Lady Detective Shadow was a low budget Dragon Gate Inn adjacent movie. The fights, story, and sets were the equivalent of a mediocre Cdrama. What it did have going for it was a competent female lead, a former royal constable, ousted by an evil, powerful eunuch during the chaotic times of the Ming Dynasty.

Sima Fei Yan and her sidekick Yezi head to Shacheng in search of the bandit Lu Jiang. Lu Jiang and numerous sects and bandits are headed there in search of the mysterious treasure that reveals itself every 49 years in the desert. Everyone converges on a rundown inn where death is a familiar guest. Official Song and his servants wind up in pieces out in the woods giving Fei Yan another case to solve. Helping her is the local official, Wu Ping, a friend of her late father.

This film had an adequate story and acting though the logic during the final quarter of the film fell apart. The fights were shot for people with no kung fu skills with lots of obvious cuts, sped up and slowed down action, and wire work. The bare minimum was put into the sets and CGI. Shang Rong did her best with the Sherlockian, unemotional role of the brilliant detective.

If you have nothing else to watch except for this film, it’s not an awful way to spend 90 minutes if you keep your expectations as low as a buried city in the desert.

15 July 2024