The Water Margin, Journey To The West and Romance Of The Three Kingdoms are China's most famous literary classics. After director Chang Cheh's film adaptations of the first two classics wowed audiences, Chang completed the circle with The Weird Man, a bizarre variation of Romance Of The Three Kingdoms. Besides Cheng Tien-chi, who starred in Jackie Chan's Fearless Hyena, Chang uses a cast of unknowns and gives the story a ghostly-horror edge. Chang is known for his lone swordsman and hero movies and strangely The Weird Man still reflects this. Cheng plays a righteous, beheaded priest with supernatural powers that returns from the dead to wreak havoc against one of the corrupt kingdoms, making Cheng a heroic "swords-ghost." It's insane sanity to the hilt, a must see film.
Julie Yeh Feng plays a devoted wife and a mother dying of an incurable illness. Her goal now is to find a new mother for her child and a new wife for her husband before she dies. Because of all her personal tragedies and on-going hard life off-screen, audiences connect with Julie on a personal level, hence making her one of the most beloved actresses of her time.
Rampaging bandits are raping and pillaging the peaceful Chinese villages until grieving dart master Liu Wen Lung sets out with his student, his son and servant to avenge his murdered wife and set things right. Renowned director Ho Meng-hua - soon to be internationally famous for The Flying Guillotine -- masterfully balances action with intrigue and romance, as the path of righteousness is littered with lies … and corpses.
Cora Miao plays Liang Pao-erh, a woman whose life is shattered when she discovers her husband (Hollywood star Chow Yun-fat) is keeping a mistress (Cherie Chung Cho-hung). When her repentant husband begs forgiveness, Liang is forced to decide on what she truly wants.
Yueh Hua, co-star of Clan Of Amazons and Clans Of Intrigue, tears up the screen as a corrupt magistrate, so obsessed with finding a hidden treasure that he not only jails and tortures his daughter's lover, but buries his daughter alive as well! Ironically, it is in her coffin that the secret to the hidden treasure is revealed, setting off a frenzy of destruction. Kung-fu choreographers Chen Ti-ke and Hsu Hsia have their hands full with this tale of martial arts masochism.
Cheng Pei-pei plays Hsiao-yun, a young singer forced to choose between love and her ultimate career. After filling in for another singer at the eleventh hour, Hsiao-yun becomes an overnight sensation. However, with success comes a heavy price and her relationship with a pianist Li Yen-nan (Peter Chen Ho) suffers. As if that is not enough, she must also deal with the unwanted affections from an influential backer Tu Pang-chieh (Chiang Kwong-chao) of her show...
In 1970, swordsmen and kung-fu aces swept through the Hong Kong film industry as never before, becoming the dominant trend and conquering the box office. No screen team was more triumphant than the "iron triangle" of director Chang Cheh and his protégés David Chiang and Ti Lung. The Heroic Ones is their quintessential historical epic, set during the waning years of the Tang Dynasty and centering on a royal family with thirteen sons. It is literally brother against brother as various factions scramble for control, with David Chiang and Ti Lung displaying their martial arts prowess as they battle insiders and outsiders. The Heroic Ones was a gigantic success in Hong Kong, far ahead of such Hollywood blockbusters as Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid and Patton in that year's box office sweepstakes.
David Chiang, Ti Lung, Chin Han, Lily Li, Nan Kung-hsun
A love triangle of the first order by one of Shaw's top directors Chin Chien. A psychiatrist falls for one of his patients at the same time another girl proclaims her love for him. An explosive mix of passion and misunderstanding...
Set against the dramatic backdrop of the Ching Dynasty, this grand Shaw Bros action thriller follows two young Shaolin rebels, engaged in a deadly mission to bring down the empire.
Lo Meng, Wang Li, Sun Chien, Chiang Sheng, Wen Hsueh-erh
In Sex, Love And Hate, director of erotica and kung-fu films Chu Yuan combines stars from both genres to create a masterpiece about Hong Kong society's differing views on love and what women want from it. The provocative Chu Tai (Ching Li), exotic Pai Mei (Lily Ho) and the princess of kung-fu films Yao Yao (Hsu Feng) compare notes on what makes them happy in love, and then subsequently proceed to find it. This film will encourage the sniffles from the audience!
The police is investigating a serious drug smuggling case and heading this important operation is Sergeant Wang (Wang Chung).When the gangster head known as Brother Sen (Yuan Kang) is arrested, he cannot be detained by the police without evidence. The informer responsible for his arrest is killed but the murderer is spotted by the night watchman and his description given to the police. Sergeant Wang's brother Hsiu agrees to penetrate the smuggling ring, and turns informer...
Wang Chung, Danny Lee, Chin Hsing-hsien, Lin Sun-cheng
Talented director Chen Gang wrote and co-directed this tale of a Chinese Zorro who wages a one-man war against the venal and tyrannical county authorities. Chi yau-tung (actor/director Ling Yun) is the "bandit with a thousand faces". After holding up a caravan taking money to the capital and escaping with a slash on his face, police officer Ma Tak (Tien Feng) is on Chi's tail. So Chi calls on his twin brother, Yau-lan (also Lin!) to help. Soon he needs rescuing too!
On a continent which reveres its martial arts, the director's nickname is "Kung-fu Liang" - holder of a filmography unprecedented in its innovation of theme, ingeniousness of plot, and imagination of its astonishingly designed kung-fu. This production is clearly the culmination of his initial Shaw Brothers work - the film which he used as a showcase for his and his brothers' - Chia-yung and Gordon Lui - skills. In the premiere, groundbreaking book on the genre, Martial Arts Movies, author Ric Meyers called it "the quintessential martial arts movie" and perhaps the greatest kung-fu movie ever made. Showing prescience customary with this visionary, the plot revolved around early 20th century pugilists vainly attempting to find a kung-fu which could defeat the bullet... years before the same theme would be used in Once Upon A Time In China. It also features the rarely dramatized magician-spies of China, who would ultimately inspire the Japanese ninja. But most importantly, it is a beautifully made action comedy featuring international fan favorite Alexander Fu Sheng and supremely brilliant kung-fu.
Liu Chia-liang , Liu Chia-yung , Hui Ying-hung , Gordon Liu
Even at an early time during Hong Kong's erotica cinema development, highly renowned directors were willing to sacrifice their reputations and established actresses were lining up to take off their clothes. In Facets Of Love, the undisputed king of epic dramas, director Li Han-hsiang, gets some of Shaw's sexiest ladies to strip for camera. It's three sexy vignettes centering around a Ming Dynasty brothel that steams with secret erotic myths, trysts and twists of pleasurable indulgence.
