80% (3) Police Story 100 min, PG-13, [Action, Comedy, Crime, Thriller] [Jackie Chan, Chi-Hwa Chen] [14 Dec 1985]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 76%, Rotten Tomatoes: 90%, Metacritic: 76%, External Reviews
Awards: 2 wins & 5 nominations.
Actors: Brigitte Lin, Jackie Chan, Kwok-Hung Lam, Maggie Cheung
Writer: Jackie Chan, Edward Tang
External Links: Wikipedia Rotten Tomatoes IMDb Language: Cantonese Country: Hong Kong
Plot: Kevin Chan (aka Jackie) is a Hong-Kong cop, who scores his first big hit by virtually single-handedly capturing and arresting a big drug- lord. Of course, the drug-lord isn't too happy about this, and frames Kevin with the murder of another cop (who happened to be on the take). Kevin has to clear his name, whilst keeping himself from getting killed or arrested, and keeping his girlfriend from leaving him.
Rotten Tomatoes: This was internationally famous Jackie Chan's breakthrough action film, the work that got him past the ethnic boundaries of Hong Kong and into competition at the New York Film Festival in 1986. It also got him into the hospital after performing a stunt in which he fell through a glass canopy -- and stopped breathing. The story itself is not particularly profound. Kevin (Ga-kui) (Chan) is an honest, self-effacing cop who manages to capture drug lord Cho (Cho Leung) almost single-handedly. A reluctant Kevin is then assigned the job of protecting Cho's secretary Selena (Brigitte Lin) who is going to testify against him. Sure enough, the trial date comes, and Selena disappears, while Cho has to be set free for lack of evidence. The next thing he knows, Kevin is framed by Cho for the murder of a fellow (dirty) cop and is running like heck from the bad guys as well as the police. Some incredible stunts in this film include Chan being dragged behind a double-decker bus. One of Jackie Chan's trademarks are hilarious outtakes shown during the end credits, and they are among the best here. This feature is repeated to great advantage at the end of his 1998 hit Rush Hour as well. Police Story picked up "Best Picture" and "Best Action Choreography" at the 1986 Hong Kong Film Festival and was nominated for several other awards that year. Sequel after sequel followed.
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73% (3) Ashes of Time 100 min, R, [Action, Drama] [Kar-Wai Wong] [17 Sep 1994]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 72%, Rotten Tomatoes: 79%, Metacritic: 69%, External Reviews
Awards: 9 wins & 12 nominations.
Actors: Brigitte Lin, Leslie Cheung, Maggie Cheung, Tony Chiu-Wai Leung
Writer: Louis Cha (novel), Kar-Wai Wong (screenplay)
External Links: Wikipedia Rotten Tomatoes IMDb Website Language: Mandarin, Cantonese Country: Hong Kong, Taiwan
Plot: Ou-yang Feng lives in the middle of a desert, where he acts as a middle man to various swordsmen in ancient China. One of those swordsmen is Huang Yao-shi, who has found some magic wine that causes one to forget the past. At another time, Huang met Mu-rong Yin and under the influence of drink, promised to marry Mu-rong's sister Mu-rong Yang. Huang jilts her, and Mu-rong Yin hires Ou-yang to kill Huang. But then Mu-rong Yang hires Ou-yang to protect Huang. This is awkward, because Mu-rong Yang and Mu-rong Yin are in reality the same person. Other unrelated plot lines careen about. Among them is Ou-yang's continuing efforts to destroy a band of horse thieves. Oy-yang recruits another swordsman, a man who is going blind and wants to get home to see his wife before his sight goes completely. The swordsman is killed. Ou-yang then meets another swordsman who doesn't like wearing shoes. Oy-yang sends this man after the horse thieves, with better results. We then find out what a man must give up to follow the martial path.
