Shaw Brothers’ superstar David Chiang displays a unique take on the narcotics racket in his directorial debut, The Drug Addicts. Addicted kung-fu instructor Ti Lung not only kicks the habit but smashes a drug smuggling ring. His fantastic performance befits as that of a martial-arts superstar.
Incredibly, the title serpent is not a harbinger of horror, but actually the film's hero. This virtuous viper sniffs out bombs, fights gangs, battles a baby-killing rodent and even takes on a duplicitous woman. This one-of-a-kind thriller will be applauded by reptile fans everywhere.
Linda Lin Dai gives a soul-stirring performance as a real-life beauty that is tricked into sacrificing herself for the good of the Chinese people. Truth is revealed too late, and she kills herself. Life imitates art and years later, Linda committed suicide.
Lin Dai , Chao Lei , Hung Por ,Wang Yueh-ting , Chang Tsui-yin , Li Yin
When super director Chang Cheh found new talent and blood with "The Five Venoms" actors, most of which were trained in the highly acrobatic Chinese opera and well versed with exotic martial arts weapons, this created a new spark for his use of bizarre weapons in his films. The Flag Of Iron is one of 20 movies that he directed featuring the utterly flabbergasting and physically exhausting action bits created by these five dudes. You have the good guys from the righteous clan versus the bad guys from the villainous clan and it's so filled with "don't-blink-or-you-will-miss-something" gags, you will need to watch it over and over again so you can see the things you missed.
Kuo Chui , Chang Sheng , Wang Li , Lu Feng , Lung Tien-chiang
The beautiful phantom Hsiao Chien has haunted readers since her appearance in the classic haunted story collection, Strange Stories From A Chinese Studio. Many film makers have tried to adapt the tales, but none have captured the eerie, horrific beauty as well as this expressive, vivid, ethereal and haunting production. It is given extra significance by its star, the enchanting Betty Loh Ti who committed suicide later.
Ching Li stars as a World War II Chinese spy planted into the Japanese Headquarters at Changsha. This film emulates Bruce Lee's nationalistic fervor as tears flow in the name of pride.
The retelling of China's most popular romance story became the fourth highest box-office in 1969. Superstar Ivy Ling Po plays a Don Juan scholar who tries to seduce a sprite-like servant, played by "Baby Movie Queen" Li Ching, known as the youngest star ever to be crowned Best Actress.
THE KUNG-FU INSTRUCTOR is martial arts film director Sun Chung's loose homage to Akira Kurosawa's Yojimbo where unlike Toshiro Mifune's Sanjuro character being a snarling, bastard, drunk swordsman looking for a drink, popular actor Ti Lung's Huang Yang role, is an upright, righteous, weapon instructor looking to keep his limbs. Huang is a famous martial artist trapped into teaching kung-fu to the wrong clan while the opposing "good" clan tries to save him so he can instruct their members. Besides kung-fu comedienne Wang Yu starring in one of his few serious roles, Sun became the first Shaw Brothers' director to use a Steadicam which gives the film's action and editing style a unique brand of tension and rhythm. The pole fights are also out of this world.
Part horror, part kung-fu, 100% outrageous, HUMAN LANTERS has a special place in the Cult Film Hall of Fame. Some of the biggest stars in Hong Kong martial arts movies enter the twilight zone in this over-the-top bloodfest, with Lo Lieh an insane swordsman who comes up with a unique way to avenge past humiliations. He opens a lantern workshop with the lampshades made from the beautiful hides of his enemies’ sisters, courtesans, and wives. Liu Yung steps down from the Emperor roles that made him famous to play a deliciously evil bad guy, and Chen Kuan-tai matches him in pride and power-lust. Lust of another kind is supplied by Tanny Tien Ni and Linda Chu, two ladies whose beautiful skin proves to be a most unwelcome asset. A rare entry in the horror-kung-fu genre, and one of Hong Kong’s most distinctive action films.
Tu Ku (Alex Man Chi-leung), having mastered the fatal skill, leads his eight section chiefs to Wu Tang to challenge Yun Fei-yang (Hsu Shao-chiang). But Yun has already gone into seclusion with his lover Lun Wan-erh (Liu Hsueh-hua). At this moment Tu receives a challenge from Chief Mochitsuki Soryu Han (Chen Kuan-tai) of the Japanese Ega clan.
Tsui Siu-keung, Liu Hsueh-hua, Chen Kuan-tai, Alex Man
Shih Hsin-chiao (Ling Yun) is a journalist who trained under mentor Lu Tao-jan (Chin Han). Lu's daughter, Chih-pai (Tien Niu) is infatuated with the good-looking and intelligent Shih, but Shih sees her only as a child. When he returns from a long stay abroad, he finds that things have changed. Chih-pai is now an attractive young woman in a relationship with rich boy (Wang Yu). A miscarriage and Lu's death throw Shih and Chih-pai together...
Liang Jia-jen delivers an awesome display of screen presence and martial art prowess in Secret Service Of The Imperial Court where he plays secret service agent Chao Pu-fun, who must rise up above the odds to protect the innocent against a power-crazy Eunuch (Liu Yung).
Fresh from his smashing directorial debut comedy Let's Make Laugh, Alfred Cheung Kin-ting returns to the screen with this seriocomic look at the clash of cultures which result when a Mainland Chinese peasant brings his family to Hong Kong. Family Light Affair, whose Chinese title literally translates as "City Lights", is the director/writer's warm-hearted memoir of street life back in the early 1980s, featuring an eclectic cast of pop music and kung fu stars who shine in their poignant roles.
Esteemed director Ho Meng-hua attained cult status among kung-fu film fans in the West with his wild and wacky martial arts hit THE FLYING GUILLOTINE. His unique directing approach focused more on the devastating nature of the horrific weapon than the kung-fu fights. One of Shaw Brothers' biggest kung-fu stars at the time, Chen Kuan-tai plays the leader of the ‘Flying Guillotine Squad’ a group of hand picked killers, commissioned by the Ching Emperor Yung Cheng, that use a deadly, beheading weapon to carry out the emperor's assassination assignments. It's actually based on a true story. Interestingly, the weapon used in the film was a complete fabrication because in real life, no one ever survived to tell what the actual weapon really looked like.
