That was the message I got from this film. Kung-fu is a more "honorable" weapon... Although it is a MARTIAL art meaning that it is used in WAR.
If Shen was on the Kung-Fu Warriors' side then it wouldn't have been a problem. I mean, only an evil person would use gunpowder to invent a cannon, right? It's not like they can be used to defend oneself.
I think that's a stretch. Gun powder and canon were not easy to come by, which is why the bad guys stole so much metal to make their weapons. Kung Fu masters were also hard to come by. The idea of one overcoming metal or machinery with empty hands, wit, training, concentration is simply impressive. I didn't read a moral message in there outside of the obvious one about the bad guys evilness in destroying others who were not a real threat to him and in his greed and desire for power.
shareAlso the psychological shock of realizing that all of your training (plus a large part of your culture and worldview) is negated by a foreign weapon is a hallmark of kung fu movies/history.
Boxer Rebellion, Legendary Weapons of China, and even Seven Samurai are examples.
Even the Europeans went through a similar shock with the English longbow and the battle of Agincourt.
i'm disappointed that the masters were DEFEATED and not killed
also anti-gun? yeah it was, but it pushed the hate to guns when it should of pushed it on to invading foreigners who used the stolen chinese technology to invent ACTUAL guns to colonise and RAPE half the world
where the westerners were cowards, can't fight so they stand far away and pull a trigger like a bunch of pussies, then looting them
this movie was a piece of crap and rips everything off chinese culture with no actual recognition to chinese people in general
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i'm disappointed that the masters were DEFEATED and not killed
It's not anti-gun, it's basically just a retelling of history.
share"only an evil person would use gunpowder to invent a cannon, right? It's not like they can be used to defend oneself"
Really? A cannon could not be used to defend against an advancing invader? And if someone invented a cannon to defend against an invader, that person would be evil? Sounds like perfect liblogic.