Chang Cheh Chang Cheh: Visionary of Death “Few in Chinese cinema, or in any other art forms for that matter, dare to ritualize or eulogize death, or see it as the heroic realization and the ultimate expression of life as Chang Cheh did. Death placed on such a lofty height is no longer a tragedy but self-fulfillment
The 36th Chamber Johnnie To Reviews: The Enigmatic Case (1980) — November 14, 2013 Happy Ghost III (1986) — November 26, 2013 Seven Years Itch (1987) — December 2, 2013 The Eighth Happiness (1988) — November 21, 2014 The Big Heat (1988) — January 9, 2015 All About Ah-long (1989) — February 1, 2016 The Fun, the Luck, and the Tycoon
Zhang Yimou Zhang Yimou Capsule Reviews Red Sorghum (1988) — January 14, 2019 “You have red on you.” Ju Dou (1990) — April 24, 2019 Basically a noir in which two young lovers conspire against the woman’s husband. Except they don’t kill him (though they certainly think about it a few times) they just have sex
Jia Zhangke Jia Zhangke Capsule Reviews Xiao Shan Going Home (1995) — January 22, 2019 Soul Asylum! Crash Test Dummies! Man, 1995 was everywhere in 1995. Xiao Wu (1997) — April 1, 2014 Jia Zhangke’s first full-length film is one of his more conventional, but like last year’s A Touch of Sin, Jia in genre mode
It's a Drink, It's a Bomb Zhang Yimou Reviews: Hero (2002) — March 28, 2017 The Great Wall (2016)— February 16, 2016 Shadow (2018) — May 2, 2019 One Second (2020) — September 17, 2021 Snipers (Zhang Yimou & Zhang Mo, 2022) – March 8, 2023 Full River Red (2023) – May 12, 2023 Capsule Reviews: Red Sorghum (1987) — January 14, 2019 Ju
The 36th Chamber Jia Zhangke 14 Ways of Looking at Jia Zhangke — February 5, 2019 Drunk for Life: Music in the Films of Jia Zhangke — March 13, 2019 Reviews: I Wish I Knew (2010) — January 23, 2020 Mountains May Depart (2015) — October 12, 2015 Ash is Purest White (2018) — November 1, 2019 Caught by the
Edward Yang Edward Yang Capsule Reviews In Our Time (1982) — August 23, 2020 Nothing more pure than Edward Yang’s complete and total lack of respect for international copyright law as it pertains to the use of popular music in film. He put two (2!) Beatles songs in his debut short film. Absolute legend. That Day,
The 36th Chamber Edward Yang Reviews: A Brighter Summer Day (1991) — July 27, 2016 A Confucian Confusion (1994) – November 3, 2022 Taiwan Stories: The New Cinema of the 1980s — September 7, 2020 Capsule Reviews: In Our Time (1982)— August 23, 2020 That Day, On the Beach (1983) — May 19, 2018 Taipei Story (1985) — March 15,
Kurosawa Kiyoshi Daguerrotype (Kurosawa Kiyoshi, 2016) Halloween may have passed but it’s always a good time to watch a creepy movie by a great director, and that exactly what Daguerrotype by Kurosawa Kiyoshi is. The artiest of the filmmakers to emerge in the J-Horror boom of the late 90s, or at least the one most
Johnnie To Johnnie To Capsule Reviews A Moment of Romance (1990) — February 22, 2016 As Tears Go By told in the style of the last five minutes of All About Ah-long. Directed by Benny Chan, produced by Johnnie To, Ringo Lam, and Wong Jing (among others), but To claims much of the authorship credit, and he’
Hou Hsiao-hsien Hou Hsiao-hsien Capsule Reviews Cute Girl (1980) — March 18, 2015 Hou Hsiao-hsien’s first film pairs pop stars Kenny Bee and Feng Fei-fei in a totally pleasant and generic romantic comedy. He’s poor, she’s rich, they fall in love anyway. Tsui Hark’s Working Class is a much better version of this
Tsui Hark Tsui Hark Capsule Reviews The Butterfly Murders (1979) — July 17, 2021 Tsui Hark’s, I don’t know, “Song to Woody”? Here’s to King Hu and Chang Cheh and Chor Yuen too And Roger Corman and Dario Argento Here’s to the hearts and the hands of the men Who made crazy wuxias
