This is considered by most aficionados to be the first great Kung Fu genre film to come out of Hong Kong in the 1960′s and is most certainly a great film by any standard. Produced by the inimitable Shaw Brothers and written and directed by King Hu, this film is an absolute technical masterpiece that defied the stereotypical films of Hong Kong at that time. The script, plot, performances, fight choreography, cinematography (compliments of master Tadashi Nishimoto) as well as direction and production values far surpassed the Hong Kong films of the era. One can make a very strong argument that the golden age of Hong Kong film making began with “Come Drink With Me” and ended with Bruce Lee’s passing.

At the time of this film’s release in 1966, it was selected as the Hong Kong entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 39th Academy Awards, but was not accepted as a nominee.

There are many remarkable and notable things about the film: Jackie Chan claims to be one of the choir children in the opening scenes. Pei Pei Chang plays Golden Swallow, at a time when female action stars were unheard of. Hua Yueh turns in a masterful performance as “Drunk Cat” (Fan Tai Pei).

The plot revolves around a general’s son who is taken hostage and used as leverage to free a bandit leader. The general’s other offspring, a girl named Golden Swallow, is sent to rescue the son. When the bandit gang encounter the Golden Swallow in a local inn, the prisoner negotiation escalates to bloodshed and the kidnappers are beaten to a pulp.

A local drunk beggar named Fan Tai Pei acts as Golden Swallow’s guardian angel, secretly helping her avoid being ambushed at night. That morning Fan Tai Pei, whom we now know only as “Drunken Cat” tips off Golden Swallow to the bandits whereabouts. They have occupied a Buddhist monastery.

Under the guise of an acolyte, Golden Swallow penetrates the temple and confronts the man who’s taken her brother hostage. During the brawl she is injured by a deadly, poisoned dart. She escapes and is rescued in the woods by Fan Tai Pei who nurses her back to health. While she’s convalescing, Golden Swallow learns that Fan is actually a martial arts master and a leader of a Kung Fu society, which he otherwise keeps a secret.

The monastery is led by an evil abbot, Liao Kung, who is also a kung fu master and has allied himself with the bandits. He finds out that the beggar carries a bamboo staff and then realises that the beggar is the former student of the same master. The abbot has in fact killed their master in order to get his bamboo staff, which was rescued by Fan Tai Pei. Now abbot Liao Kung sees the opportunity to gain control of the staff.

Fan Tai Pei is hesitant to confront Liao Kung for two reasons. First, Liao Kung’s Kung Fu skills are unparalleled, and he thinks he has no chances against him, or at the very least, one of them would not survive a confrontation. Second, despite his evil ways, Liao Kung has actually done a good deed to Fan Tai Pei: he persuaded the master to accept Fan Tai Pei into the Green Wand Kung-Fu school when he was a mere homeless orphan, thus giving him a chance in life. For this reason, Fan is reluctant to fight the abbot even though Fan knows about the abbot’s criminal deeds.

In order to release the General’s son, Fan stages a prisoner exchange. During the exchange, the government soldiers receive the General’s son, but Fan prevents the bandits from releasing their leader. As the government soldiers march the bandit leader back to prison, the bandits attack the procession. Golden Swallow, leading her female warriors, fights off the bandits. The evil abbot forces a showdown with Fan Tai Pei.

And the rest, as they say, is history…

Sit back, relax and get prepared to be dumbfounded. Please…allow me to explain. What if I told you that Jackie Chan made a Kung Fu Movie that combined these stunning plot elements: Crazed Amazons. Ghosts who cheat at cards. Bouncing vampires. Japanese Nazis who attack riding atop 1970s clunker cars. Burlesque musical numbers. Abraham Lincoln as a World War II general. Gratuitous violence. Chinese guys dressed in kilts and Elvis jumpsuits, and, er, Jacky Chan and his pet chicken.
Yes this movie has it all. So…sit back, don’t try to think to much, smoke a fatty, crack open a beer and let this movie warp your sensibilities. DO NOT try to figure out what this movie is about. PLEASE. Viewing this film through the veil of contemplation will only BRING YOU PAIN. Trust me. This Film is for the select few who have the uncanny ability to appreciate the weird, the offbeat, the senseless and obscene. To those few: This just may be the GREATEST Kung Fu Movie ever made.

Jackie Chan had already established himself in Hong Kong as a major box office star with 1978′s Drunken Master and 1979′s Fearless Hyena, but he was not getting his fiscal due from Lo Wei Productions, so he opted out of his contract with Lo Wei and was hired by Golden Harvest. The Young Master was the first feature Chan did for Golden Harvest, but it wasn’t without a lions share of difficulties. The film was interrupted several times because of the contract disputes with Lo Wei and a Triad that tried to muscle in on Jackie’s fortune. This was eventually settled with some help from Jimmy Wang Yu whom Jackie would owe (along many other actors) several favors.
Jackie stars as Ah Lung, a mediocre student, (funny he doesn’t seem so in the film and that point is soon forgotten) who loses in a beautifully choreographed lion dance competition because his fellow adopted brother Jing Keung (Wei Pei), faked an injury and competed incognito for the Wei Yee school. Lung and Keung’s sifu Master Tien soon finds out of this deception and this betrayal leads to Keung leaving the school. After an impassioned plea from Lung, Tien gives Lung his blessing to find his brother. Jackie takes his big white fan (important plot point.) Jing looks for work at the Wei Yee school, but is turned down when he is found to have helped the Wei Yee school win the Lion Dance competition. He is then recruited with two others, including Fung Hark-On (aka Fung Ke-An who was the martial arts consultant with Jackie) who has a large mole on his face.
To free Master Kim (Hapkido expert Whang In Shik) Jing uses his big white fan to help Kim escape. So Ah would later be mistaken for his brother and sought after by the local police inspector and his son (played by Hong Kong regulars Shih Kien and Yuen Biao.) This would lead up to an awesome fight scene between two of the Seven Little Fortunes, Yuen and Jackie. Yuen would expertly use a bench and you get to see Jackie use a pole again.
Even with the continuity problems (even admitted by Jackie, including one scene where Jackie is fettered and the next he is not) and the overuse of sped-up footage and zoom shots (including one that is parodied in Kung Pow), this is a fun film to watch.
The Cantonese comedy is a delight and the martial arts are sublime. In those fight scenes you get to see him use many props such as sword, pole, bench and even a skirt, a skill he learns from his encounter with the Police Chief’s daughter played by Lily Li. The high point of the film is a showdown that involves an 18-minute plus scene between Jackie and Whang (Jackie in his autobiography “I Am Jackie Chan” considers this his ninth best fight scene). This movie is a “must see” for any self respecting Jackie Chan or Hong Kong kung fu film fans.

