In twelfth century China, the land is controlled by a corrupt government and the roaming armies that they manage to employ, lead by the sinister General Shih Wen Kung (Toshiro Kurosawa). Luckily, for the sake of the people, there is a group of one hundred and eight warriors who oppose the tyrants in power who go by the name of The Mountain Brothers (which makes sense, seeing as they live up in the mountains and all) and who are lead by Sung Chiang (Feng Ku).

Although the rebels have, thus far, done a fine job of prodding at the powers that be, Sung Chiang becomes concerned for his men when he finds out that Shih Wen is working for the enemy. He figures that the only way to stop Shih Wen is to call upon his old comrade, Lu Chun (Japanese cinema legend Tetsuro Tamba), who is off working on his form and practicing his martial arts in a small town. Sung Chiang makes the trek in hopes of convincing his old friend to join the ranks of his warriors but Lu Chun's son, Yen Ching (David Chiang), steps in and makes a mess of his plan. Soon enough Lu Chin's assistant causes problems for employer by making him out to be a traitor. When this happens, Yen Ching has a change of heart and he winds up working alongside Sung Chiang and his men to spring his father, who has been wrongly imprisoned, out of jail and take down General Shih Wen at the same time.

Interesting in that it uses both Chinese and Japanese actors in prominent roles, The Water Margin is the very definition of 'epic.' While more modern films like Hero show us the modern take on the grand scale martial arts film, this 1972 effort does a truly fantastic job of bringing together a very large cast without sacrificing character development or losing the heart of the story. Obviously some characters get more screen time than others but things are actually fleshed out really well here and considering that this film adapts a few select chapters of a book and not the entire book, the film tells a surprisingly cohesive story. If a strong story and an interesting cast weren't enough, then the visuals ought to seal the deal for anyone who is one the fence about this one. The cinematography in The Water Margin is very impressive, with the camera doing justice to the colorful period costumes and massive sets/locations that the film was shot on and around.

While some might be put off by a two-hour long subtitled foreign film based on an old book (there are those who just don't dig this stuff), the fact of the matter is that The Water Margin is paced so well that you won't even notice the longer than average running time. The story is also quite accessible, in that at its core it is a simple tale of good versus evil, it just happens to be told here with plenty of visual flair and fantastic visuals. As far as the action goes, again, the movie delivers and fans of Chang Cheh's heroic bloodshed films won't be disappointed particularly with the ending. While the hand to hand combat scenes isn't as flamboyant here as in other productions, the weapons fighting is top notch and very creative and more so than the hand to hand scenes, these parts really stand out.

Note: This film was released in the United States by Warner Brothers in a re-edited version under the title Seven Blows Of The Dragon with an English dub track overtop of the original Mandarin audio. The version contained on this DVD is the original Mandarin version that clocks in at one hundred and twenty five minutes long, as opposed to the Seven Blows cut that runs approximately eighty-minutes in length. It would have been nice to see both cuts, but one can imagine that there were likely licensing issues at work that would prohibit this from being a realistic option. Regardless, the full-length version is obviously the preferable one and it's great to see it given a domestic release as a special edition DVD. It should also be said that Chang Cheh followed this film with a sequel, All Men Are Brothers, a few years later in 1975.