Rotten Tomatoes: Master Hong Kong filmmaker Wong Kar-wai directed this lyrical, dream-like martial arts epic. A famously troubled shoot, the film took two years and 40 million dollars to produce (a shocking sum for a national cinema populated with low-budget quickies) and features a virtual who's-who of the Hong Kong film world. Conceived as a prequel to the popular martial arts novel The Eagle-Shooting Hero by Jin Yong, the movie is less a straightforward action thriller than a visually striking meditation on memory and love. It nominally centers on Ouyang Feng (Leslie Cheung), who ekes out a lonely existence as an itinerant hired sword. Getting on in years and tormented by memories of a lost love, he also works an agent for other mercenary assassins from his remote desert abode. Ouyang's old friend and fellow swordsman, Huang Yaoshi (Tony Leung Kar-fai, who starred in the The Lover) drowns his lovelorn misery in a magical wine that makes him forget. Later, a mysterious young man named Murong Yang (Brigitte Lin) hires Ouyang to kill his sister's unfaithful suitor, Huang Yaoshi. The following day, that spurned sister, Murong Yin (Lin again), hires Ouyang to protect her dearly beloved. Meanwhile, Hong Qi (pop star Jackie Cheung) finds some redemption for a life of killing by accepting a poor girl's offer to avenge her brother's death -- a task that Ouyang brusquely shunned. In another subplot, a master swordsman (Tony Leung Chiu Wai) is slowly going blind. He agrees to defend a village from horse thieves so that he can afford to go home and see his wife before his eyesight fails completely. This film is one of the most celebrated examples of 1990s Hong Kong cinema: it won multiple awards in its native Hong Kong, along with a Golden Osella for Best Cinematography at the 1994 Venice Film Festival. ~ Jonathan Crow, Rovi
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85% (2) The Bride with White Hair 92 min, [Fantasy, Adventure, Romance, Action] [Ronny Yu] [25 Sep 1993]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 70%, Rotten Tomatoes: 100%, External Reviews
Awards: 7 wins & 6 nominations.
Actors: Brigitte Lin, Elaine Lui, Francis Ng, Leslie Cheung
Writer: Kee-To Lam, Yusheng Liang (novel), David Wu, Ronny Yu
External Links: Wikipedia Rotten Tomatoes IMDb Language: Cantonese Country: Hong Kong
Plot: The sensitive swordsman Cho Yi-Hang is tired of his life. He is the unwilling successor to the Wu-Tang clan throne and the unsure commander of the clan's forces in a war against foreign tribes and an evil cult. One day, he meets the beautiful Lien, a killer for the evil cult who is equally unsatisfied with her situation, but their love angers both the Wu-Tang clan and the evil cult.
Rotten Tomatoes: This Hong Kong epic melodrama is based on an ancient Chinese fable about a doomed love affair between a young man and a strange mountain woman. Adapted from a novel by Hong Kong novelist Leung Yusang, the film is set in the Ming dynasty and chronicles events between feuding clans.
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79% (2) Chungking Express 102 min, PG-13, [Comedy, Crime, Drama, Mystery, Romance] [Kar-Wai Wong] [08 Mar 1996]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 81%, Metacritic: 77%, External Reviews
Awards: 8 wins & 19 nominations.
Actors: Brigitte Lin, Faye Wong, Takeshi Kaneshiro, Tony Chiu-Wai Leung
Writer: Kar-Wai Wong
External Links: Rotten Tomatoes IMDb Language: Cantonese, English, Japanese, Hindi, Mandarin Country: Hong Kong
Plot: Wong Kar-Wai's movie about two love-struck cops is filmed in impressionistic splashes of motion and color. The first half deals with Cop 223, who has broken up with his girlfriend of five years. He purchases a tin of pineapples with an expiration date of May 1 each day for a month. By the end of that time, he feels that he will either be rejoined with his love or that it too will have expired forever. The second half shows Cop 663 dealing with his breakup with his flight attendant girlfriend. He talks to his apartment furnishings until he meets a new girl at a local lunch counter.
