The Angry River

The Angry River was the first film produced by the newly formed Golden Harvest film company in Hong Kong. It was not the first film that they released, being preceded, by a few months, by The Invincible Eight. It starred Angela Mao in her first screen role, though she did also play a major part as one of The Invincible Eight. Sammo Hung and Jackie Chan also make brief appearances in it.

As a wuxia the main elements of the plot are fairly standard. The King of Hell (Ying Bai), leader of the Lunar Sect is murdering prominent martial artists with his Seven Fold Spikes. These righteous men are being cut down by a dishonourable method, killed from a distance, and the darts are poisoned! Lan Tin-lung, father of Lan Feng (Angela Mao) and master of the Liangyi Castle, calls together his fellow warriors to take action against the evil upstart. Before he can take action he is gravely wounded by a dart to the back. Lan Feng must journey to the Sorrowful Ghost Valley to find a rare plant that can cure the poison. She must trade her Kung Fu, her ability to use Chi, for it. Without her martial skill she must journey back, hunted by the Lunar Clan. Inevitability she is too late and must destroy The King of Hell herself.

The Angry River is Golden Harvest's first film and it shows. Some of the special effects work is really ropey and some costuming looks a little iffy. It is also Angela Mao's first onscreen performance. In Hong Kong action movies martial arts ability often trumped acting. Having the ability to do both in one person is rare. Mao came from a background of Chinese Opera, and could act. In this first film she is stagey (in later films she tones down the force required to hit the back of the theatre). As a martial artist she is fast. It's not just Sammo Hung's fight choreography: she is noticeably quicker that the people she is up against.

The look of The Angry River is pretty much what you would expect. It has the tropes and clichés that come with the territory, shaky pan and zoom, objects obscuring the foreground. What sets it apart is writer/director Huang Feng's eye for composition. His landscapes are amongst the best in Hong Kong cinema. Combined with Sammo Hung's choreography, his blocking out of fight scenes, the depth of onscreen movement, is narratively satisfying. The images he makes are also occasionally surprising.

There are two version of The Angry River generally available, the original Mandarin and the American dub. The American dub is somewhat dumbed down. The language is less poetic: Seven Fold Spike becomes weapon; Sorrowful Ghost Valley, Devil's Valley.

It is easy to forgive The Angry River its shortfalls. They don't detract from Angela Mao's performance as an action hero. Her acting is a little stagey but it is effective. Feng's compositions, interior and exterior, are beautiful to look at, and the fight scenes are impressive.

Reviewed on: 22 Aug 2026