Introduction
Legends of the Condor Heroes: The Gallants was specifically produced in 2024 to celebrate the 100th anniversary of Jin Yong’s birth, the creator of the Condor Trilogy.
Before I watched this movie, I had zero knowledge of the novel. I think I saw a few Hong Kong versions of the Condor Trilogy when I was small, but my young brain couldn’t understand the intricate history, mythology, and knowledge that surrounds the trilogy. After watching it, I started looking around to get some info about the story, which is a condensed version of the long novel. With only around 2.5 hours, the plot also moves fast, so I often got confused. Only after reading some information about the novel that I get some clarification. Below, I compiled some from Wikipedia for future watchers who have never read the novel. The information is not about the whole novel, only parts that connect with the movie. You’re welcome to skip the part below if you have already read the novel, or you don’t want to be spoiled for the story before watching it.
Legend of the Condor Heroes: The Novel
The Legend of the Condor Heroes (Chinese: 射鵰英雄傳) is a wuxia novel by Hong Kong Chinese writer Jin Yong (Louis Cha Leung-yung). It is the first part of the Condor Trilogy and is followed by The Return of the Condor Heroes and The Heaven Sword and Dragon Saber. The title The Legend of the Condor Heroes is derived from an incident in our protagonist Guo Jing’s youth when he shot two eagles with a single arrow.
The story is set in imperial China during the wars between the Jurchen-led Jin Empire and the predominantly ethnic Han Song Empire. Guo Xiao Tian lives in a village with his wife Li Ping, who is pregnant with Guo Jing. There is an ambush from the Jin Empire in the village, and Guo Xiao Tian is killed. Li Ping runs into Mongolia, where she gives birth to their son, Guo Jing, who grows up in Mongolia under the care of Genghis Khan.
Guo Jing is honest, loyal, and righteous, but outwardly slow-witted. He learns martial arts from some masters, some of them are the “Seven Freaks of Jiangnan.” He eventually meets his lover Huang Rong. The main plot follows Guo Jing and Huang Rong’s adventures and their encounters with the “Five Greats”, the five most powerful martial artists in the martial artists’ community, and they learn various martial arts techniques from them. Guo Jing also discovers who was behind the death of his father.
With Guo Jing’s assistance, the Mongols conquer the Jin Empire and subsequently turn their attention towards the Song Empire. Guo Jing is unwilling to aid the Mongols in attacking his ancestral ground, so he leaves them and returns to the Song Empire to help his fellow Han people counter the impending Mongol invasion.
The movie is based on chapters 34 through 40 of the novel.
Movie Info
Movie title: Legends of the Condor Heroes: The Gallants (Native title: 射雕英雄传：侠之大者 )
Alternative title: The Legend of the Condor Heroes: The Great Hero,
She Diao Ying Xiong Chuan: Xia Zhi Da Zhe
Genres: Wuxia
Released: Jan 29, 2025
Duration: 2 hours 26 minutes
Director: Tsui Hark ( 徐克 )
Screenwriters: Tsui Hark ( 徐克 ) and Song Xuan ( 宋譞 )
Adapted from book 1, "The Legend of the Condor Heroes" (射鵰英雄傳),
in the novel series "Condor Trilogy" (射鵰三部曲) by Jin Yong (金庸).
Trailer:
Synopsis
It tells the story of the world of grievances and hatred in the war-torn era of power struggle. Guo Jing left his hometown and acquired a huge power of martial arts to change destiny. Although he was valued by Kung Fu Masters who passed down the world’s peerless martial arts, “Nine Yin Manual” and “Eighteen Dragon Subduing Palms”, jealousy towards him was formed from all parties, where he became the target of public criticism. Guo Jing and Huang Rong turned the tide and protected the Southern Song Dynasty border amidst the rain of arrows with the spirit of gallantry (source: Sony Pictures).
Characters
Main Characters
Xiao Zhan ( 肖战 ) as Guo Jing
A Song man who grew up in Mongolia. Guo Jing lost his father at a young age and wandered the grasslands with his mother. After growing up, he returned to the Central Plains and met Huang Rong. With her help, he gradually mastered powerful martial arts. However, the two lovers were separated due to misunderstandings. After the misunderstandings were resolved, he searched everywhere for Huang Rong. In the border town, he reunited with Huang Rong, and the two joined forces to protect the southern Song border.
Sabrina Zhuang ( 庄达菲 ) as Huang Rong
The daughter of the Heretic East Huang Yao Shi, one of the Five Greats in the martial arts world and the 19th leader of the Beggar’s Sect. During her travels in the martial world, she met Guo Jing, and they developed feelings for each other and became a couple. However, their happiness was short-lived because Guo Jing mistakenly believed that her father had killed his mentor, the from the Seven Freaks of Jiangnan, forcing them to part ways.
Tony Leung ( 梁家辉 ) as Ouyang Feng
Ouyang Feng, the Grand Master of the Great Jin, one of the Five Greats of the Central Plains, is known as Venom West. To become the best martial artist in the world, he seeks the “Nine Yin Manual”, which Guo Jing and Huang Rong had obtained. After being defeated by Guo Jing, Ouyang Feng captured Huang Rong, hoping to obtain the “Nine Yin Manual” Scripture from her.
Baya’ertu ( 巴雅尔图 ) as Genghis Khan
The Mongolian Khan who was an outstanding politician and military strategist. He was a masterful commander, unifying the nomadic tribes and leading them to resist the oppression of the Jin Dynasty. He took in Guo Jing and Li Ping, his mother, and became Guo Jing’s adoptive father. He wanted to assimilate Guo Jing, but the latter refused to allow Genghis Khan to attack Song.
Zhang Wen Xin ( 张文昕 ) as Hua Jun or Zheng (in the novel)
The daughter of the Khan, a Mongolian princess. Hua Jun and Guo Jing grew up together, and she always hoped to marry him. After Guo Jing returned from the Central Plains, she learned that Guo Jing had fallen in love with a woman from the Central Plains, which made her very angry. Later, she discovered that the woman she had saved was Guo Jing’s beloved, Hua Rong.
Supporting Characters
Tou Lei (Alan Aruna). The fourth son of the Khan. Tou Lei grew up alongside Guo Jing, and the two formed a deep bond, becoming sworn brothers.
Li Ping (Ada Choi). After her husband Guo Xiao Tian died, she traveled to Mongolia and raised Guo Jing alone in a harsh environment.
Hong Qi Gong (Hu Jun). The 18th leader of the Beggar’s Sect, one of the Five Greats of the Central Plains, known as Beggar North, had great power in the martial arts world and wielded the “Eighteen Dragon Subduing Palms” and the “Dog-Beating Stick Technique”.
Master Yi Deng (Wu Xing Guo). Commonly known as Duan Zhi Xing, he is one of the Five Greats of the Central Plains, the Loyal South, Monk Sole Light. He obtained an ancient martial arts manual “Nine Yin Manual”
Guo Xiao Tan (Li Chen). Guo Jing’s father. Twenty years ago, Guo Xiaotian, was tragically killed by the treacherous and corrupt officials in the Southern Song court.
Review
Story and Plot
As I wrote in the Introduction, the plot moves fast, and the movie tries to include as much of the novel in small portions. In my opinion, without a background knowledge of the book, the audience will get lost in understanding the details of the plot and the depth of the story.
The focus of the movie is about Guo Jing and Guo Jing alone. It’s understandable because he’s the favorite character of the author. The movie is about his journey to finding his purpose in life and becoming a hero (gallant). Because it’s more intellectual and conceptual, there are a lot of speeches but not many martial arts fighting scenes, as there should be in a wuxia. The hardcore wuxia fans may be disappointed. The last fight with Ouyang Feng is also more about qi battle than physical combat. Their duel using inner energy techniques can only be presented with CGI, things that are more commonly seen in xianxia than wuxia.
Guo Jing and Huang Rong’s romance is cute, especially touching is their perilous quest to find each other again after they broke up and separated. Having seen a lot of romance dramas, I’m not a fan of the so-called love triangle trope used between Huang Rong-Guo Jing-Hua Jun/Hua Zheng, although Hua Jun’s love towards Guo Jing and her father’s betrothal are in the novel. But at least, Huang Rong and Hua Jun’s fight is a true martial arts physical fight that can be seen and enjoyed in this movie!
True to the novel are also most of the dialogues. The dialogues are ancient style, similar to what we read in ancient holy books. They feel poetic, and we can tell the difference when there are dialogues that are not from the book since they sound modern.
Character and Acting
Guo Jing in this movie is honest, loyal, and righteous, but doesn’t seem slow-witted as told in the novel, and I don’t know how he was portrayed in previous adaptations. Because if he’s stupid, how could he learn from so many masters to achieve great martial arts? Because of his ability, he can get the support to become the leader of the martial arts world.
Xiao Zhan did a great job portraying Guo Jing. At the time Director Tsui Hark interviewed Xiao Zhan, he felt that the actor was a little thin to be Guo Jing, so Xiao Zhan started to exercise to bulk up when he returned. He also trained hard to prepare for the martial arts scenes, as shown below. He started training more than two months before the filming of the movie. The dedicated actor also learned Mongolian to speak it properly. I also praise other Chinese actors and actresses who learned the language.
Having said that the focus of the movie is Guo Jing, I feel like the other main characters are just supporting characters. For example, I had no clue who the Five Greats are and what is amazing about them until I read their information post-watching. In the movie, their greatness is only shown in silhouettes.
