild: Farmer Chang's son, see {{Seppuku}}.
21	* DemotedToExtra: Golden Swallow who is the main character from ''Come Drink With Me'' takes a backseat, to accomodate the then-upcoming popularity of Jimmy Wang Yu.
22	* TheDreaded: Silver Roc, hands down. His name strikes terror in the souls of evil-doers and have them running with their tails between their legs.
23	* DualWielding: Silver Roc uses two swords simultaneously, which allows him to kill twice the amount of enemies, twice as fast, in fight scenes.
24	* DyingMomentOfAwesome: [[spoiler: Silver Roc, whom have killed the final BigBad, takes on TheRemnant... single-handedly. All 60 of them. And winning, although he succumbs to his injuries a few seconds later, standing in a valley full of corpses]].
25	* FacialHorror: Many of Silver Roc’s victims are killed by having their faces carved apart by his sword, in rather graphic detail too.
26	* FlatCharacter: Most of the bandit leaders and clan bosses, whose characterizations boils down to "ordering minions to fight Silver Roc, [[ScrewThisImOuttaHere flee when things go south]], get caught by Silver Roc and die by his sword..."
27	* GoodIsNotSoft: Silver Roc may be on the side of good, but he's really ruthless and not a nice guy at all, as listed on various examples on this list.
28	* {{Gorn}}: Plenty of these shows up throughout the film, with loads of gore and blood from extras. [[spoiler: Also on Silver Roc himself during his LastStand]].
29	* HateSink: The Chao brothers are a pair of corrupt landlords whom are willing to stomp on poor farmers and civilians. When the Changs, a farming family, refuse to sell their land to the brothers, they willingly framed farmer Chang's son for stealing and eating a goose, demanding the farmer to hand over his entire land for compensation. They ordered the farmer to be whipped for failing to pay for the allegedly stolen goose, forcing the young boy to disembowel himself to prove his innocence, and then kill off farmer Chang, causing Chang's wife to go insane from losing her family in one morning. Completely without remorse, their very next appearance is them ordering their mooks to tear down the farm to build their new mansion. Of the hundreds of victims slain by Silver Roc, the Chao brothers deserved their comeuppance more than anybody else.
30	* IHaveAFamily: One of the last mooks working for the Chao brothers pleads with Silver Roc that he still have a mother at home he need to take care. Silver Roc still carves his face like a pumpkin anyways.
31	* HalfTheManHeUsedToBe: One scene in the bandits' underground hideout have several captives being executed by guillotines... positioned at waist-level. The audience get to see more than one captive getting bisected from the waist, with copious amounts of gore and blood.
32	* HookerWithAHeartOfGold: Silver Roc's crush and a potential love rival for Golden Swallow, is a prostitute whom is actually kind and cares for the people around her.
33	* HumanPincushion: [[spoiler: During his final stand, after Silver Roc slays the first wave of enemies, a second wave with a few archers included fires their arrows at him, landing several arrows into Silver Roc. He responds by [[LodgedBladeRecycling pulling out some of the arrows]] embedded in his torso and throw them into the faces of the archers, then continue kicking ass]].
34	* ImpaledWithExtremePrejudice: Happens in a battle scene in a bamboo garden, between Silver Roc and 4 MookLieutenant set after him. Silver Roc slice a bamboo tree into half, then knocks one of the mooks backwards, where he ends up a human on a bloodied bamboo stick.
35	* ImpromptuTracheotomy: One (of the 180 or so) of Silver Roc’s many victims is killed when Silver Roc shoved his sword into his opponent’s mouth, all the way to the throat region.
36	* InASingleBound: Plenty of characters have abilities to leap high and far distances with a single jump. Pretty standard ''wuxia'' fare.
37	* LetsFightLikeGentlemen: The final confrontation between Silver Roc and Iron Whip. They’re not battling each other to death, but merely trying to prove their superiority in martial arts. Before a clear winner is decided though, Golden Swallow arrives and stops the dueling men.
38	* LoveTriangle: Between Silver Roc, Golden Swallow, and Iron Whip. [[spoiler: It ends with Silver Roc's death]].
39	* ManOnFire: After going through the underground dungeon where the bandits are gathered, and killing all 100 of the bandits gathered within, Silver Roc made sure there are no survivors by setting the place on fire before leaving. Cue two bandits who escaped Silver Roc's initial rampage, only to be caught by the fire, rushing out of the dungeon with their entire bodies set alight.
40	* MenAreTheExpendableGender: ''Every single male character'' [[spoiler: including Silver Roc]] that is not Iron Whip and have more than two lines of dialogue ends up dead before the credits. Of the 200-plus people who died onscreen, ALL of them are men.
41	* MutualKill: [[spoiler: After killing majority of the final wave of mooks sent after him, 4 EliteMook armed with whips and daggers manage to ensnare the badly-wounded Silver Roc through his arms and legs, and then stab Silver Roc fatally in the gut (with ALL 4 of their daggers!). But Silver Roc is still holding his sword, and kills the last 4 mooks, before he stood up... and expires]].
42	* OffhandBackhand: Silver Roc does this with ''swords'', casually slicing up mooks sneaking behind him without even looking.
43	* OneManArmy: Silver Roc, hands-down. He slays roughly an average of 2.5 mooks per minute of the film's overall run-time.
44	* OneHitKill: Silver Roc, who can slay up to 5 mooks with a single swipe of his sword. He makes killing look so easy!
45	* OnlyKnownByTheirNickname: Subverted. Silver Roc's name is Yin-peng, but nobody really calls him that name. Not even the prostitute who had a crush on him.
46	* ReportsOfMyDeathWereGreatlyExaggerated: Silver Roc was assumed to be dead until his reappearance.
47	* RuggedScar: Silver Roc have a threatening one on his forehead, which is a gash he received when his family gets massacred by bandits when he was a child.
48	* SecondaryCharacterTitle: Golden Swallow plays second fiddle to Silver Roc in this movie, despite being the titular character.
49	* {{Seppuku}}: This happens to farmer Chang's son, barely 10 years of age, during the Chao brothers' hostile takeover scene, where the boy (being framed for stealing and eating an expensive goose) is forced to disembowel himself to prove his innocence. And the audience get to see it in great detail, too, with copious amounts of accompanying {{Gorn}}.
50	* ShieldBearingMook: In the underground cavern battle, Silver Roc had to battle 9 mooks that attempts to corner him with shields. He simply jumps above their shields and kills all of them.
51	* SingleStrokeBattle: Majority of the battles Silver Roc finds himself in is like these, with the victims getting sliced up the moment they and Silver Roc starts making a move.
52	* StaircaseTumble: Featured in the hideout battle where Silver Roc have to climb upwards to reach where the Dragon Clan’s quarters are located. More than thirty mooks shows up at the top of the stairs, but Silver Roc merely carves a bloody path through the mooks sending 30 or so dead bodies tumbling down the stairs one after another. Golden Swallow and Iron Whip arrives much later, and is utterly shocked to see the pile of corpses at the bottom of the stairs.
53	* TheStoic: Silver Roc seldom speaks, or show emotions, before, during, and after killing scores of mooks. [[spoiler: Although he does get a NotSoStoic look on his face when he realized he's fatally wounded in the end]].
54	* WireFu: Well, its a ''wuxia'' film, that's expected to happen.
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Context Film / GoldenSwallow