A Stunning Wuxia Epic
Summary
Blades of the Guardians: Wind Rises in the Desert is a welcome return of Wu Jing and Jet Li (even if Li is an extended cameo). It’s a sweeping epic with gorgeous visuals and plenty of bloodshed. The sandstorm fight is innovative and one of my favourites from this year. The music is also fantastic, but if you’re not a fan of wirework then that may put you off as it is in every fight. For me it just made it more fantastical and gave Blades of the Guardians a sense of wonder amid the carnage.
Plot: Legendary action master Yuen Woo-ping brings together martial arts icons Wu Jing, Nicholas Tse, Max Zhang, and Jet Li on an epic wuxia adventure across the desert sands. Bounty hunter Doa Ma takes a job escorting the empire’s most wanted man, Zhi Shi Lang, to Chang’an city. As word gets out, his group is hunted down by warriors across the land. The chase is relentless, the action is non-stop, and the blades cut deep.
Review: I’m not sure why Blades of the Guardians has been given the unnecessarily longer title of “Wind Rises in the Desert” but don’t let that put you off as this is still a gorgeous wuxia epic. That does indeed means the fight scenes are infused with wirework which bothers me less these days as I think it adds a gracefulness and beauty to the action. That doesn’t make Blades of the Guardians any less violent as we get limbs chopped off and some decent kills too. At just over 2 hours it moves at an almost relentless pace with regular swordfights and battles.
If you’re watching this for Jet Li you may be disappointed to know he is only on screen for about 10 minutes, so it’s more of a cameo but we do still get to see him back in action and in spectacular style.
This is very much Wu Jing’s show and it’s great to see him back in a huge film like this; he is at his charismatic best here and proves he still has the moves in the fight scenes. The supporting cast includes Nicholas Tse, Ci Sha and Max Zhang with Sha making for a truly hateful and smug villain. Chen Lijun has one of the best arcs in the film as Ayuya going from an optimistic adventure seeker turned vengeful warrior.
The visuals are gorgeous and the music score is one of the year’s best adding a genuine sense of grandeur to the action.
Overall, Blades of the Guardians: Wind Rises in the Desert is a well paced 2 hours packed with bloody swordfights and an awesome cast. It is let down by an overuse of wirework, but the action is still epic stuff.