To Kill with Intrigue (1977) (2025)

Popular reviews

• Review by Rafael "Parker!!" Jovine ★★★½ 2

  Starring: Jackie Chan - The Suicidal Clown, Drunken Kicker and Master of Punches

  One thing that can’t be disputed is that, as of right now, this is the most stunning a Chan film has ever looked. The production design, the costumes and everything else are just stunning. Really, really loved the cinematography.

  The rest of the movie is, for the most part, really great too. That scene between Chan and Feng at the house was great. I like the fight sequences where you can’t pick up on the fact that they're all choreographed and sadly, this one has a few instances where you can see that, but other than that, there are plenty of good combat scenes. It never goes…

• Review by threepenny ★★★★ 3

  When you watch enough DVD extras and listen to enough commentaries you'll notice a trend - movies that perform poorly at the box office are spoken of with derision by many of the creators involved, and the expert commentary will often regurgitate their same tired talking points. So it is here, where we are told it was "too cold" for the kung fu to be good, and it was a poor result because of tension between the director and the star. As if films have never been shot in the freezing cold before while actors had to pretend otherwise, nor that tension between creatives can sometimes lead to great things (Herzog and Kinski, anybody?). Also to imagine this was ever…

• Review by gregs1999 ★★★

  You can see Jackie Chan’s style come into a play a little bit, but it’s the 80’s when he comes into a world of his own. The finale fight went on for far too long, and actually lost interest. Plot wise it was alright, the twist wasn’t great, and the romance felt secondary.

• Review by Dennis Vehlen ★★★

  One of the weirder pre-Drunken Master Jackie Chan films directed by Lo Wei and featuring some outrageous villains (the killer bee gang!) and brutal fights (nowhere near the genre's best but still pretty good) but also a weirdly confusing story. This feels much more like Lo Wei than it does like Jackie Chan - Jackie starts the movie with slapping his pregnant girlfriend and ends it with a scared face like an Italian zombie, so that's something you don't see every day.

• Review by mosquitodragon ★★★½

  This has a bit of a reputation as one of the poorer Jackie Chan films. I can see why someone expecting the usual Chan thing would be disappointed - this is really much more like a standard Shaw Brothers style, traditionalist kung-fu film, which happens to star Jackie.

  Even so, you can tell he's got something special. There were some phenomenal performers before Jackie Chan showed up on the scene, but I dunno - I think you can just tell there's a step up in athleticism and skill, even here where he hasn't fully honed his capabilities.

  Critic Rick Baker (not the effects guy) gives an interview on the disc where he points out that Jackie was under duress for…

• Review by Mark Costello ★★★

  The Jackie Chan we know and love today wasn’t always THAT Jackie Chan…

  Before he came to the attention of global fight fans with 1978s double whammy of Drunken Master and Snake in the Eagle’s Shadow and finely honed his more comedic, Buster Keaton with fists persona, he was just another in the long line of those hoping to emulate the spirit of Bruce Lee. And no one did more to try and make this happen than The Big Boss director Lo Wei.

  For several years, Wei tried to mould Chan into a straightforward copy of Lee, putting him in several films that landed with a thud at the Hong Kong box. And while most of these are fairly forgettable…

• Review by Matthew Noble ★★★ 9

  JMN presents… Chan-uary!
  Film #1: To Kill with Intrigue (1977)
  Language: Mandarin
  Runtime: 107 mins

  31 days, 31 Jackie Chan movies.
  My next January marathon has officially begun!

  And in the case of To Kill with Intrigue, an inauspicious start is in order. It's clear the Hong Kong film studios didn't know what to do with Jackie during the mid-70s. They briefly attempted to market him as the next Bruce Lee, even though they're nothing alike. And here they tried sticking Jackie in a Shaw Brothers style revenge flick. You can imagine how this plays out: inciting attack which kills key players, hero escapes and goes on journey, hero trains in martial arts, hero faces villain in final fight.

  Jackie…

• Review by Gentry ★★★★

  “Qian Qian!”

  Peach Blossom Bee

  Swallow this hot coal if you want to live. Ever thought what it would be like to see Jackie Chan in a King Hu film? Well, this is the closest thing.

  Fathers are not righteous heroes and masters sometimes want to kill their students in Lo Wei's late 70s throwback wuxia and continuation of his partnership with a still-finding-his-footing Jackie Chan. Like The Killer Meteors, To Kill with Intrigue is another Gu Long story, taking place in a fantasy wuxia world of divine elixirs, bandits jumping from treetops, mega-sized cartoon mallets and bad guys snarling, “I have another identity, which you guys will never expect!”

  It’s also noticeably shot in the bitter (but beautiful!) South…

• Review by Rock ★★★½

  I wasn’t always gripped by the drama, but I appreciated the movie’s dedication to complicating the revenge motivations of the different characters. Plus, there are a lot of nifty fights, livened up by the variety of weapons featured, the energetic use of handheld camerawork, and the bold colours of Hsu Feng’s outfits. Alas, she does not appear in the climax, but the movie makes up for it with a pseudo 3D aesthetic where wide angle lenses and a shifting axis of action make it seem as if the fighters’ limbs are coming right at you.

• Review by Tanner ★★½ 1

  Really struggling with Lo Wei but this is a slight improvement over Killer Meteors. A wuxia film featuring more Jackie Chan but still misusing him. There’s still so much plotting and shifts in tone that lack any sort of motivation. A supernatural opening becomes a revenge tale becomes a love story full of betrayal. At least there are some decent fights, nothing so memorable but enough of a payoff to the excessive drama.

• Review by Gentry ★★★★

  🗣️ Watched with audio commentary by David West, critic and author of Chasing Dragons: An Introduction To The Martial Arts Film

  After a Wang Yu vehicle in which Jackie played the villain, and a more serious follow-up where Jackie played a mute, director/producer Lo Wei stuck JC in a wuxia (with one foot in kung fu). Some good info on the two leading ladies: Hse Feng, with her discovery by King Hu and difficult upbringing, and the more mysterious South Korean actress Yu Ling-Lung, who was also featured in The Killing Meteors, but beyond that, little is known. More thoughts back here.

• Review by Carlo V ★★★

  Sure makes you wonder what would've happened to Jackie if Yuen Woo-ping hadn't been around to save him from Lo Wei movies. This is Jackie before the man himself knew what that would go on to mean. Deadly serious with fights that are pretty easy to drift from, without being downright bad in any way. Lo Wei did enough movies at Shaw Bros to have them be functional and good-looking, which does go part of the way before you inevitably kinda zone out.

  Watched via 88 Films' bluray release, and they like to sell this as "fast-paced" and "one of Jackie finest hours." This is neither, but I'm sure the name Jackie Chan means enough return on what was probably not the most expensive of licenses. It worked on me! (on sale)
  PHYSICAL FEBRUARY #16