Chang Cheh The New One-Armed Swordsman (Chang Cheh, 1971) Even at the warp speed of Hong Kong generic cycles, it’d be weird to remake a movie that came out only four years earlier, so Chang Cheh, in the midst of probably the most frenetic period of production of any great director ever, didn’t remake his smash hit
Chang Cheh Chang Cheh Capsule Reviews The Magnificent Trio (1966) — November 5, 2017 Chang Cheh’s second wuxia film, and the oldest one to survive. The first, Tiger Boy, was a low-budget black and white film for which he did the choreography himself. By all accounts it has been lost. The Magnificent Trio is in color
The 36th Chamber Chang Cheh Chang Cheh: Visionary of Death — December 7, 2017 Chang Cheh: Death and Glory — May 23, 2018 Reviews: The One-Armed Swordsman (1967) — July 12, 2013 The Assassin (1967) — May 12, 2014 Return of the One-Armed Swordsman — July 25, 2013 Vengeance! (1970) — July 27, 2013 The Heroic Ones (1970) — July 29, 2013
Wilson Yip SPL: Paradox (Wilson Yip, 2017) It’s unclear if this film is actually a continuation of the SPL series or if it just started as one and then mutated into its own thing. I thought I saw the characters for “Sha Po Lang” on the title card of the movie though, so I’m just
Hong Sangsoo Mysterious Object at Cannes: Claire’s Camera (Hong Sangsoo, 2017) Claire’s Camera, barely over an hour long and shot in about a week at last year’s Cannes Film Festival, isn’t even the best Hong Sangsoo movie of the past year. That would be On the Beach at Night Alone. Nor is it likely to be the most
Herman Yau Shock Wave (Herman Yau, 2017) A kind of amalgam of The Taking of Pelham 123 and The Hurt Locker, the first of three Herman Yau films to be released in the first half of 2017 (released in late April, it was followed by The Sleep Curse in May and 77 Heartbreaks in June, with a
Yang Lei The Legend of the Naga Pearls (Yang Lei, 2017 In what has been a strong summer for Chinese language releases here in Seattle (with Our Time Will Come, Wolf Warrior 2, Meow, Once Upon a Time, and The Adventurers following SIFF's minifestival of Hong Kong films and their presentation of the restored Taipei Story last week), Legend
Stephen Fung The Adventurers (Stephen Fung, 2017) Almost thirty years after A Moment of Romance, Andy Lau still looks impossibly cool riding a motorcycle. He does it here as the lead of a small gang of jewel thieves in Stephen Fung’s heist movie, his first film since the lunatic double punch of 2012’s Tai Chi
Tsui Hark Once Upon a Time in Hong Kong: The Cinema of Tsui Hark Tsui Hark has been the central figure in Hong Kong and Chinese language cinema for the past 40 years, responsible for at least a dozen different masterpieces as director and/or producer. He’s often likened to Steven Spielberg, though more for the universal popularity of his films and their
Zhao Xiaoding Once Upon a Time (Zhao Xiaoding, 2017) The intersection between myth and teen drama, between cartoon wuxia and soap opera, with a dash of Hitchcock just to make things interesting, Once Upon a Time is unlike anything likely to play on Seattle Screens this year. The directorial debut of longtime Zhang Yimou cinematographer Zhao Xiaoding (he shot
Wu Jing Wolf Warrior 2 (Wu Jing, 2017) Somewhat surprisingly, Wu Jing’s Wolf Warrior 2 is smashing box office records across China, on pace to overtake last year’s The Mermaid as the number one Chinese film of all-time. Wu is probably the greatest Chinese martial arts star of his generation, best known here in the US
Benny Chan Meow (Benny Chan, 2017) From Mao to Meow: Revolution in Contemporary Chinese Cinema Pop will eat itself. “A cat is never on the side of power.” — Chris Marker Last summer veteran Hong Kong director Benny Chan brought us the year’s best martial arts film with the High Noon variation Call of Heroes. This
