Without watching Shaw's films, one cannot say that one understands Hong Kong cinema; without watching Shaw's films, those who study the history of Hong Kong cinema will have a gap in their research. Shaw's films document not only its most glorious 10 years of history in Hong Kong (mid-1960s to late 1970s), but also one aspect of the 50-year history of Hong Kong cinema.
In 1930, Run Run Shaw and his third brother, Shaw Yan Mui, set up the Shaw Brothers Film Company, which bought a number of theaters and traveled to Europe and the United States to acquire advanced Western films and equipment. By 1961, Shaw Brothers was the largest private studio in the world.
Shaw's Heads - Run Run Shaw and Zou Wenhuai
Shaw was born in Shanghai in 1907, a native of Zhenhai, Ningbo, Zhejiang Province, and his father was a bleaching and dyeing businessman, who was the sixth in his family, and was therefore known as "Sixth Uncle. In 1924, he and his brothers set up the Shanghai "Tianyi Film" and were responsible for distribution in foreign countries, and in 1926 he dropped out of the Shanghai YMCA High School and went to Singapore to assist his third brother, Shao Renmei, in managing the movie business.
In Singapore, he met a wealthy Nanyang Chinese tycoon, Yu Dongxuan, and his girlfriend, Huang Meizhen, with whom he fell in love. Fortunately, Yu Dongxuan was not only unruffled, but also a good man, and sent hundreds of thousands of dollars to Shaw to start his own business, and Shaw married Huang Meizhen in 1937, and gave birth to two sons and two daughters. The marriage lasted for 50 years until 1987 when Wong Mei Chun died in the United States at the age of 85. That year, Shaw's company also announced that it was ceasing production, while Shaw's four children faded out of Shaw's management one by one.
A big reason for Shaw's decline was the establishment of Golden Harvest Pictures by Run Run Shaw's former subordinate Zou Wenhuai.
Zou Wenhuai, who is now the boss of Golden Harvest, is a well-known figure in Hong Kong and even in the world's movie circle, and his popularity is even higher than that of Run Run Shaw.
Zou Wenhuai worked at Shaw's for 12 years, starting as director of the publicity department until he was promoted to general manager. Because of his disagreement with Run Run Shaw, he took his subordinates, such as Ho Kwun-cheong and Choi Wing-cheong, with him to look for another way out.
The most widely circulated story in the film industry is that Zou Wenhuai, while working for Run Run Shaw, pried Shaw's movie star Wang Yu, who was famous for his "One-Armed Sword," out of his schedule, and arranged for his "One-Armed Sword vs. Blind Warrior" to be filmed in Taiwan in order to circumvent the restraining order. Run Run Shaw was furious when he found out that the film was released, Shaw pointed out that "Golden Harvest" infringed on copyrights, and both of them went to court in person, and the lawsuit lasted for a year, costing more than 1 million Hong Kong dollars in lawyer's fees until the end of the movie's release period, which is a clear indication of the fire and brimstone between the two men.
Zou Wenhuai's success depended mainly on the independent production system he implemented, which changed the employment relationship with actors into a cooperative relationship, with the movie's profits being shared with the actors, thus netting a large number of talented actors. The record of $6.25 million box office of HUI Koon-man's "Ghosts and Horses" was not unrelated to Tsou's hiring policy. 80's, Tsou discovered Jackie Chan and created another peak for Golden Harvest. But what made Golden Harvest famous and profitable was actually a set of western movie - "Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles", which broke the box office record of $200 million, with four cute little turtles that could fight Chinese Kung Fu in the small children to be popular. Zou Wenhuai's position in the international movie market has since been established.
Shaw's kung fu film masters
Hong Kong kung fu film can achieve today's achievements, not overnight, those pioneers, and many from Shaw. So let's take a look at the names of these creditors -
Directors: Chang Cheh, Hu Jinquan, Cheng Gang, Chu Yuan, Lau Kar-leung, Lau Kar-wing, Bao Xue-li, Wang Yu, Sun Chung, Wu Ma, Zhang Zengze, Gui Zhi-hong, Tsui Tseng-hung and so on.
Martial arts instructors: Liu Jialiang, Han Yingjie, Tang Jia, and so on.
Actors: Zheng Pei Pei, Wang Yu, Jiang David, Dillon, Liu Jia Hui, Fu Sheng, Li Xiu Xian, Wang Long Wei, Bai Biao, Qi Guan Jun, Chen Guan Tai, Wang Yu, Gu Feng, Jensen, Er Dong Sheng, Yue Hua, Zong Hua, Liu Yong, Deer Fung, Luo Lie, Zheng Lei, Yang Zhi Qing and so on.
