Lo Lieh Movies

A cop near the end of his career joins forces with a 16-year-old girl to find his missing granddaughter in this action-packed drama with comic overtones. Wu (Law Lit) is a veteran Hong Kong police detective who finds himself taking on a case with a personal impact when his teenage granddaughter Cho disappears and he's assigned to investigate. Wu contacts P (Zeny Kwok), Cho's best friend, who claims the missing girl borrowed a large amount of money from her before she went missing. Wu is a by-the-books cop, while P is all adolescent attitude, and at first they mix about as well as oil and water, but a grudging respect begins to grow between them as they set aside their differences in hopes of finding Cho. Before long, Wu and P are joined in their search by Tofu (Chui Tienyou), P's significant other. Law Lit starred in a number of martial arts pictures in the 1970s under the name Lo Lieh. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Michael Mak directs this Category III box-office smash loosely based on a notorious 17th century text. Mei Yeung-sheung (Lawrence Ng) is a scholar who has a hard time keeping his mind on his studies because of his raging libido. When he cannot satisfy his appetites with his seemingly insatiable wife, Chau-yin (Amy Yip Chi-mei), he gets an operation on his undersized phallus which literally leaves him hung like a horse. He sets out to give his new addition a test drive by seducing the wife of abusive merchant Wong Chut (Tsui Kam-kong). As he moves on to the sexually adventurous though emotionally unbalanced Shui Chu (Yip again), Wong Chut sets out for revenge by luring Mei's abandoned wife Chau-yin, who spends her free time learning new uses for calligraphy brushes. Athletic coupling in gauzy soft focus ensues. ~ Jonathan Crow, Rovi

Asian-American filmmaker Wayne Wang returns to the city of his birth for this surreal, violent, and darkly comic look at the seamy underside of life in Hong Kong. A young man of Chinese/Japanese heritage (Spencer Nakasako) working at a racetrack in San Francisco is hired by gangsters to deliver a briefcase to the Big Boss (Lo Wai), a notorious leader of Hong Kong's organized crime syndicate. Dressed in western clothes and proclaiming himself "The Man with No Name," the courier arrives in Hong Kong with the briefcase chained to his wrist, but this doesn't stop a group of enterprising young hoodlums from stealing it from him. As he searches for his precious cargo, the man tries desperately to rendezvous with the Big Boss, only to hear a dizzying variety of excuses from his second-in-command (Lam Chung) as to why the Boss can't or won't see him. The courier also has to deal with his elderly Uncle Cheng (Cheng Kwan Ming), who would rather show off his latest dance routines than help his nephew save his own neck. The man also witnesses all sorts of bizarre and bewildering behavior, from a restaurant that serves feces to a prostitute who announces she doesn't mind being abused, though she's tired of not being paid for it. Directed by Wayne Wang in collaboration with actor Spencer Nakasako, Life Is Cheap...But Toilet Paper Is Expensive was released by Wang with a self-imposed "A" rating (for "Adult") after being threatened with an "X" by the MPAA ratings board; the film contains no explicit sex, but the MPAA was troubled by the film's gangland violence and pervasive bad taste. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

In this actioner, ninjas take on greedy pirates in the ancient Orient. ~ Sandra Brennan, Rovi

It's not Bruce Lee, nor Bruce Le, nor Bruce Lei nor Bruce Li. Nope: the star of Dragon of Shaolin is someone named Brute Lee. That someone plays a martial arts student, who saves his temple from Mongolian bandits. Others in the cast are Casanova Wong, Jim Choi and Sally Chen. Also known as Dragon From Shaolin, this film was completed in 1982, but not given worldwide release until '84. ~ Hal Erickson, Rovi

In this film, a group of Chinese police officers are assigned to take out a sinister crime ring. ~ Iotis Erlewine, Rovi

Tyron Hsu directs Lo Lieh, Yueh Hua, and Sang Gwan in the Hong Kong action film 99 Cycling Swords. When political rebels begin to cause trouble in a small town, the warlords command a village official (Lieh), to roust them. He in turn passes the job onto four martial arts masters. ~ Perry Seibert, Rovi

Chao Chun-fang (Lo Lieh), a mentally unbalanced lantern maker gets a chance to avenge his mistreatment by two rich and powerful men when one of the men (who are enemies, in fact) asks him to make special lanterns for an approaching festival. Chao then methodically kills three female family members of the two wealthy men and peels off their skin to use as a covering for the lanterns. These acts are shown in full detail -- not a movie for anyone sensitive to the victimization of women in films, nor for those who are aware of the Nazi antecedent of constructing lampshades out of the skin of their victims, nor for those who would find the actions objectionable on any grounds. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi

Joseph Velasco directs martial arts star Bruce Lee in the action film Ninja vs. Bruce Lee. A Japanese Ninja is tearing apart a Chinese police force. Using his Chinese kung fu skills, Bruce Lee takes on the Ninjitsu master in order to set things right. ~ Perry Seibert, Rovi

As a sequel to Executioners from Shaolin, this standard kung-fu actioner features Liu Jiahui as the fighter Hong Wending whose friends have been killed by the seditious White Lotus Society. He wants revenge. In order to prepare himself for the great confrontation with the head of the White Lotus fighters, White Eyebrow--otherwise known as Pai Mei--who has two remarkable skills: He can achieve weightlessness and he can draw his reproductive organs up into his stomach in order to protect them. Wending is trained by a woman (Hui Yinghong) in how to use her more flexible style of combat. From his boss, he also learns the secret of acupuncture points that are connected with specific parts of the body. Armed with needles placed in his braided hair, he is ready to shut down his opponent like a toy whose batteries are disabled. His opponent, it so happens, is an aged abbot (played by director Lo Lieh) who looks like he could not harm a fly. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi

Lau Kar-leung spins this high-flying kung-fu saga about a Peking opera actor named Chen (played by the director), who, along with his beautiful sister (Kara Hui Ying-hung), is invited to dine with the dastardly and powerful Mr. Tuan (Lo Lieh). There Chen is slipped a mickey and when he comes to is accused of trying to rape Tuan's wife. Tuan offers to spare Chen's life if his sister becomes his concubine. The dealt is struck and Chen is cast into the street after getting his hands smashed by Tuan's henchmen. Years later, we find Chen struggling as a street performer with a trained monkey named Ah Mo. When Chen runs afoul of some gangsters, they kill his monkey. Just before Chen decides to snuff his own candle, he realizes that energetic street urchin known as Monkey (Hsiao Ho) would make a decent substitute for his former simian partner. After the two again run afoul of the same gangsters, Chen vows to teach Monkey kung-fu and soon thwarts the thugs. Later, he along with Monkey decides to take on Tuan and break his sibling out of sexual bondage. ~ Jonathan Crow, Rovi

In this vintage martial arts-adventure, a warrior (Gordon Liu), searching for a criminal on the run from the law, discovers a gang of thieves who plan to steal an irreplaceable Jade Buddha. He leaps into action to save the Buddha, but he discovers a variety of bizarre traps and gifted martial arts fights are laying in wait for him. Fists and Guts also stars Lo Lieh, best-known for his work in Five Fingers of Death, the first major martial arts hit in the United States. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

In this fast-moving martial arts melee set in the Warlord Era of the 1920s, chaos rules the land and only one woman has the strength to survive a constant onslaught of desperate criminals and fierce warriors. When a woman warrior (Angela Mao) comes to town, there's a fight to be had every ten minutes, and the gang of bandits who rule with an iron fist are about to get a taste of their own medicine. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi