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Bruce Lee was found unconscious on July 20, 1973, after he went to sleep complaining about a headache. He was pronounced dead at the hospital. He was at the home of Taiwanese actress Betty Ting Pei in Kowloon, Hong Kong. He was 32 years old at the time of his death. Dr. Peter Wu, a neurosurgeon, confirmed that his death was caused by cerebral edema or swelling of the brain.

There have been some crazy theories regarding his death, which had nothing to do with his cerebral edema. Some believed that he was assassinated by the Mafia. They suspected that Lee’s encounter with director Lo Wei two weeks before his death had something to do with his death. Others also called it a family curse after his son Brandon Lee also died young in a set accident.

However, the more believable theories suggested what caused his cerebral edema. Here are some of these theories,...

Mainland-born Yip Wing Cho began his career at Shaw Brothers Studio as a photography assistant under director Lo Wei, working on titles like “Raw Courage”, “The Golden Sword” (1969), and “Brothers Five” (1970). He later transitioned to directing with “Girl of Ghost Valley”, starring Hsing Hui, and “The Black Tavern”, both from scripts written by his father, Yip Yat Fong. During the revival of Cantonese cinema, Yip spent his later career acting in numerous romantic comedies and crime thrillers.

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“The Black Tavern” tells a simple story about a group of thieves attempting to rob a governor at a remote tavern. The unique story begins in a bustling restaurant in a small town. A wandering monk (Dean Shek) enters, singing and begging his way from table to table. His song reveals that retired governor Hai Gong Feng (Yang Chi Ching) is traveling with a chest full of diamonds and...

In many walks of life, a combination of recency bias and genuine progress makes it easy to think that the latest thing is also the greatest thing. However, this thought process doesn't apply to the martial arts movie genre, where a man who died in 1973 continues to be the yardstick all other stars are measured with -- and generally fall short.

Bruce Lee's death at the age of 32 cut short his life but not his legend. It can be easy to forget that his "Bruce Lee era" was just the final, star-making phase of his career. Before breaking through with his English name on "Green Hornet," Lee appeared in 20 Hong Kong movies, often using his Chinese name Lee Jun Fan and stage names like Lee Siu Lung ("Lee Little Dragon"). This means that a true Lee aficionado has plenty of comparatively obscure material to wade through -- from the 1941 film "Golden Gate Girl,...

Mainland born Lo Wei was an actor whose film career flourished after migrating to Hong Kong. After directing “The Black Butterfly” for Shaw Brothers, he followed it up with “Death Valley” starring the same pair of male leads. He is best known as the director who launched the kung fu film careers of Bruce Lee in “The Big Boss” and “Fist of Fury” and also Jackie Chan in “New Fist of Fury”.

Master Chao Yun Yang (Lo Wei) of the Chao Manor in Death Valley is getting old and thinking of retiring. Since he has no children, he wants to give everything he owns to his nephew Chao Yu Lung (Yueh Hua), a righteous swordsman who wields a pair of deadly short swords. Before the opening credits roll, we see him easily dispatching a group of bandits and he even pays for their burial. Furthermore, he also picks up a cowardly lone traveler,...

Jackie Chan is celebrated as one of the greatest kung fu film actors of all time. His classic kung fu movies have their own unique blend of physical comedy, complicated fight choreography, and elaborate stunts. They were not only full of action but were connected to the traditional martial arts to the skill, discipline, and incredible kung fu techniques. Though he went on to become an action star around the world, in his earlier kung fu movies, Chan captured the best of both worlds: the raw power of bare-knuckle fighting and the elegance of the old school martial arts.

What sets him apart from other martial arts actors is his gift for blending comedy with heart-pounding action. Whether portraying a mischievous, incorrigible student in Drunken Master or a sympathetic, bullied orphan in Snake in the Eagle's Shadow, Jackie fully embodies the characters he is portraying and his films all have...

In 1985, Jackie Chan grabbed an umbrella and ran towards a moving bus. Here’s how Police Story changed action cinema forever.

There had never been an action scene quite like the one that appeared in the first few minutes of 1985’s Police Story. Jackie Chan’s plucky cop, in dogged pursuit of crime boss Chu Tao (Chor Yuen) engages in a wildly destructive car chase through a hillside shanty town, demolishing rickety buildings and detonating gas bottles in his wake. When Tao and his goons then make their escape on a stolen bus, Chan’s Sergeant Kevin hooks onto the back with the help of an umbrella, his body flung to and fro as the vehicle lumbers through traffic.