The only character whom I think goes through a character development in such a short time is Hua Jun/Hua Zheng. Her character portrayal and emotional trajectory are very fitting for the role of a girl who has been in love with Guo Jing for a long time (the plot follows the novel by the way); making her the only character in the film who stands out, evoking both affection and sympathy.
Despite not much character depth on the other main characters, all the actors and actresses vividly expressed the personalities and styles of different characters, each with their own charm.
The Visuals
The costumes and makeup of the characters in the movie, especially the Mongolian characters, are quite authentic. The visuals of the battlegrounds, war chariots, large camps, and golden tents are well-executed. The Inner Mongolia landscape as the filming location is breathtaking. The film’s visual effects in its portrayal of large battle scenes and the military formation when the armies are gathered are stunning. I wish the fighting scenes could have been longer since they’re choreographed very well.
I understand that the Director chose to transform martial arts moves into wonders beyond the laws of physics for a contemporary perspective. But with the CGI-heavy fight, especially between Guo Jing and Ouyang Feng, their qi battle becomes xianxia’s style, with fire and wind coming out of the characters’ hands. When preparing for this movie, the filming crew first had to solve the problem of showing the unique martial arts techniques of the “Eighteen Dragon Subduing Palms”, “Nine Yin Manual”, and “Toad Roar”.
The aesthetic in this movie is not only in its special and visual effects, but also in the poetic language shown through the cinematography. I will give you an example of how the movie uses the symbol of color. When Guo Jing misunderstood that Huang Rong’s father killed his master, he broke up with Huang Rong and angrily left Peach Blossom Island. With his monologue “In but a moment, all blossoms lost their hue”, the colorful peach blossoms on the screen faded to grayish white. This symbolizes the collapse of his beautiful world with Huang Rong, dissected frame by frame.
Original Soundtrack
Two classical songs are used for the OST. “Iron Blood, Loyal Heart” and “You’re Always the Best in the World” were released in 1983 to accompany the Hong Kong adaptation of The Legend of the Condor Heroes.
Insert song: “Iron Blood, Loyal Heart” (鐵血丹心) by Roman Tam (羅文) and Jenny Tseng (甄妮)
Opening song: “You’re Always the Best in the World” (世間始終你好) by Roman Tam (羅文) and Jenny Tseng (甄妮)
Closing song: “Sand Whirlwind” (旋风沙) by Qing Ge Le (青格乐) from Anda Union
Conclusion
The newest adaptation of Jin Yong’s epic novel The Legend of the Condor Heroes by the famous Hong Kong director Tsui Hark focuses on the chivalrous aspect instead of the battle or martial arts scenes. The movie emphasizes the chivalrous spirit of the original novel through each of the main characters. With the addition of amazing visualization, this movie presents the martial arts described in the book three-dimensionally on the big screen.
To appreciate the movie details, I think future watchers need some prior background knowledge of the story, or they may find themselves too busy reading the captions without understanding, and miss a lot in this fast-paced movie.
So the part that was cut out featured Guo Jing as part of the Mongols capturing Khawazarem (modern day Persia). So from what I saw was that it was cut out due to international and diplomatic issues and censorship. The crew apparently spent months filming in the desert. It is really a pity because in fact it is the part that most other adaptations skip out. One of the big premises of this movie was that the movie will adapt that part into live action and it was actually one of the bigger plots in the movie. It did also contribute to the hype towards the movie. Therefore that part getting cut out did lead to the movie feeling slightly disjointed and less action. From the leaks I saw, Tsui Hark seems to have really poured his heart and soul into filming that part and if that part had been added to the movie, it would have been an hour longer. Some of those parts were added in the post credits scene in the movie especially that xz shooting the arrow scene was taken from the cut part. I also mourn the fact that xz did parkour and we only got to see a part of it.
Wow… thank you so much for the explanation about the censorship issues! It’s a pity indeed. I think nobody would complain about the movie being longer, knowing the novel source is also long. Our biggest pet peeve when watching any Chinese show (drama/movie): If something is taken off, either being censored or the fear of being censored, the plot is always disjointed. Every time I read Douban reviews, nobody dares to complain about censorship, but they blame the scriptwriting or editing. Or maybe the complaint are taken off…
The movie after the flashbacks felt very enjoyable for me. Apparently a part of the movie was cut out due to censorship issues and from the leaks I saw those scenes had more action. It probably would have been even more enjoyable with those cut scenes.
Oh really? I don’t know that! Why did they have to censor it? Too violent? I see that the movie is already patriotic-focused for China (Han), but Jinyong’s novel message is also patriotic, so I don’t have any objection. Although I read some comments on Douban, the movie is too preachy about patriotism.