While we're on the subject of King Hu films supposedly shot only in Taiwan, I thought it is worth including some shots of the last 30 minutes or so of A Touch of Zen. The Chinese title 俠女 (Haap Lui in Cantonese) means "chivalrous woman" and refers to the main character, Yang Hui-ching (Hsu Feng), who has escaped the clutches of a corrupt eunuch who has had her family killed. Most of the film was indeed shot in Taiwan, but the last half hour of extended finale - as the righteous fugitives battle the eunuch's military commander (Han Ying-chieh) and his two sons (one of them played by Sammo Hung) - was shot at two locations in Hong Kong.
This first location is when Mr Gu, along with his newly-acquired baby son, falls asleep among some trees next to what looks like a river. The river is in fact Shing Mun Reservoir and the trees are a cluster of paperbark trees which are quite famous at this location and have featured in numerous films over the years. In fact, King Hu returned here the next year to shoot scenes for The Valiant Ones.
This area is located at the northwest side of the reservoir and is fairly easy to get to. It has changed a bit (and the reservoir is never quite this full these days) but the paperbark trees are still there.
The film's star, Hsu Feng, retired from the film world a while back and now runs a large property development company in Hong Kong set up by her late husband (Tomson Group).
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