The Perfumed Arrow
In the essay “Musical China, Classical Impressions: A Preliminary Study of Shaws’ Haungmei Diao,” Edwin W. Chen places The Perfumed Arrow in the “Period of Decline”. Which is both accurate, and maybe not fair.
Chen seems to judge Haungmei Diao films based on the uniqueness of their music and the lushness of their visuals. And, honestly, Perfumed Arrow isn’t doing a lot in those departments that other Haungmei Diao films haven’t done better. The songs are familiar, as are many of the story tropes. Ivy Ling Po dresses as a man for what I think is the 6th film in 3 years. There are scholars. There is romantic misunderstanding. It’s all very familiar.
But while Chen criticizes this as the genre’s decline, I think that this familiarity and repetition is the point. Could Shaw Brothers have invested money and creativity into keeping Haungmei Diao fresh and inventive? Yes. Is that the system that Shaw Brothers was built on? Absolutely not. It’s not a surprise that directors that wanted to make lush, inventive movies (King Hu, Li Han-Hsiang) tended to leave Shaw Brothers as quickly as possible. You want to be creative? Go to Taiwan. You want to make a ‘product’? Work for Shaw Brothers.
And it’s not like Shaw’s approach was commercially wrong. Of the roughly 50 Haungmei Diao films made, Shaw Brothers made 30 of them (according to Chen). Nearly all of those were over a 10 year span. The familiarity clearly worked for audiences and studio alike for a decade.
So, does The Perfumed Arrow take big risks or push the genre? Not really. Does it need to? Maybe not.
That’s not to say that the film is without interest or pleasure. I liked it quite a bit. Ivy Ling Po is great in these roles and I liked her here. Same goes for Chin Feng. And Celestial just released a nice-looking higher quality version for free on YouTube. A massive improvement over the blurry DVD release of the early 2000s that makes it easier to appreciate the set and costume work.
The first few numbers are particularly fun. Ivy Ling Po, with full knowledge of her family, has spent years living as a man. And when her scholar friends tease her for being such a small and weak dude she schools them by doing a bunch of heavy deadlifts and archery tricks. “Courage is more important than build” she sings, comparing her self to Hua Mulan. Later on there’s a scene where Ivy Ling Po gets irritated by the irrational ‘purity’ of another female character. More than many other Hangumei Diao, The Perfumed Arrow seems to be enjoying its gender bending and satirizing gender roles.
It’s easy to mark The Perfumed Arrow as an inflection point for Shaws. It marks the last time Chang Cheh would write a musical. From this point on he’s only writing Chang Cheh-style films. The first half of the film is quite inventive and fun. Then, at the exact mid point of the film, we take a break from the musical for a 10 minute action scene where Ivy Ling Po (and her not particularly subtle stunt double) kills like a million dudes. After that interlude we return to the musical romance but the verve of the first half seems to be gone and the film settles into predictable outcomes.
It’s hard not to map that directly on to the trajectory of Shaw Brothers. This is a point of transition. Where the studio of Li Han Hsiang becomes the studio of Chang Cheh. And, in that way, we are in the period of decline for Hanugmei Diao.
Ian Whitney
Published: 2025-02-06