The scene is brilliant not just because Chan’s risking his neck by doing his own stunts. It’s not just brilliant on a technical level (the planning that went into...

Bruce Lee's impact in bringing Kung Fu to the West and influencing subsequent movies cannot be overstated. Snake in the Eagle's Shadow set the stage for Jackie Chan's signature comedy Kung Fu style. King Boxer and Crippled Avengers were international successes that showcased the best of Kung Fu cinema.

The 1970s was an incredible time for Kung Fu movies, as it was the heyday of the world’s biggest martial arts stars and there were so many great films to check out. From incredible historical epics to slapstick comedy movies, Kung Fu cinema during the 1970s was vast and varied as some truly unique films were being made, and the genre was being discovered by an international audience. With fast-paced fight sequences, expertly choreographed battles, and intense martial arts showdowns, Kung Fu movies were truly at their peak during this decade.

The success of Kung Fu movies during...

"New Fist of Fury" launched Jackie Chan's career as a leading man, showcasing his martial arts skills and professional relationship with director Lo Wei. "Snake in the Eagle's Shadow" established Chan's unique comedic fighting style, allowing him to relax in his performance and showcase his talent. "Shinjuku Incident" marked a departure from Chan's usual roles, showcasing his dramatic range and versatility as an actor beyond physical comedy.

Jackie Chan is a brilliantly talented actor, but only a few of his movies can be considered defining moments in his career. The Hong Kong national began performing as a child, appearing in small roles since the age of 5, and has since spent an incredible sixty-two years developing and honing his acting skills. While many will know Jackie Chan for his martial arts skills, he's proved his versatility as an actor and has a wide range of abilities as a performer.

In his long career,...

The 1970's was an era of extravagant hair dos and fashion senses that will test the contrast option on your television settings! It was also the time of the Kung Fu Boom and therefore the inevitable attempt of Hong Kong studios to attempt to cash in. Long before Jackie Chan made his first crack at international stardom, we got “Slaughter in San Francisco” aka “Yellow Faced Tiger” with Wong Tao in the lead and Lo Wei at the helm. Throw in Chuck Norris as the bad guy with the incredible chest hair and you have a movie that is pure 1974, released by Eureka Entertainment in their latest addition to their collection.

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Cops Wong (Wong Tao) and John (Robert Jones) are best friends and partners on the force. An altercation with some bad guys leaves Wong removed from the police and working as a waiter.

One of the great thrills of old school kung fu flicks is the juxtaposition between the dance-like choreography and bone-crunching violence. Bright splashes of blood are made more shocking by the balletic quality of the fights themselves. This is the contradiction at the core of almost all classic martial arts films; the spirituality inherent in Shaolin Kung Fu coexists with its potential to cause serious bodily harm. Many of the best releases of the 70s and 80s golden age understood how to blend Zen-like philosophy with animalistic anger, and revenge storylines allowed for especially potent drama. Here are five of the most down-and-dirty payback plots from the heyday of Hong Kong action.

5. The Duel

Chang Cheh's Ti Lung and David Chiang team-up from the year before, “Vengeance,” might be the obvious choice, but “The Duel” is an underrated slice of Triad grittiness. Lung and Chiang are two of the coolest...

Hot on the heels of their first collection of Shaw Brothers movies, Shout! Factory’s Shaw Brothers Classics Vol. 2 continues the ongoing, multi-label effort to restore and release notable entries in the Hong Kong studio’s vast catalog. As it did with their previous collection, Shout! limits the selections for this second box set to a concentrated period of the studio’s productions. Whereas the 1967-69 range of the first box showed the studio frantically capitalizing on the breakout success of The One-Armed Swordsmen with a slew of like-minded wuxia films, the broader selection here among the first half of the ’70s finds Shaw Brothers both setting and chasing after trends.

Shout!’s first volume demonstrated how the Shaw Brothers studio made so many functionally identical movies, between the revenge-based plots, sword-based action, and reused sets, that within two years of The One-Armed Swordsmen’s paradigm shift, the house brand was already getting stale.

Jackie Chan is about to get a major new collection from Criterion, with the prestige label announcing a new set called Jackie Chan: Emergence of a Superstar. The set will contain a few of Chan’s early classics, including Fearless Hyena (and its sequel) and The Young Master, as well as a later film, My Lucky Stars, and a pair of his earliest vehicles, Half a Loaf of Kung Fu and Spiritual Kung Fu. Fans of Chan’s may be scratching their heads at a few of the titles, as outside of Young Master and Fearless Hyena, none of the films included in the set are considered his best work.

