You're not going to play catch with this frisbee.
- "Lord help us if a dude with a flying guillotine ever teamed up with a guy using dragon missiles!" - Silver Emulsion Reviews for The Dragon Missile
The Dragon Missile is a 1976 Martial Arts Movie produced by Shaw Brothers, directed by Ho Meng-hwa (of Flying Guillotine fame) starring Anthony Lau-wing and Lo Lieh.
A ruthless tyrant in the late Qin Dynasty, Lord Qin Quan, is diagnosed with a deadly disease (called 100 Birds Worshiping the Phoenix, what?) which will claim his life in seven days. Lord Qin decides to send his personal assassin and champion hitman, Sima Jun (Lo Lieh) to locate the herb, but the only person with knowledge of where the herb is grown is a herbalist named Tieh Er-long who is reluctant to save a brutal dictator and tyrant.
It is worth noting that the movie is released on the very same day as Master of the Flying Guillotine, directed by and starring Shaw Brothers' previous megastar, Jimmy Wang Yu, who had jumped ship and started his own production company, and yes, this film is pretty much Shaw Brothers' attempts to steal business from their former star. It... didn't work.
The Dragon Missile contains examples of:
- Action Girl: Tan Li, played by Shaw Brothers’ lesser-known action-girl Nancy Yen.
- An Arm and a Leg: Fang Song lose his arm while fleeing on his horse, courtesy of the titular missile.
- Assassins Are Always Betrayed: Played straight for Sima Jun, when his master, Lord Qin decides him to be expendable and orders for his death.
- Dual Wield: Sima Jun during close-range fight scenes uses both missiles as twin swords.
- Idiot Ball:
- Fang Song, after subduing Sima Jun, ties him right up and proceeds to flee on his horse… without bothering to remove the titular dragon missiles, which are still strapped to Sima Jun’s back. Sure enough, a few seconds later Sima Jun has freed himself, where he then reaches for the missiles and uses them to remove Fang Song’s arm.
- The true Big Bad of the film, Lord Qin, grabs the villainous version when he decides to double cross Sima Jun, who is on his way to retrieve the herb that can cure Lord Qin of his disease… before Sima Jun can return to the Lord’s mansion. Ultimately Sima Jun ends up fleeing and dying at the end of the film, and with nobody else capable of retrieving the herb for him within the seven-day limit, Lord Qin is doomed to die slowly and painfully of his infection.
- Expy: Sima Jun is pretty much Ma Teng from "Flying Guillotine" all over again, but with less of a conscience.
- Impossibly Cool Weapon: Oh hell yes with the Dragon Missiles. It’s a pair of curved swords whose handles are dragon’s heads, with razor-sharp curved blades that can cut through bone and solid objects and keep going forward, until returning to the hands of their thrower. They can also be used as dual swords for close combat.
- It's Personal with the Dragon: Lord Qin may be the true Big Bad, but Tieh Er-long's vengeance is towards his personal lackey, Sima Jun. He never even meet the warlord face-to-face throughout the entire film.
- Laser-Guided Karma: Lord Qin has a seven-day lifespan due to being infected with a deadly boil on his back, which can only be cured by a herb owned by the herbalist Tieh Er-long. Sending his personal assassin and best henchman, Sima Jun to retrieve the herb, Lord Qin decides to betray Sima Jun, barely a few days before the latter can return. Sima Jun ends up escaping with the herb he had retrieved, originally meant to cure Lord Qin of the disease, and soon enough Lord Qin would die by the seven-day limit.
- Logical Weakness: As deduced by Tan Li and Tieh Er-long, before their final showdown against Sima Jun, the best way to defeat the Dragon Missiles would be to stop them from flying, which can be achieved if they get tangled into objects. So in the final showdown, the beach where it takes place has ascending nets hidden under the sand, and by luring Sima Jun into throwing his blades then pulling the nets upwards, Tan Li and Tieh Er-long managed to get the missiles entangled in multiple thick ropes which the missiles are unable to slice through all at once, relieving Sima Jun of his weapon and allowing Tieh Er-long to score a killing blow on his opponent for good.
- Off with His Head!: The Dragon Missiles, being a Flying Guillotine expy, relieved more than one victim of their craniums in the movie.
- Precision-Guided Boomerang: Those Dragon Missiles, again. Which can be flung to decapitate or dismember victims from a great distance, and return to the thrower.
- Rule of Seven: Lord Qin has a seven-day lifespan thanks to the infectious boil on his back. Sima Jun has to compete with six other assassins also wanting the herb for themselves, where the seven of them repeatedly tries to screw each other over throughout the movie.
- Tragic Villain: Sima Jun, ultimately. He may be a Professional Killer serving a warlord, but he still demonstrates plenty of Villainous Valor and is a Punch-Clock Villain at most, and when he ultimately gets betrayed it’s hard not to feel bad for him.
- Wolverine Claws: Tan Li uses the "extended-from-fingertips" variety to intimidate her opponents.
- You Killed My Father: Tieh Er-long’s vendetta towards Sima Jun becomes personal when Sima Jun killed his mother. Via decapitation.
- Your Days Are Numbered: Lord Qin Quan, who is suffering from an infectious disease which will kill him in seven days, and can only be remedied with the longevity rattan of a thousand years.
