Cheng Pei Pei, best known to western audiences as Jade Fox from "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon," is absolutely beautiful in this movie and puts in a great performance as the film's main protagonist, Golden Swallow. Drunken Cat is another entertaining character, though the actor who portrayed him didn't seem very drunk at all. The film's music is also memorable, and is likely to get stuck in the head of the viewer for the rest of the day after watching it.

Though the film is very important, it doesn't quite hold up after forty years, which is what kept it from recieving a perfect score. It is still entertaining, but some viewers of newer martial arts and wuxia may feel disappointed with the slow action of this classic.

When western audiences saw Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon in 2000 they were truly dazzled by it's effects and stunning imagery. To Eastern audiences, however, it must have seemed somewhat old-fashioned. Brought up from childhood with ancient tales like the Outlaws of the Marsh (The Water Margins) and Journey to the West (Monkey), surrounded by Wuxia (swordplay) and martial arts in novels, films and TV programs, they'd seen it all before. More specifically, they had seen it all in a trio of films made over thirty years earlier by a gound breaking director called King Hu. His 'Inn trilogy' would take these magical worlds and make them a reality for the first time. Yet it took Ang Lee's homage to bring his name to public attention, sadly some three years after his death.

Before Come Drink With Me Hong Kong swordplay movies were quite a different breed, far closer to the stylised theatrical acting and fighting seen in Chinese Opera productions. A breath of fresh air, it dealt these films with a maturity and a scope of vision never seen before.

In Come Drink With Me Cheng Pei-pei plays the legendary Golden Swallow, come to free the Governors son, her brother, from the clutches of a villainous gang of bandits aiming to swap him for their captured leader. In one of the greatest set pieces in Hong Kong cinema, Golden Swallow enters an inn frequented by the bandits who are not only unaware of who she is but also that she is in fact a woman. (One element of the story we must take with a pinch of salt, as it's difficult to see the beautiful young Cheng Pei-pei, then only about 18, could be thought of as anything else.) Gradually, as the outlaws goad her, she shows just how powerful she is. Catching coins flung at her on a chopstick. Easily deflecting a wooden bench and a heavy wine jug hurled at her with just one hand. When two members throw coins above her she impales them to the ceiling using three chopsticks, then casually opens her fan to catch them as they fall. When a bandit asks for his money back, she chucks them on the wall, forming the shape of a swallow and revealing her identity. Amazed, they still inadvisedly decide to take her on, disturbed only by the sudden appearance of a beggar known as Drunken Cat (Yueh Hua), and promptly lose.

Drunken Cat seems to be a bumbling fool, but he soon reveals there's more to him. Saving Swallow form an assassination effort that evening, he proves himself just as adept at jumping up to high gantries and over rooftops. He also hints the bandits location in song under the guise of entertaining the inn's customers. Something of a guardian angel, he helps her unseen during her confrontation at the bandits hideout. Vastly outnumbered, she still gets the better of their No. 2 Jade Faced Tiger, but falls victim to one of his poison darts (fired from his fan) on her escape.

Drunken Cat saves her from being found by the outlaws, hiding her in his home. There is no cure for the poison, however, meaning he must suck it out (in a very sexually charged scene - particularly for Hong Kong in the mid 60s). As Swallow is recovering she realises that Drunken Cat is a great master, the most powerful martial artist she has ever known. His mortal enemy is a rouge Abbott who has allied himself with the outlaws. Both shared the same master, but it was Drunken Cat who took their teachers powerful bamboo spear. Drunken Cat organises the exchange, and the stage is set for the final showdown not only between Swallow and the bandits, but himself and the Abbott.

Come Drink With Me was King Hu's first wuxia/swordplay movie, and to it he brought a truly fresh approach and vision, made possible by his incredible skill as a filmmaker. Influenced by the work of Akira Kurosawa, Hu brings a bloody, violent reality to fight scenes that had previously been far more stylised affairs based on those in Chinese Operas. Full of scope and complexity that hadn't been seen before in Hong Kong films. The acting is more restrained showing that, like Kurosawa, Hu also had a more 'European' sensitivity. In fact, Hu deliberately picked young actors, new to filmmaking, so he could mould exactly the performances he wanted from them.

Considering the resources available at the time, Hu's technical ability surpasses that of nearly any other director. His use of camera tricks brings magical, superhuman powers to life in such a way that you believe the impossible. Frequently using techniques such as reversing and speeding up film and most importantly very clever editing - he had a great awareness of just how much, and more often how little, was needed to convince the viewer of what has happened. He also innovated the use of trampolines, using real martial artists to jump high into the air. The effect is more realistic than the more stylised wirework which dominated the eighties.

His technical ability also shows itself in how well made the film is generally. The use of pulleys manoeuvring the camera around a scene are as sophisticated as anything happening in the west. Hu uses the entire screen, not just the centre. With compositions that fill the screen, Hu often plays with the audience rather than patronises them, a character might be seen fleetingly in a corner. The result shows how beautifully a story can be told.

One of her first movies, Cheng Pei-pei (Thundering Sword, Golden Swallow, Wing Chun) makes such a convincing female swordsman it's easy to see why this film catapulted her into a long run of similar roles. Yuan Ha (Killer Clans, The House of 72 Tenants) also delights by not overplaying what initially appears to be a comic role, which would have undermined his later revelation. In fact, initially his performance is not unlike that of Masaaki Sakai in the famous Monkey series form Japan. (Yueh had played that role two years earlier in the film that influenced the series, Monkey Goes West.) The cast itself reads like a who's who of Hong Kong movies. Ching Siu-tung, who would later make some of the most innovative wuxia movies since Hu including A Chinese Ghost Story, Swordsman II and Duel To The Death appears as the child spying on the outlaws in their temple hideout. The assistant action director Han Yingjie was a young Sammo Hung, and one of Hung's best friends Jackie Chan also appears as one of the children. Yuen Siu-tui, who would later play a Drunken Master of his own opposite Chan, plays one of the bandits. Sui-tui's son, Yuen Woo-ping, would become the action director on Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon and if the connection needed to be made any clearer, Cheng Pei-pei played that films villainous Jade Fox.

It's impossible imagine what kind of impact it must have had when first shown in Hong Kong, but with the terrific restoration job that has been done on it, Come Drink With Me looks as fresh as ever. Not only does it not reflect its 36 years, if anything it looks more modern than Crouching Tiger. A must for anyone who loved that film, not just fans of the genre.

(This review is part of a special feature about King Hu's 'Inn trilogy' to appear on HKFlix affiliate site http://www.easternkicks.com)