It seems like rights issues are keeping legit early classics like Drunken Master off the set, with the most puzzling choice being to include Fearless Hyena 2, which is really little more than a curiosity for fans. Chan notoriously quit...

A couple of days into the new month and we've still got time to let you know what is coming to the Arrow Video Player in August.    Subscribers will get two currated selections from League of Gentlemen's Reece Shearsmith and filmmaker Roger Avery. There is the classic Jackie Chan flick New Fist of Fury. It is the action icon's first leading role, from the original film's director Lo Wei.    Arrow Offers Classic and Cutting Edge Cult Cinema   August 2023 Lineup Includes a Lost German Gem, Reece Shearsmith Selects, Revenge, Paul Joyce Docs and More!   August 2023 Seasons:   Revengeamatics, Reece Shearsmith Selects, Access All Areas: The Documentaries of Paul Joyce, Renegade Cops, Roger Avary Selects, This is Torture!   Arrow Video is...

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Arrow’s recent box sets Shawscope Volume One and Volume Two highlighted the golden age of Hong Kong’s Shaw Brothers studio, spanning roughly from the mid-1970s to their pivot toward TV in 1986. Now, Shout! Factory’s Shaw Brothers Classics: Volume 1 focuses on the studio’s rapid commercial ascendency at the end of the ’60s with their then-new, harder-edged take on martial arts cinema.

The earliest film in the set is, fittingly, Chang Cheh’s The Assassin, from 1967. Made hot on the heels of Chang’s (and the studio’s) breakout feature The One-Armed Swordsman from the same year, The Assassin furthers the filmmaker’s interest in moving the martial arts film away from its erstwhile emphasis on female heroes who are prone to musical outbursts and flowery romances as they are violence and toward the sort of male-centric revenge narratives that dominate the titles collected here.

One-Armed Swordsman...

None of Bruce Lee's movies have been revisited on the big screen more than Fist of Fury. Enter the Dragon is without question the actor's most popular film, but Fist of Fury has a unique legacy unrivaled by any of Lee's other movies. Since it hit theaters in 1971, the story has served as the foundation for several more martial arts films.

Released in 1971, Fist of Fury was the second of five kung fu movies Lee worked on in his lifetime. In the film, the actor played Chen Zhen, a Chinese martial artist who rises up to fight the Japanese after his master dies. The patriotic symbolism attached to Lee's character made Fist of Fury an impactful film in the Hong Kong movie industry. In response to its success, filmmakers found more to do with Chen Zhen and the struggle faced by the people in the movie. Of course, this...

Jackie Chan is now a household name, but one of his delayed comedies could have made him famous much earlier. In the U.S., Jackie Chan is most known for his brand of action humor and slapstick martial arts, all of which are propelled by his fighting abilities. He first broke into the North American market with the 1995 movie Rumble in the Bronx, although he had already achieved notoriety in the Hong Kong film industry by 1978.

Despite Jackie Chan’s breakout successes in the movies Snake in the Eagle’s Shadow and Drunken Master, both released in 1978, he could have achieved fame earlier via the film Half a Loaf of Kung Fu. This movie was also released in 1978 but could have reached the public beforehand if not for Chan’s producer at the time, Lo Wei, hesitating to make that happen. This delay was unfortunate given that Jackie Chan's kung...

Having worked with Bruce Lee on “The Big Boss” and “Fist of Fury” was one of the great achievements in the career of Hong Kong director Lo Wei, as it propelled the actor’s reputation as well as the filmmaker’s. However, while shooting the latter, he also collaborated with one of the future stars of the martial-arts-genre, as Jackie Chan did some of the stunts on “Fist of Fury” and left quite an impression with Wei who followed his career, until he was certain Chan could be the next star on the horizon. Since he also saw something of the charisma and talent of Lee in Chan, it was perhaps logical to make him star in “New Fist of Fury”, a somewhat loose sequel to the 1972 original. While it is not on the same level as the former, it has a few qualities worth mentioning, especially in the second half,...

Hong Kong novelist and screenwriter Ni Kuang, who penned some 300 screenplays including The One-Armed Swordsman and The 36th Chamber Of Shaolin, has died. According to local media, he passed away on Sunday at age 87.

Tenky Tin Kai-man, actor and spokesman of the Federation of Hong Kong Filmmakers, confirmed Ni’s passing to the South China Morning Post. The cause of death was reportedly skin cancer.

