The Snake Prince (1976) Review

The Snake Prince | Blu-ray (Imprint)

Director: Lo Chen
Cast: Lin Chen Chi, Ti Lung, Helen Ko Ti-Hua, Fan Lei, Wong Yu, Ng Hong-Sang, Wong Ching-Ho, Ching Miao, Leung Seung-Wan, Lin Wei-Tu
Running Time: 93 min. 

By Paul Bramhall

When it comes to 1970’s Shaw Brothers oddities there are a few titles that will likely spring to mind. Whether it be the studios riff on King Kong with The Mighty Peking Man, venturing into mutant territory with The Oily Maniac, or taking a crack at the tokusatsu genre with The Super Infra Man, all come with their own distinctive charms of the era. One production which seems to have flew under the radar though for fans of the bizarre is 1976’s The Snake Prince, an unlikely genre mishmash of Chinese folklore, musical, kaiju action, horror, and even a little eroticism and kung-fu thrown in just for good measure. If you were looking for the Shaw Brothers movie that has everything, then The Snake Prince could well be the one that ticks all the boxes.

Helmed by Lo Chen, as a director he was one of the Shaw Brothers most prolific filmmakers in the 1960’s working outside of the studio’s martial arts flick factory. Adept at making a wide range of genres, Chen’s output spanned everything from comedies (The Tryst), musicals (The Shepherd Girl), dramas (Torrent of Desire), and Chinese Opera (Comedy of Mismatches). By the time the 1970’s rolled around Chen increasingly worked for other studios as well as the Shaw Brothers and, like so many directors, inevitably found himself directing a handful of martial arts flicks thanks to the genres rising popularity. Whether they be wuxia’s like 1971’s The Mad Killer (notable for being the choreography debut of Yuen Woo-Ping) or gritty slices of kung-fu like 1974’s The Concrete Jungle, it seemed Chen was never comfortable as a kung-fu movie director, so in many ways The Snake Prince represents him making a return to what he does best.

Opening with a solemn Lin Chen-Chi (The Spiritual Boxer, The Battle Wizard) leading the members of her drought-stricken village in song to ask the Gods for rain, the first impression may be one of a serious drama retelling a Chinese legend. However that’s before the funky electric guitars kicks in, and we basically spend the first 15 minutes getting down in the Chinese folklore equivalent of a tiki bar, complete with scorpion bowls and straws. Of course any village that features Lin Chen-Chi sauntering around in song is likely to draw attention, and sure enough three snake spirits from the nearby Snake Mountain slither down to check things out, handily able to take on human form through thousands of years of practice. The Snake Prince of the title is played by Ti Lung (The Blood Brothers, Four Riders), flanked by his loyal followers Wong Yu (Executioners from Shaolin, Dirty Ho) and Ng Hong-Sang (The Daredevils, The Proud Youth).

Unable to resist the sound of 70’s funk (who could?), the trio decide to get in on the action, and after a couple of synchronised song and dance numbers, Lung finds himself helplessly enamoured with Chen-Chi. This particular version of the folk tale, of which there are a few, takes its inspiration from The Snake and Three Sisters, which sees Chen-Chi’s father venture into the forbidden Snake Mountain to ask the snake spirits if they could put an end to the drought. Lung agrees to use his “snake magic” to give them access to their water source, but on the condition the father grants permission for him to marry Chen-Chi, after which you can bet we’ll get to see a very different kind of “snake magic”. While Chen-Chi herself is happy to marry Lung (even after learning he’s a snake), everyone else, from the villagers to her 2 older sisters, are resistant to the idea, and gradually the human world begins to threaten their happiness together.

The best way to describe watching The Snake Prince is to say that it’s a bit of head trip. The role is a complete departure for Ti Lung, who’d star in much more familiar fare like Chang Cheh’s Shaolin Temple and Chor Yuen’s The Magic Blade during the same year, and who’s closest experience to appearing in a musical was a blink and you’ll miss it musician cameo in 1970’s The Singing Killer. His actual participation in the song and dance numbers (which, to be honest, mostly disappear after the initial 30 minutes) is limited, meaning his dance moves are few enough to not be held up to too much scrutiny. Appearing far more frequently is his scaly reptilian makeup, which definitely doesn’t hold up to much scrutiny, although there’s a certain charm to be had in the old school nature of the effects.

While the stuck-on snakeskin may be blatantly obvious, the three gigantic snakes fare much better, seemingly created from a lot of rubber and some rudimentary animatronics. They also take centre stage for what essentially becomes an all-out human versus kaiju finale that becomes surprisingly bloody. A number of extras meet a grizzly demise, whose facial expressions so far have sometimes struggled to hide their confusion at why they’ve been asked to sing and sway in the background, versus the usual routine of waving around a weapon in a non-descript fashion. From being set on fire, falling off a cliff, repeatedly rammed into a rockface, to being eaten alive, all the while blood is liberally splattered everywhere and eyeballs are impaled with arrows. The last 10 minutes of The Snake Prince almost feel like director Chen was visited by Chang Cheh for a quick masterclass on orchestrating bloody onscreen mayhem.

Which brings us to the question of exactly who the audience is (or was) for The Snake Prince. For the first two third’s proceedings are for the most part family friendly, there’s even some comedic kung-fu thrown in, however in the last third things start to get rather raunchy and violent. On their wedding night Lung confesses to Chen-Chi that he can only have sex in snake form, leading to one of the most bizarre snake human sex scenes ever committed to film (although I’m not sure how much competition the scene actually has). Intimacy coordinators would certainly have earned their pay cheque with that one. However it’s the introduction of Chen-Chi’s 2 sisters that really begins to derail Lung and Chen-Chi’s marital bliss as, upon seeing the riches of Snake Mountain, both attempt to seduce Lung without a thought for their younger sister.

As the middle sister Ko Ti-Hua (The Sugar Daddies, Virgins of the Seven Seas) is a particular highlight. I confess I haven’t seen many musicals so am far from an expert on the genre, but from those I have seen, The Snake Prince is the first that offers up a musical number completely in the nude. Knowing that Lung is in the vicinity of the bathing area, Ti-Hua de-robes to take a bath, busting out a sultry musical number to grab Lung’s attention while in her birthday suit. She also proves to be the most ambitious in her desire to replace Chen-Chi, leading to her interruption of Chen-Chi’s giving birth resulting in a particularly traumatic birth scene, one of those that falls into that distinctive category of “only in Hong Kong cinema.”

It is worth pointing out that, as with almost any Hong Kong production from this era that involves snakes, for those averse to animal cruelty there are certain moments when you’ll want to look away. While there’s nothing on the level of Calamity of Snakes (but then again, what is?) which would come 7 years later, or even Shaw Brothers own The Killer Snakes from a couple of years prior, there’s still a few instances of snake trampling on display and threats involving fire.

Subjectively answering the question of if The Snake Prince is a good movie is a tricky one. Throwing seemingly every genre that you can think of at the screen, and wrapping it up in occasional outbursts of song and dance, feels like it shouldn’t work, but perhaps thanks to the fact it’s been aged by almost 50 years and they just don’t make them like this anymore, more often than not it does. For a dose of snake-skin mid-riff bearing waist coats, and Ti Lung passionately singing about embroidered handkerchiefs and face cream, The Snake Prince is the movie you’ve been looking for.

Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 7/10