Journey to the West (1966 Shaw Brothers Edition)
Directed by He Menghua, this 1966 color Huangmei opera film by Shaw Brothers serves as the opening chapter of their Journey to the West tetralogy.
Journey to the West (The Monkey Goes West) is a color Huangmei opera film produced by Shaw Brothers (Hong Kong) Ltd. and directed by He Menghua. It premiered in Hong Kong on January 18, 1966, with a total runtime of approximately 112 minutes, featuring Mandarin dialogue accompanied by Huangmei opera songs. This film is the first of the Shaw Brothers' Journey to the West tetralogy, followed by Princess Iron Fan (released the same year), The Cave of the Silken Web (1967), and The Kingdom of Women (1968). The plot centers on the early stages of Tang Sanzang's (played by Ho Fan) pilgrimage to the West: after being imprisoned under the Five-Elements Mountain for five hundred years, the stone monkey Sun Wukong (played by Yue Hua) is enlightened by Guanyin and accompanies Xuanzang on his journey. Along the way, they recruit Zhu Bajie (played by Peng Peng) at Gao Family Manor and Sha Wujing (played by Tian Shun) at the Flowing-Sand River, forming their traveling party. Presented as a musical, the film reimagines the opening chapters of Journey to the West, blending the iconic color cinematography of 1960s Shaw Brothers with traditional opera conventions and supernatural special effects. It is one of the few works in Chinese cinema to present Journey to the West in the Huangmei opera style and remains one of He Menghua's representative works in the fantasy genre.