Hailed as a giant in the Chinese literary world, Ni rose to fame with the New Adventures Of Wisely series which was first published in Chinese daily Ming Pao in 1963. He specialized in martial arts, wuxia and science fiction.

Beginning in 1965, Ni branched out into screenwriting, often working for the Shaw Brothers. His credits include 1967’s The One-Armed Swordsman; 1975 superhero movie Infra-Man; and 1978’s The 36th Chamber Of Shaolin and Enter The Fat Dragon (the latter directed by and starring Sammo Hung); along with hundreds of others.

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Ni Kuang, the prolific Hong Kong writer behind the Wisely series of sci-fi novels as well as over 300 film screenplays including the classic martial arts films One-Armed Swordsman and The 36th Chamber of Shaolin and the Bruce Lee hits Fist of Fury and The Big Boss, has died. He was 87.

The South China Morning Post reported that Ni died Sunday at his home in Hong Kong. Local media reported that the cause of death was skin cancer. In a double blow to Hong Kong’s cultural landscape, Ni died on the same day as legendary director and screenwriter Alex Law.

A giant of Chinese literature, Ni’s shadow looms large over the genres of science fiction, wuxia fiction and martial arts, but he also wrote extensive non-fiction pieces, newspaper columns, satirical pieces and dabbled in the romance and detective genres. It has been...

Ni Kuang, one of Hong Kong’s most distinguished screenwriters and novelists, has died. He was 87.

He died on Sunday in Hong Kong, with local media reporting skin cancer as the cause of death.

Ni wrote some 300 screenplays, many in the martial arts genre and many for the Shaw Brothers studio with co-writer Chang Chen. He wrote the scripts for classic films “The 36th Chamber of Shaolin” and “One Armed Swordsman” and had a hand in two of Bruce Lee’s six movies “The Big Boss” and “Fist of Fury” though the writing credit went to Wei Lo.

As a novelist, Ni wrote the “New Adventures of Wesley” a series of detective stories that often featured aliens and extra-terrestrial creatures. These were initially serialized in the Ming Pao newspaper from the 1960s and spawned numerous films and TV series (some written as ‘Wisely’).

“For those who are a bit old,...

Making a remake of a beloved classic is always risky business, no matter what genre we are talking about, but in the case of a Bruce-Lee-movie, there is always the obstacle of the leading actor having to compete with the martial-arts legend. Consequently, Jet Li, despite his status within the Chinese film industry and impressive filmography at that point, was hesitant when he was approached to star in a new version of “Fist of Fury”, a feature which cemented the reputation of Lee as one of the major forces within the genre. In an interview with Hong Kong Cinemagic director Gordon Chan explains that, even though he knew about the risks, he always felt the script was something of a weakness of the original, painting a “black-and-white” image of the conflict between Japanese and Chinese. In the end, “Fist of Legend” does a lot more than re-tell the familiar story...

It is no secret that Jimmy Wang Yu, with his connections had helped Jackie Chan, then a young actor to settle his dispute with director Lo Wei. So in returning the favor, Chan appeared in a few movies produced by Wang and this is one of their collaborations. Interestingly, even though he only showed up briefly in support roles, these movies still get marketed as him being the main lead. As Chan became more popular in the West, and on DVD, this production became “Jackie Chan is The Prisoner”, which is misleading.

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Set in Taiwan, this prison drama has quite an impressive ensemble cast of supporting Hong Kong actors besides Golden Horse Awards winner, veteran Taiwanese actor Ko Chuen Hsiung as the prison superintendent. Nevertheless, Tony Leung Ka Fai plays Andy Wang Wei, a cop who, upon his return to Taipei, witnesses his father-in-law gunned...

Taiwanese filmmaker and actress Sylvia Chang has been chosen as the Filmmaker in Focus at this year’s Hong Kong International Film Festival (Hkiff).

The festival (March 23-April 6) plans to screen 13 of Chang’s films, including the world premiere of her new work, Murmur Of The Hearts.

Other films to be screened include Legend Of The Mountain (1979), That Day, On The Beach (1983), Passion (1986), Queen Of Temple Street (1990), Tempting Heart (1999) and 20 30 40 (2004).

Chang will also attend a “Face to Face” seminar on April 5 at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre to share insights on her films, art and life.

Born in Chiayi City, Taiwan, Chang moved with her family to Hong Kong and New York before returning to Taiwan aged 15.

She made her acting debut in 1973 in Wei Lo’s The Flying Tiger and her directing debut in 1981 by completing Once Upon A Time, after the film’s original director, Tu Chung-hsun, died in a car accident.

In 1995, Chang...