Dynasty (1977) User Reviews

Prime time 3D broadcast on Pittsburgh's Chiller Theater in 1982

[kevinolzak · 6/10 · 26 December 2012]

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).

3D fighting!

[BandSAboutMovies · 6/10 · 8 April 2021]

Qian Dao Wan li Zhu AKA Super Dragon AKA Dynasty was the first Hong Kong/Taiwan 3D film, as well as using the Sensurround 8-track stereophonic sound system. That way, the things you've come to expect from martial arts films - punches, kicks, swords and flying guillotines - mix up with things you will in no way expect - flying heads, crushed skulls, metal umbrellas as weapons and even a man battling with his amputated knubs - while flying directly at your face.

The prince of the Emperor is accused of treason against the throne by an evil eunuch and his sword-wielding henchman and must fight for his life, which is all the set-up you need for 94 non-stop minutes of fighting. It's not the best martial arts you've ever seen, but it is one of the few that made it into the third dimension.

Director Mei-Chun Chang*also made Young Dragons: Kung Fu Kids and understand that we want to see 3D bust our eyeballs. And serving as the 3D advisor on this? Michael Findlay. Yeah, the very same.

*Chang also directed another 3D martial arts film, Revenge of the Shogun Women.

Amazing 3-D kung fu spectacular

[osimola · 4/10 · 31 August 2000]

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.

Put Dynasty on DVD already!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[SuperNinja · 10/10 · 19 April 2004]

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!!!!!!!

A one-time 3D feature

[Leofwine_draca · 4/10 · 18 July 2017]

DYNASTY is very much a nondescript period martial arts feature from Taiwan, starring a couple of notable performers in the forms of Flash Legs Tan and Bai Ying, but otherwise with little to make it stand out from the rest. The plot is a political one and sees a put-upon prince struggling to clear his name while fighting off numerous enemies trying to make him dead.

The one thing that makes this film stand out is that it was originally a 3D movie, hence fists and feet flying out at the screen at all times. I didn't see it in 3D, which of course negates the effect somewhat, and the resultant film is both poor quality and quite dull; despite the intricacies of the classic 'wronged man' plot, the very bad dubbing helps to make this a somewhat laughable experience.

GREAT FLICK!!!

[tshodan · 8/10 · 5 September 2000]

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.

I was searching this for decades!

[stermix501 · 8/10 · 1 September 2012]

when i was a young child, my father took me to the cinema to watch this. apparently we went because it was 3D otherwise he wouldn't let me watch such violent movie. I was tying for decades in vain to find out which movie was so intense in my memory. I have just recognized it from the trailer. Plot:According to what i remember, there was a bad emperor with long gray hair who was terrorizing people. besides his martial arts, he had some iron claws put on his fingers. at some moment he took out his coat and used it as a boomerang! even his guardians wanted him dead to free the land from his violent reign, but in vain. they were easy opponents for him. then there was a young guy who in order to kill him entered his army and became his favorite guardian. one day this young guy tries to kill the emperor during his sleep, but that bad guy was always on alert and escaped. the young guy said: "i promise, i was just trying to test your senses for your safety". he later finally achieved to defeat him. at its time it was a very spectacular movie. maybe if one could see it now, it wouldn't be that great.

Soon availalble

[mmcgee282 · 10/10 · 1 April 2021]

By the time anyone reads this it will long been available on home video Blu- Ray, by 04/13/21. A year and a half ago there was a fund raiser on kick starters by Bob Furmanek and the 3d archive to raise money to have this restored. It was suppose to be released on 12/20 ,but there were more delays. As a financial contributor ,I just got my copy yesterday. It's great. It the first blu- ray 3d that combines polarized with anaglyph print ,for those who don't have a Polaroid 3D set up. So everyone can see the way it was shot . Earlier I had sent Mr Fermanek email suggested that they ought to use color code ,since it mess up the color way less .I got a respond and he told me that they already tested it with anaglyph. Unfortunately the latter is copy righted so that would have been an expense .Red left cyan right is public domain,but seeing it through red left blu right glasses reduces the color distortion and makes it less green slightly more color detail,but, color code come closer to Polaroid. This was the first Kung fu extravaganza in 3D. Although it is advertised in 4 channel quadraphonic sound,it originally was recorded in mono. The producer probably mixed the tracks that were originally for the mono. Well the music and the sound affects are of oriental in nature .Flutes ,drums japans guitars .The horses galloping sound affects were good .Although the story is minimal the kung fu action is great. Now i don't know which actor plays the prince since all the actors are unknown to me,but Ying Bai plays a corrupt Eunuch Chow who now controls all of Taiwan,were it was shot. The prince wanted to over throw him,but, is forced to go to a monastery for protection,but, that won't prevent Chow to destroy him. Yings character is strange besides being a bad guy. David Wei Tang plays Eunuch's guard protector. The film maker did not give this character name. That was odd. There is a scene where David make a surprise Attack almost to Eunuch,but it turns out he was just practicing cause he want to be a general. The Strange thing is that Eunuch grabs his hand and moves him to Eunuch's bed and starts to put his arms around David and gets' closer to him and next scene. All of a sudden Eunuch gets up it's time to sneak to the monastery and surprise the Prince,Guess who get up out of the same bed ? David. Did he and the Eunuch Chow had gay sex? Sometime Eunuch called Davids character his brother. Tao Liang Tan plays Sao Chin Tan son of a warrior ,who got killed by his enemy, Eunuch ,in a 2d still shot flash back of the brutal murder ,probably the producer wanted to save money on the film. The actor looks very skilled at the portrayal of king fu,but my guess had probably a technical adviser to choreograph it probably. Sao takes off way after the bad guy arrives killing all the monastery priests as they defend themselves. Oh I forgot to say that when Eunuch went to the palace to see if the prince was there they captured an old man played by younger actor Wen Tai Lee. He refuses to answer them and gets his head chopped off,almost flies off the screen .Now poor Sao all alone in the world has seven days to get rid of Eunuch Chow and his Gang. There another character,bad guy ,who plays a general ,who looks likes David character ,Kang Chin ,who plays Lu Kuai. In fact when Sao was scaring Lu Kaiu into the woods ,right next to the city, and surprised attack Lu chopping lu's hands off and Ramming a piece of wood in his chest,suggested,I though they killed David character..Then I realizes he was still alive in another scenes. The 3D cinema photography in the kung fu fights was excellent. The scene where Eunuch's soldiers try to decapitate Sao heads with a claw attach to a chain and he uses his trusty metal umbrella to fight them off,just like the leading character in the 1936 musical the dancing pirate,then more help shows up ,or more help for the bad guys?. The soldiers end up choppy off the head of the extras flying out of the screen instead of Sao's. Eventually ,after a lot of fighting against each other ,David's character has turned against Chow,probably for raping him, and offer help to Sao to overthrow the dictatorship of Eunuch Chow in Taiwan. Although the voices were kind of ridiculous the dubbing was in sink. Too bad the original mandarin language is lost. No there was not one women in this film,except for some servants .Fear not the women will have there turn in the sequel Shogun women coming soon.i remember seeing this in an advertisement at the empire theater in 77,but did not see it at that time .Even though ti was shown on t.v. In 82,but it never came to my station. Fortunately I saw it in Polaroid at the martin twin when it was reissued to the theaters in 83. Extras in this Bu ray disc is a cartoon 3d music video. Mike Ballew discussion of the super touch 3D lens ,which was invented by sexploitaion film maker Mike Findley. More 1950's stereo slides and a slide presentation of a famous department store in Dallas Texas. Worth the buy and watch.04/01/21.