20. So-Yi Yoon
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So-Yi Yoon is a promising newcomer from South Korea.
She does an excellent job carrying on the great tradition of female Wuxia practitioners in “Legend of the Shadowless Sword”. It’s a fine movie, though maybe not quite as stylish as “Hero” nor as engaging as “Crouching Tiger”.
See it for the underwater brawl or just to see So-Yi Yoon show her stuff. “Shadowless Sword” should be out on DVD soon, but hopefully So-Yi is working on her next gig already.
19. Cate Blanchett
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Can Cate pull off the Triple-Crown?
She’s certainly got the acting chops, as her Best Supporting Actress Oscar can attest. And, while she isn’t usually thought of as a hottie, she’s certainly no slouch in the looks department either.
But sword fighting? C’mon, wispy little Cate? Not a chance, you say. But you know what? She K.O.’d co-star Shia LaBeouf’s groin during the filming of their sword fight in the latest Indiana Jones movie. Ouch!
Okay, Cate, you win, I’ll add another star to the swordplay rating.
18. Pei-Pei Cheng
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Beauty fades. And so do sword fighting skills.
Or do they? Pei-Pei Cheng would say otherwise. She first appeared on the scene in 1966 in the ground-breaking “Come Drink With Me”. I say ground-breaking because it paved the way for modern martial arts movies featuring women. “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” for example. That one also featured — you guessed it — Pei-Pei Cheng.
Nearly forty years later, she still kicks butt. Her original work is phenomenal and a must-see for any fan of the genre.
17. Faye Dunaway
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Faye Dunaway has had a long and illustrious career as an elegant beauty who can act circles around most of the other women on this list.
As a result, she she probably thought that her performance in 1988’s “The Gamble” would be long since forgotten by the time this list was compiled.
But no, I’ve resurrected that one from the junkyard to tell you that it probably should stay there. Matthew Modine is his usual wooden self and it’s not one of Faye’s best showings either.
It does have a single redeeming quality, however, and that is a highly-choreographed cliff-top sword fight between Faye and Matt. I won’t spoil the surprise by telling you who wins.
16. Sienna Miller
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Sienna Miller — not to be confused with fellow sword babe Sienna Guillory — puts on a good show in “Casanova”. She battles Heath Ledger in a spirited duel. Sadly, she wears a mask the whole time.
Luckily, since she’s quite the looker, you get to see her unmasked throughout the rest of the film. She even does a bit more sword fighting near the end, though that’s a little less convincing.
She’ll be in the upcoming “Nottingham”. If she dons a sword in that one, I’ll have to revisit her score.
15. Rosamund Pike
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Rosamund Pike will forever be known as the babe that brought fencing to the James Bond series. Either that or playing second-fiddle to Keira Knightley in “Pride and Prejudice”. I prefer to emphasize the former and try to ignore the latter.
Rosamund does a good job convincing us that she’s an Olympic fencer in “Die Another Day”, even as the action gets a little over-the-top toward the end. No surprise there, really — it is a Bond movie, after all. But since sword fighting plays a central role in the plot and Rosamund’s a hottie, she scores quite well on this list.
14. Kristanna Loken
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What happens when one of the worst directors of all time — Uwe Boll — gets together with a supermodel whose most relevant acting experience consists of playing a nude, mute robot alongside the Governor of California?
You get “Blood Rayne”. It’s just a terrible movie, and Kristanna’s no Meryl Streep. But she charges ahead enthusiastically, does a decent job convincing us that her swordplay is improving as the movie goes on, and looks insanely hot while doing it.
Not sure exactly why she turned down the sequel. I guess she had had enough of Uwe.
13. Milla Jovovich
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Milla Jovovich is gorgeous. She’s been a supermodel, gracing the covers of over 100 magazines as well as earning over $10 million dollars from her modelling in 2004 alone.
She can certainly handle her sword too. She wields it threateningly and convincingly in “Messenger: Story of Joan of Arc”, “Ultraviolet” as well as in all of the “Resident Evil” series.
And her acting? Well… Did I mention that she was gorgeous?
12. Maggie Q
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Maggie Q (aka Maggie Quigley) may be the only American to become successful first on the Hong Kong martial arts scene and then do a reverse transition to become a Hollywood movie star.
You’ve likely seen her skills in “Mission Impossible 3”, “Die Hard 4” and “Balls of Fury”, but you may have missed “Naked Weapon”. In that movie, she’s kidnapped and raised by assassins to be one of them, wins a battle royale between a dozen or so other trained assassins, and then goes on a globe-trotting assassin adventure. It’s a silly movie, but she stands out, so it’s no surprise that Maggie has risen up from that genre to become a mainstream star.
11. Jennifer Garner
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Jennifer Garner first got everyone’s attention in “Alias”. I can’t recall if she ever used a sword in that TV series, but she made up for it in “Daredevil” and “Elektra”.
She’s held her own in some non-action movies as well, which means she’ll likely be moving away from the swordplay as she gets older. That’s a real shame for us blade fans.