Rotten Tomatoes: Wong Kar-Wai's movie about two love-struck cops is filmed in impressionistic splashes of motion and color. The first half deals with Cop 223, who has broken up with his girlfriend of five years. He purchases a tin of pineapples with an expiration date of May 1 each day for a month. By the end of that time, he feels that he will either be rejoined with his love or that it too will have expired forever. The second half shows Cop 663 dealing with his breakup with his flight attendant girlfriend. He talks to his apartment furnishings until he meets a new girl at a local lunch counter.
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76% (2) Zu: Warriors from the Magic Mountain 95 min, Unrated, [Action, Adventure, Fantasy, Horror] [Hark Tsui] [01 Jan 1983]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 67%, Rotten Tomatoes: 86%, External Reviews
Awards: 5 nominations.
Actors: Adam Cheng, Biao Yuen, Brigitte Lin, Damian Lau, Hoi Mang, Sammo Kam-Bo Hung
Writer: Cheuk-Hon Szeto
External Links: Rotten Tomatoes IMDb Language: Cantonese Country: Hong Kong
Plot: Chinese soldiers in an ancient civil war get caught up in a fantastical quest to save the universe.
Rotten Tomatoes: Set in 5th century China, centers on Ti Ming-chi (Yuen Biao) a young innocent from the West Zu army who wandered away from the battlefield and into a magical underworld filled with demons and murderous swordsmen. When his life is saved by the noble warrior Ting Yin (Adam Cheng Siu-chau), Ti joins forces with his band of fighters -- including a Buddhism monk named Abbot Hsiao Yu (Damian Lau Chung-yan), his klutzy underling Yi Chen (Mang Hoi) and a fearsome old wizard named Long Brows (Sammo Hung) -- in their quest to save the world from the terror of the Blood Demon. In spite of Long Brows' powers the Demon attacks and poisons Abbot Hsiao. Ting and company take the injured monk to the enigmatic Countess of Jade Pond (Brigitte Lin Hsia) hoping that her skills can cure him. Though she manages to cure Hsiao, the demon soon possesses Ting. The combined power of Ting and the demon are too great; the Countess can only surround her castle with a solid block of ice and wait while Ti, Yi and one of the countess's guards (Moon Lee Choi-fung) ventures to the top of Blade Peak to find the legendary Twin Swords. ~ Jonathan Crow, Rovi
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74% (1) Peking Opera Blues 104 min, TV-14, [Comedy, Action] [Hark Tsui] [06 Sep 1986]Ratings & Reviews: IMDb Reviews: 74%, External Reviews
Awards: 6 nominations.
Actors: Brigitte Lin, Cherie Chung, Mark Cheng, Sally Yeh
Writer: Raymond To
External Links: Wikipedia Rotten Tomatoes IMDb Language: Cantonese, Mandarin Country: Hong Kong
Plot: The movie is set in chaotic 1920's China, when warlords fought each other for power while Sun Yat-Sen's underground movement tried to establish a democratic republic. The movie tells the story of three young women and two young men who are thrown together. One young woman grabs a box of jewels during the looting when one warlord takes Peking. A deserting soldier joins her, but the jewels end up at the Peking Opera. Here we meet the daughter of the head of the troupe, who dreams of being an actress. But even female roles are played by men in the opera. Soon, the daughter of the currently ruling warlord and a male agent of the democratic underground are involved.
Rotten Tomatoes: This slapstick comedy drama stars three of Hong Kong's most attractive and popular actresses of their time: Brigitte Lin is the daughter of a general, Cherie Chung is a petty thief, and Sally Yip is the daughter of the manager of the Beijing Opera theater. The story is set in 1911 when the Chinese revolution overthrew the monarchy and established a republic. The general's daughter has to steal an important document from her father's safe in order to help out the guerrillas who are fighting for the republic. Her exploits and those of her two friends flow back and forth between the Imperial Palace and the theater of the Beijing Opera. Action, farce, and political satire tumble over each other as the story leads up to its dizzying rooftop climax. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi
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