Latest Reviews
Hsu Tseng-Hung was always attracted to the more literary side of wuxia. Though responsible for helping start Shaw Brothers' "New Wuxia Era" in 1965, the films he made never seemed part of the movement. The plots usually focused on interpersonal dynamics rather than martial action. The fights, when they happened, were stagey and deliberate. The camera work was usually efficient and plain, thanks to Hsu's Japanese training in how to shoot quickly and cheaply.
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Kao Pao-Shu started as a reporter, but switched to acting in college, which allowed her to tour outside of China. This may have made it easier for her to relocate to Hong Kong after the Communists took control.
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A shot-in-Thailand film about a stylish and charismatic Hong Kong guy who travels abroad to show a bunch of Thai criminals who's boss. Maybe this stylish and charismatic Hong Kong guy is, in fact, The Big Boss? No. It's just David Chiang trying his best to look like Bruce Lee.
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Back in the early-to-mid 1960s, when Shaw Brothers and MP&GI were bitter rivals, the studios would use all sorts of skulduggery to find out the movies their opposition were making so that they could rush a version of the same story out a week or two earlier.
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Another example of Shaw Brothers sending a star or two to Taiwan to make a movie with a mostly Taiwanese cast and crew. Though this one does not appear to a be a co-production or the studio distributing a film that another company shot.
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