Qian dao wan li zhu

Me and my friends went to see an amazing 3-D kung fu spectacular. And we got what we asked for.

The plot was set in history somewhere near the end of Ming Dynasty, some evil guy attacked some good monks, some young monk fought back, and then there was lots of fighting. We really didn't understand much - it felt like we were watching a censored version where the plot was cut out. Anyway, the plot isn't important. Neither is the acting, which was quite wooden (what would you expect from people selected by their martial arts skills?) and the english dubbing which made it even worse.

But what was important: there was kung fu. The director knew that one and half hours of plain fighting is a bit boring, so there were some quite spectacular stunts, huge army of those one hit point guys, truly ridiculous special weapons (not to spoil anything, I just wonder what material that umbrella was...), the meanest big bad (and good, it seems) guys that require surreal violence to get killed, and all too much 3-D effects, which were more or less amazing.

It seems like there are two special things you can do with 3-D. Thrusting things at the audience or placing irritating things between the audience and the action to make them feel the depth. The first one was used all too often - arrows, swords, a bell-ringing log, you name it. The other one, too. Interestingly, during the movie the bad guy says: "Cheap tricks result in immediate failure".

Overall the movie was not all bad. There were some spectacular fight scenes and the rest wasn't bad enough to make us walk away before the end.

Before the huge 3D revival of 1982-83 (when I myself caught "Andy Warhol's Frankenstein" and "Jaws 3D"), there were a few 3D productions of rather low quality filmed around 1976, "A*P*E" perhaps being the most notorious. Certainly the best remembered of the small number of martial arts features filmed in 3D, "Dynasty" was issued under a dizzying barrage of alternate titles, such as "Qian Dao Wan Li Zhu," "Super Dragon," "Supercross," and "Warlord." Its added Quadrophonic soundtrack can still be detected (right from the beginning, the soldiers marching on horseback) in the 2D DVD from FarEastFlix, the best quality version available not in 3D. They certainly weren't bashful about utilizing the dimensional depth, as no minute goes by without something being thrust at the audience, from numerous weapons to simple bell ringing. Although slow to start at 90 minutes, there's really no paucity of gory action, with one dying victim continuing the battle even after both hands are cut off! No doubt many viewers first encountered this film during television's 3D boom of 1982, when Pittsburgh's Chiller Theater aired it for a special prime time broadcast, 8:00 PM on Friday night July 16 1982 (Bill 'Chilly Billy' Cardille usually hosted on Saturday nights). I missed this one at the time, but did catch both "Revenge of the Creature" and "Gorilla at Large" in all their 3D glory, too bad "House of Wax" wasn't included (enjoying another theatrical revival).

Before the days of Karate, JuJitsu, Aikido and Tae Kwon do action stars was the Kung fu Decade. Wonderfully Introduced to us by Bruce Lee but badly continued by many Chinese film studios. However, in this decade a few Jems shined through. Dynasty 3-D was one of them. I missed the original theatre release but caught the rerun of this wonder during the short lived 3-D TV revival (Gorilla at large , Return of the Creature) Surprisingly this was the best chinese (Non Bruce lee)kung fu movie i had ever seen. Bruce Lee would have been proud. Intense action, great use of weapons, cool plot and good acting. If you can find it, SEE IT.

This movie was SHEER INSANITY!!!

This movie is EASILY one of my top ten favorite kung fu movies!! The 3-D effects were DAMN good too!!

I saw this movie on TV when I was a little kid(over 2 decades ago) and I have been waiting to see it again ever since!!! It doesn't look like it's available anywhere, but I HOPE that changes in the near future!!!

What's taking them SOOOOO LONGGGGG???????

To whom it may concern, Gimme Dynasty NOW!!!!!!!