Director Yuen Woo-ping gives instructions on location in the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region. [Photo provided to China Daily]

One night in 2024, director Yuen Woo-ping sat in a tent in the Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region, closely supervising a perilous scene for Blades of the Guardians.

As of last Sunday, the film has grossed $200 million domestically and overseas, with international markets including North America, Australia, New Zealand, and Southeast Asia, making it the world's second highest-grossing Chinese-language martial arts film of all time, according to industry tracker Maoyan Pro. On Saturday, the film, which was released during Spring Festival, announced that it would extend its theatrical release by one additional month, until April 16.

The sequence required two skilled swordsmen, played by Wu Jing and Yu Shi, to fight while surrounded by fire created by oil seeping through the sand. The flames were real. The original plan had called for digital effects, but the change meant the actors had to be carefully protected to avoid injury.

At 80 years old, Yuen — one of the most renowned martial arts filmmakers, known for blockbusters such as the Oscar-winning Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and The Matrix films — personally demonstrated the stunts to the actors.

Leaning into his walkie-talkie, he murmured: "I just love the real things."

The line was simple and unadorned. For many diehard martial arts fans, it was enough to bring tears to their eyes.

Teasingly dubbed by netizens as "handmade martial arts", the approach — performing real action with actual punches, kicks, and horse riding across howling sands — reflects a respect for, and preservation of, one of the most appealing hallmarks of Hong Kong cinema during its golden era: stars trained in martial arts from a young age, often risking their lives to perform gravity-defying stunts.

"Through all these details, the film captures the nuances of facial expressions and action movements that could never be replaced by artificial intelligence," says Hu Zhifeng, dean of the School of Arts and Communication at Beijing Normal University.

From kung fu giant Jackie Chan's Drunken Master to iconic auteur Wong Kar-wai's The Grandmaster and two Ip Man films starring Donnie Yen, Yuen's decades-long career has itself become part of wuxia (martial arts hero) history. This genre — distinctive to Chinese-language cinema and rooted in Eastern aesthetics — was among the earliest to bring Chinese films to the attention of Western audiences.

Actor Wu Jing (left) stars as Dao Ma, a royal warrior-turned-fugitive, and Nicholas Tse plays Di Ting, his former comrade. [Photo provided to China Daily]

Adapted from artist Xu Xianzhe's comic series of the same title, the film fictionalizes a tale set during the turbulent final years of the Sui Dynasty (581-618). Actor Wu Jing stars as Dao Ma, a former member of the royal army, who flees into the vast desert of China's sparsely populated western regions after rescuing the infant son of his younger sister — a concubine of the deposed crown prince. Though a fugitive himself, Dao makes a living by tracking down wanted criminals and collecting bounties.

When he accepts a special mission from an old friend — to escort the empire's most wanted man, a spiritual leader seeking to overthrow the tyranny of the Sui Dynasty — Dao embarks on a perilous journey across the desert toward the capital. Facing deadly threats from a pursuing army and two vengeful former colleagues, he is joined by Ayuya, a headstrong woman determined to avenge her father's death — Dao's old friend and the leader of a utopian-style clan — as well as a young bounty hunter with a mysterious background. Together, they battle their enemies.

During a recent seminar held in Beijing, Yuen recalled spending a week immersed in the comic series after discovering the work four years ago.

"I was immediately captivated by its vivid, multidimensional characters — Dao, who seems driven by profit yet harbors a burning sense of justice and responsibility deep within, and the others, each real and fully fleshed out, flawed yet resilient and unwavering. They reminded me very much of modern young people — those striving to live with integrity and stay true to themselves," he says.

"We wanted to take that chivalrous spirit and present it to today's audience, so more people could experience something uniquely Chinese — the essence of our martial arts culture," he adds.

Yuen also explains why the big-budget film was shot in Xinjiang. He says he wanted to capture the atmosphere often depicted in ancient literature — windblown sand, the biting cold of snowy nights, and confrontations flickering in firelight. These natural settings, he says, are not merely visual backdrops; they are integral to the story, reflecting the characters' inner worlds.

Yueju Opera star Chen Lijun makes her film debut in the martial arts blockbuster Blades of the Guardians, playing the heroine Ayuya. [Photo provided to China Daily]

Actress Chen Lijun, who plays Ayuya, says her film debut was a profound learning experience. Drawing on two decades of training in traditional opera, the 33-year-old Yueju Opera star completed 32 scenes in just 11 days of intense filming. Among the toughest challenges was shooting in the desert, where surface temperatures reached as high as 55 C.

In one standout scene, her character charges out of a rolling sandstorm on horseback, bends down to bite off one side of an arrow's fletching — altering its trajectory — and takes down a shielded enemy. The moment has helped propel Chen to greater popularity.

"Traditional opera shares a deep connection with Chinese cinema,"Chen says, pointing out that China's first-ever film, Dingjun Mountain (1905), was a recording of the famous Peking Opera of the same name, and that many early action actors in the Hong Kong film industry came from opera troupes.

Still, she found that her stage-trained martial arts movements were too graceful and stylized for the screen. For the film, she was required to fight with greater toughness and realism, delivering raw, punch-by-punch intensity.

"Some netizens have jokingly called it a 'handcrafted' film in the age of special effects and artificial intelligence. Behind it lie the sweat, dreams and passion of countless action performers," says Chen.

One scene features Jet Li as a highly skilled antagonist. [Photo provided to China Daily]

For many insiders and film critics, the movie — featuring a stellar cast that includes action stars like Jet Li and Nicholas Tse — has revived the wuxia genre, which has struggled over the past two decades. It also serves as a tribute to old-school filmmaking techniques in an era when action sequences can be generated by computer in a short time.

Doris Pfardrescher, CEO of Well Go USA Entertainment, an American company in charge of the film's distribution in the United States, told China Daily that the film has clearly connected not only with overseas Chinese audiences but has also crossed over to reach a broader base of foreign fans enthusiastic about martial arts cinema.

She says the success lies in various elements, from having legendary names like action star Jet Li to Yuen, whose reputation carries considerable weight with audiences who appreciate authentic martial arts filmmaking.

"Films like this show there is still a strong international appetite for well-made action movies, especially when they deliver big spectacles and exciting choreography that audiences can't easily get from short-form or streaming content. Even with the rapid changes in the industry — AI, short-form video and evolving viewing habits — we still believe theatrical releases have an important place," she says.