The website
Love Hong Kong Film recently ran a poll in order to come up with the top 100 greatest Hong Kong films of all time. They reportedly recieved over 160 entries (more than hoped). The choices were to submit either 10 or 20 films and they had to be in order of preference. If you submitted 10 titles, then #1 was worth 10 points, #2 was worth 9 points, etc. If you submitted 20 titles, #1 was worth 10 points, #2 was worth 9.5 points, #3 was worth 9 points etc.
Having watched Hong Kong films religiously since I was in my late teens (more than half my life) I was all too happy to contribute mine. It wasn't easy to do, but it WAS fun. The following are the 20 films (plus one) that I submitted as my favorites from among the thousands (no, really) that I've seen over the last two and a half decades:
1) King Boxer (aka 5 Fingers of Death)
Click through the jump for twenty more!
2) A Better Tomorrow 2
3) Legendary Weapons of China
4) Eastern Condors
5) Project A Part 2
6) Project A
7) Dangerous Encounters of the First Kind (aka Don't Play With Fire)
8) Fist of Fury (aka The Chinese Connection)
10) Crippled Avengers (aka Mortal Combat) (aka Return of Five Deadly Venoms)
11) One Armed Boxer (aka The Chinese Professionals)
12) The Super Inframan
13) Dreaming the Reality
14) The Prodigal Son
15) The Deaf Mute Heroine
16) Heroes of the East (aka Challenge of the Ninja)
17) Dragons Forever
18) Five Element Ninja (aka Super Ninjas)
19) Aces Go Places 2 (aka Mad Mission 2)
21) Love on Delivery
I doubt half of these even make it into the Top 100 (I usually go off the beaten path... I can't help it), we'll see in a couple of weeks...
...I don't know what I should watch first.
ReplyDeleteI want to watch all of them!
ReplyDeleteLogging in as Anonymous as I can't as El Professore Movie (dern glitches!)
ReplyDeleteMichael, my list may not be the best starting point if you're new to these films, but assuming you've already seen Bruce Lee's Fist of Fury (and if not, that should be the starting point) and staying strictly with this then I would first go with King Boxer, Crippled Avengers and Heroes of the East. Those three would tell whether or not you like 70s style kung fu films. After that, I WOULD reccomend Project A, BUT the US version was terribly re edited and re scored (thanks, Disney, grrr!) and that's the only version widely available. Eastern Condors is a combo of Rambo and The Dirty Dozen and the best martial arts/warsploitation film ever. If you've enjoyed John Woo's films (The Killer, Hard Boiled) then you need to see A Better Tomorrow 2. The ending blows away anything Woo (or anyone else) has done. Dreaming the Reality is the best Girls With Guns/Battling Babes film I've ever seen and luckily the entire film is online (click the link below the poster). Dangerous Encounters is the most nihilistic movie I've ever seen. It makes Straw Dogs and A Clockwork Orange look like kiddie matinee. If you like horror, gore and/or extreme craziness, you can't go wrong with The Seventh Curse.
Hope this helps...
I want to skip right to Love on Delivery, although Aces Go Places 2 (Mad Mission 2) looks right up my alley.
ReplyDeleteJay, I think you'd enjoy both of them. Aces Go Places 2 would make more sense (or less nonsense) if you see the first one er, first.
DeleteThanks Jeff! Good to hear. Now if only you could conveniently screen them somewhere for me, with some awesome trailers in-between. :)
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