Old-Asian fighting movies

I watched "Hero", a Chinese Wuxia movie, on TV today. Last week the same channel presented "Zatoichi", a Japanese sword-fighting movie. I guess the channel will continue broadcasting films in this style. They're very interesting since they depict the Asian culture of former centuries. Much of the way people in these films think seems strange to me. But this has made me come to the conclusion that human existence is simply not exactly only what we've been told from our parents and the older people in our community. Human beings are wild animals, and only law and tradition made them peaceful. These films from Medieval China and Old Japan show what people are like if the ethical and judical systems are still less developed. The two assassins' decisions not to kill the Emporer in "Hero" when they had the opportunity to showed the power of intuition - "Calligraphy has taught me", one of them said. The king's dismayed approval of the people's wishing to kill the second assassin is equally uncommon for the modern Westerner.

I've learned that martial arts have simply evolved from experience at how to tackle opponents' attacks. It's interesting that in the old Asian communities a lot of men seemed to master them. Fights and duels might have occurred rather often.

The extreme violence in Zatoichi has reminded me of the video game "Mortal Kombat". Obviously a lot of computer effects have been added, since blood is sparkling in a way one hardly sees in other movies. "Hero" features a lot of unrealistic movements - the battlers often seem to fly. This makes it appear like poetry in some way.

Anyhow, the unusual brutality of these films has been shocking.