Filmed in beautiful Barcelona, Spain, the story centers around cousins Thomas (Jackie Chan) and David (Yuen Biao) who run a fast food van. The food is delivered by Thomas, who rushes around the busy downtown square on a skateboard. After a melee involving a biker gang, they meet the beautiful pickpocket Sylvia (Lola Forner), who asks them to hide her in their van to avoid the police. Thomas and David are instantly enamored by her, but after allowing her to stay in their apartment that night, they wake to find both Sylvia and their hard earned money gone. The next day, they bump into Moby (Sammo Hung), a bumbling private investigator who is also tracking Sylvia. It is discovered that Sylvia is the heir to a sizable inheritance that a criminal gang is trying to steal from her. When she is kidnapped, Thomas, David, and Moby team up to save her, infiltrating the villains’ castle and defeating them in a martial arts battle.
Chan, Yuen and Hung, are long-time friends and attended the Peking Opera School in their youth. The release of Wheels on Meals came in the midst of their most prolific period working together as a trio. The three men had acted together on Chan’s Project A and the first of Hung’s original Lucky Stars trilogy, Winners and Sinners in 1983. Wheels on Meals was released in 1984, and a year later they were reunited twice more for the Lucky Stars semi-sequels My Lucky Stars and Twinkle, Twinkle Lucky Stars. This was something of a golden period for Hong Kong cinema-goers, as three of the nation’s most beloved action stars performed together on screen.
Wheels on Meals was the first of two films which paired star Jackie Chan against former professional kickboxing champion Benny Urquidez (the other being the 1988 film Dragons Forever). Their fight in this film is typically regarded as one of the greatest on-screen martial arts fights ever performed. At one point in the final battle between the pair, a spin-kick performed by Urquidez is so quick that the resulting airflow extinguishes a row of candles. This is shown onscreen, with no cuts or trick photography!

Let me be frank: This is not a great Jackie Chan film. This is not even a good Jackie Chan film. Although he portrays a bad guy, which is rare, and sports an odd looking mole on his face, this is no career defining moment. Considering my own personal cinematic proclivities, seeing Jackie with a hairy facial mole this is worth the price of admission (Admission? Hey…isn’t this movie free?).
Plot: Incriminating evidence against a gang is left in a cab, when a gang member dies while riding in it. The gang chases the innocent cab driver, who receives help from the dead gangster’s sister, a tough police woman.
Blah. If we look beyond the obvious, this is not a really bad film overall. The plot is fairly formulaic, but the action is passable and I for one really like Charlie Chin Hsiang-Lin, who does an excellent job in this film. He is the films saving grace.
As for Jackie Chan ; This is very early on in his career, in fact I think this may be one of the first times he’s not relegated to playing the “country bumpkin”. He was far from the international superstar he is today. But hey…WTF…guy’s gotta start somewhere, right? Worth a quick peruse just for the curiosity factor.

As far as plots go, Jackie Chan’s Fearless Hyena is nothing special. Here, Chan plays yet another country bumpkin whose venerable master gets killed by a dastardly villain. This, of course, leaves Chan no other option but to train under a new master to avenge his teacher’s death and vanquish all evildoers by the final reel. What sets Fearless Hyena apart from the substandard chop-sock standard fare of its day is the manner in which the film executes its formulaic storyline. From the fine comic performances to the well-timed stunt choreography, Fearless Hyena manages to entertain despite its obviously flawed charm. A must see for fans of Jackie Chan.

Also known as “Master with Cracked Fingers”; Jackie Chan plays the main character whose father dies early on after disobeying the rules of his clan because of not killing “innocent people”. Young Jackie was intrigued by the martial arts from an early age, but his father had strictly forbid its practice. One day, he meets an old beggar who offers to teach Jackie how to fight. Through disciplined training, Jackie grows up to be quite good though he keeps his knowledge a secret until he is forced to fight by an extortion ring that’s putting the squeeze on his uncle’s restaurant. The movie has a great fighting scene at the end, and some fun action throughout the rest of the movie. A must for fans of Jackie Chan!

This is one of the better early Jackie Chan films, when Jackie had finally started to come into his own. Too often, in many of Jackie’s first films, he was relegated to the role of “country bumpkin” and his talents were often overshadowed by poor production qualities and lesser talented players. Here the plot revolves around an orphan boy (Jackie Chan), who is rejected by kung-fu masters at a monastery; he is taken in by a beggar and a wise man who teach him the martial arts. Now he’s out for revenge on those who killed his father and on those who abandoned him.