These men are the backbone of Shaw's kung fu films, and they represent the highest achievement of Shaw's kung fu films, and can be seen in almost all of Shaw's classic kung fu films. These people have either passed away or retired for a long time, and only a few of them are active in the movie industry. Everyone is familiar with Dillon, but recently he played Emperor Qianlong in "Return of the Pearl 3", and I don't even recognize him, he's getting old, the years are not forgiving. In the past, he was the brother and son of Qin Pei and Er Dongsheng, who share the same mother and father. One of his most recent performances was the familiar "Daisy", in which he played Zheng Yusheng's boss, the one who played the boss of the killer organization. Since the release of "The One-Armed Sword" in 1967, Chang Cheh has led his partners and godchildren to fight in the field of kung fu films. Chang Cheh has made more than 100 films in his lifetime, and many of the subjects of the films we see today were first discovered by him, and he is represented by the following films:
The Golden Swallow, The Two Warriors, The Great Assassin, The New One-Armed Sword, The Bodyguard, The One-Armed Sword King", "Stabbing Horses", "Water Margin", "Dang Kou Zhi", "Revenge", "The Eight-Power Allied Forces", "Fong Sai Yuk and Hu Huay Chien", "Shaolin Monastery", "The Five Shaolin Ancestors", "Mutilated", "Ma Yongzhen", "The Wicked Guests", "Boxing", "The Thirteen Generals", "The Rebel", "The Young Man", "The Shooting Eagles and Heroes" Trilogy, "Flying Foxes of the Snowy Mountains", "The Hateful Lianhuan", and many more. Anyway, today's people can think of kung fu themes, Zhang Che almost shot all, he is also ruthless enough, did not leave any space for the development of future generations, the future generations after imitating the road he traveled, remake his work. Works more natural uneven, there are good and bad. Zhang Cheh's works that I personally think have treasured value are - "One-Armed Sword", "New One-Armed Sword", "One-Armed Fist King", "Thirteen Taobao", "Ma Yongzhen", "Revenge", "Double Chivalry", "The Five Shaolin Ancestors", and "Mutilated". Of course, this is just personal opinion. My favorites are The New One-Armed Sword and The Two Amigos and The Thirteen Generals, where David Chiang's performance is superb! These three movies are he and Dillon co-starred, the two are known as the "double role" of Zhang Cheh's movies, and Zhang Cheh and the "Iron Triangle" combination, the three created the myth of Chinese kung fu movies. Dillon was very handsome at that time, especially in "The Horse" and "The New One-Armed Sword", combining masculinity and gentleness, and was a rare acting star. I'm not going to go into detail about these movies, but if you are interested, you can watch them, after all, as the old saying goes, "It's better to hear than to see".
Chang Cheh is Shaw's chief kung fu movie master, but Chang Cheh can't attract audiences forever, Shaw's huge movie studio needs more different types of directors to join, Chu Yuan is another martial arts director who has attracted a lot of attention. Chu Yuan's martial arts films are basically adapted from Gu Long's novels, and there is also an iron triangle here - Chu Yuan, Gu Long and Dillon. Directed by Chu Yuan, originally written by Gu Long and starring Dillon, they were box office guarantees for Shaw Brothers in the later years. Chu Yuan's Gu Long wuxia films include The Sword of the End of the World, Meteor Butterfly Sword, Before and After the Battle, The Embroidered Thief, Xiao XI Lang, The Sentimental Swordsman, The Sword of the Three Young Masters, and Chu Liu Xiang, etc., all of which are wonderful and worth a look. I don't need to say much when I see these names, but they should be familiar to fans of martial arts novels.
Lastly, I would like to talk about Lau Ka Leung, this one should be more familiar, Jackie Chan's "Drunken Fist II" he played that Manchuria's last martial arts, in the "Seven Swords" play pay the green master is him. He is Shaw's last pillar director, Shaw's late classic kung fu films are almost all from his hands, "36 rooms of Shaolin", "God Fight", "18 martial arts", "Lu A Cai in Wong Fei Hung" are his masterpieces, the film shows his hard bridge and hard horse real kung fu. His father, Liu Zhan, was his master, and his father was a disciple of Lin Shirong, who you should know who he is, right? On the martial arts in terms of pleasing to the eye, Liu Jia Liang's martial arts design is the best, he has real kung fu, know how to how to perform best in front of the camera, you look at his performance in the "Drunken Fist Ⅱ", you can know that he is extraordinary.
It can be said that Shaw's success is not the work of one or two people, but in the golden age of Hong Kong cinema, which focused on countless investors, producers, directors, screenwriters, actors and behind-the-scenes staff with pioneering spirit and talent, and then caught up with Hong Kong's economic take-off, the prosperity of the film market, and the right place, right time, right person, and the right people, which is why it left us with a classic film that still affects us today.
Shaw's top10
1. The Drunken Warrior (1966)
2. The Thirteen Generals (1970)*
3. Interstellar Blunt Foetus (1983)
4. Butterflyflyfly Sword of the Meteor (1976)*
5. A Night of Flowers and Moonlight in the River (1966)
6. The Beauties of the Jungfang River (1959)
7. )*
7. Shing Kee Tea House (1974)
8. Love in a Fallen City (1984)
9. The Great Warlord (1972)*
10. The Price of Love (1970)