That's from a sitcom I watched many decades ago, and it summarizes "Golden Swallow", Chang Cheh's take on a sequel to "Come Drink With Me".

Golden Swallow (Cheng Pei Pei), Swordswoman Wonderful, is rescued by and nursed to health by Han Tao (Lo Lieh), Swordsman Noble and Pure, and they're living in the midst of some of the loveliest scenery in Taiwan when they learn that all manner of mass killings are being committed and attributed to Golden Swallow, who hasn't been doing much of anything except healing and taking in the local views. Everywhere the bodies pile up, a Golden Swallow dart has been left behind.

(Digression. In Old China, there must have been a Custom Dart Shoppe, since so many of these characters have their own distinctive darts. Golden Swallow's darts are quite nice; I'd like to dull the tip of one and use it as a hair stick. "Tired of no one knowing you zorched the bad guys? We'll make a unique custom dart for you, unmistakably yours only. Available by the dozen, gross, or thousand-pack. Express service available.")

Golden Swallow's old buddy and shifu-sharer Little Roc (Wang Yu) has grown up. Now going by the name Silver Roc, he's going about the countryside mowing down evildoers and miscreants wherever he finds them, leaving bodies behind all over the map. His motivations are twofold: he likes zorching bad guys and he is trying to draw out Golden Swallow.

What is unsettling about Silver Roc is that he does all of this without a twitch, the way most of us would smash a mosquito; he's so cold and unfeeling about it that one wonders if he would not benefit from some serious antipsychotic meds in a later age. For most women, I suspect killing people in their name is not something we would find the least bit romantic; and while some women may well find poetry written about them romantic, finding it scrawled on the wall of the brothel where the guy lives probably won't yield the desired effect upon us, either. So, while Silver Roc is a rather disturbing character, Golden Swallow has issues herself.

Left in the wake of these two are Noble Swordsman Han Tao and Heart of Gold Prostiture Meng-Niang, who both display uncommon patience with their confused amours.

Telling any more would be telling too much; this is a good movie, but I wanted to smack Golden Swallow ("Girl, you're crazy!") several times. Production values of this early Shaws opus are sky high.

(I was puzzled why Silver Roc rode bareback. I've done that, and it isn't easy. Horses are not made for humans to fit, and in their warm weather coats with a little sweat they are slippery. Stirrups are one of the most significant inventions of humanity--truly--for without them the major horse-riding nomad invasions of history would not have happened. You need to be fairly secure if you're going to use a sword, bow, axe, or lance from the back of a horse.)

Set in an alternative present or near future, Trinity's world looks like ours but it isn't. Trinity deals with the aftermath of genetic experiments directed by a Dr Clerval, an aftermath resulting in the deaths of people followed by the disappearance of Clerval.

"Clerval" is the name of a friend of Dr Victor Frankenstein in the original novel.

Agents Brach and Schiller are sent to investigate a distress signal sent from the arctic research station formerly operated by Clerval. They find one person there, a man who looks like Clerval but who claims to be his clone, not Clerval but "of him", possessing some of his memories, but not all. But is cloneClerval telling the truth?

Nearly the whole of the movie deals with the interaction of these characters. Bach and Schiller both have personal agendas beyond assigned duty. It is difficult to know who and what to believe. All three characters carry emotional burdens involving the others, bringing them into constant and sometimes violent conflict with one another. The isolation of the research station creates a claustrophobic atmosphere that none of them can readily escape.

Elsewhere, Trinity is listed as having a run time of 120 minutes instead of the nearly 80 minutes as released in Holland in autumn 2004. Trinity is known to have several different versions. It would be interesting to know just what was omitted in the present release, and how the other versions differed. It would also be interesting to know why the movie was completed in 2001 but not released until 3 years later, and then only in Belgium and Holland.

9 double helices out of 10

Additional note: Tom McCamus'role as cloneClerval led to his being cast as Mason Eckhart, another white-haired character of moral ambiguity in the series Mutant X