The Knight in the White Night

The Knight in the White Night is a 2018 wuxia starring Xie Miao that unfortunately represents the weaker side of Chinese streaming cinema. Rather than focusing on martial arts or adventure, the film puts most of its energy into broad comedy, an unlikely love story and fight scenes that are often too deliberately silly to generate any real excitement. That wouldn't necessarily be a problem if the action itself were particularly strong, but the choreography rarely rises above mediocrity. The exaggerated comedic approach removes much of the physical impact from the fights, leaving very little for martial-arts fans to get excited about. Its main saving grace is undoubtedly Xie Miao. Even with such limited material, his charisma and acting ability are obvious, demonstrating once again why he stands comfortably above the average leading man of Chinese streaming productions. Without him, this could easily have been a complete disaster. The director would later make a couple of similarly modest productions without ever really establishing himself as a particularly noteworthy filmmaker, and it's easy to understand why from what we see here. As it stands, The Knight in the White Night is a forgettable early streaming wuxia mainly worth watching for Xie Miao completists. Two stars—and it should probably consider itself lucky to get them. My Rating: \*\*

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