Best movies like The Black Tavern

The "Godfather Of The Kung-Fu Film" created this rousing epic of a seemingly suicidal mission to destroy the Japanese Navy's flagship in 1937, featuring many great actors he had worked with over the years. Their courageous and desperate attempts to do just that comprise the remarkable action in this rousing epic, featuring some of the greatest actors Chang had ever made, was making, and would ever make famous. (IVL)

Our hero Kuo Tsing is winning the hand of fair maiden Huang Yung. However, almost immediately, clan rivalries in the "Martial Art World" lead to Kuo being wounded by Ouyang Feng and Huang being named the new leader of the Beggar Clan. All this is mounted with sparkling energy by three kung-fu choreographers and a star-packed cast.

A treasure hunt sparks the continuing violence in this Hong Kong action film, yet the film does not focus only on the violent nature of some of the characters. An enamored Ting Tien (Pai Piao) spends a cold winter's night waiting to spot the love of his life, Ling Shuang-hua (Szu Shih), when she makes her usual morning excursion onto her balcony. The theme of his love for her is treated with sensitivity, though his love does not affect the fate in store for both himself and the woman he worships. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, Rovi

When the children of an executed General are pursued in 1457 China, some heroic martial arts swordsmen intervene.

There is no place more hallowed in the martial art world than China's Shaolin Temple. This special place deserves a special epic, which is what the martial arts maestro delivers in this battle between a brave brand of Chinese boxers and literally thousands of Qing troops - complete with betrayals, intrigues, and such novel fighting machines as 108 wooden robots. The conflicts grow in complexity, intensity and even suspense as monks struggle to stay alive in the face of overwhelming odds.

Chan is asked by a young, wealthy lady to take her sick brother to a particular doctor in order to be cured. To reach this doctor, Chan and a handful of travelling companions must pass through bandit-infested wild country. They meet and kung-fu-fight several gangs of thugs along the way.

Zhao Wuji embarks on an very tragic adventure with full of intrigues to avenge his father, who is beheaded by a traitor working for Tang, on the eve of son's marriage.

Liao Jiang is the lowest ranking member of a gang that holds up a jewelery store. Subsequently the three other gang members die, and their gold haul goes missing. Liao Jiang and his new gang member Huge Eyes are then forced to turn to a triad gang to help get back their gold from a rival group.

Eagle Chief Yoh Xi-hung raises orphans to be his personal killers. One such is Chik Ming-sing who now wants to put his killer life behind him. When the Eagle Clan come after him, a stranger called Cheuk comes to his assistance It turns out that Cheuk is the son of a family who were robbed and murdered by the Eagles. Now they will team up to destroy the evil clan.

This documentary tells the story of Bruce Lee and his unsuccessful efforts to start a acting career in the U.S., he returned to Hong Kong where he became an international star, and his death at age 32.

After avenging the death of his brother, Chen Shen (Bruce Li) returns home from Shanghai. He tells his mother (who went blind from crying over her son's death) that he will no longer fight. However, being a movie with the words "fist" and "fury" in the title, Chen doesn't keep his promise for very long. Japanese occupiers who are aware of Chen's history terrorize his family by, among other things, vandalizing his mother's store and beating up his brother. Later, they frame Chen for a murder. After the Japanese boss arrives in town and causes a ruckus, Chen breaks out of jail for a final confrontation.

Robert Wallace travels to Hong Kong to bust a gang of drug trafficker's. There he finds help from Tang and Suzy, as well as his fellow Supermen Max & Jerry.

The most explosive barehanded combat sequences ever filmed. An electrifying video of martial arts mastery and mayhem. This program takes a behind-the-scenes look at the weapons, the mystical eastern philosophy, and the incredible skills that have made martial arts films one of the most popular genres in the world today.

The emperor's reign of terror expands. Heroic outlaw Ma Teng joins a squad of female rebels, whose leader is torn between family loyalties.

Wong Fei Hung and his friend are constantly having contests to see who has the better martial arts skill. After getting in trouble with their fathers, Wong Fei Hung settles down and starts to train seriously, while his friend still horses around. After his friend is hurt by a rival school, Wong goes to the school for retribution. Instead his skill is tested through a series of events which climax with him taking on a Northern martial artist. In an excellent battle of skill, he earns the respect of the rival school. Also stars Mai Te Lo and Hui Ying Hung.

A young Kung Fu student seeks a reclusive teacher so that she may learn to defeat the evil Black Demon. She doesn't realize that the servant woman she befriends is actually the kung fu master she seeks. After Black Demons henchmen attack, the master reveals herself and eventually takes on the student to train her so that they may both defeat the villian. A love triangle complicates things when another student asks for training as well.

Set at the time of Italian explorer Marco Polo's historic expedition to China ,during the reign of Monogol ruler Kublai Khan, it stars American actor Richard Harrison as Polo. Taking considerable liberties with the historic record, the film has Polo turning up as an Imperial Inspector assigned to root out Chinese rebles in the south, but eventually being won over to their cause.

This top ten box office hit reunites the star duo from Come Drink With Me in another classic action adventure. Cheng Pei-pei radiates her trademark charm while wielding the deadly title weapon, which is implicated in multiple murders and a major heist. Whether single-handedly fighting sixteen bandits or avenging her father's brutal death, she demonstrates why she was Hong Kong's number one swordswoman and no slouch with the whip either!

A noble swordsman and a one-armed swordswoman go up against the vicious Crimson Charm gang of thieves and cutthroats. The lovely and lethal Ivy Ling Po teams with the amazing Chang I for a classic tale of good versus evil in which the best man and one-armed woman wins.

As an expert of the 'Cross fists' technique, a reclusive kung fu master Li Pai perfects a lethal maneuver called the 'Shaolin Handlock' while an old wolf-in-sheep's-clothing friend Fang Yun-piao pays the unwitting Li a visit. Armed with the deadly Handlock maneuver, Cheng-ying & Kun Shih joins forces to exact revenge on the evil Ling Hao after the truth is unraveled.

Sun Chung had been recognized as an expert comedy and crime thriller director, but he was to gain even greater acclaim for his soulful, powerful, intelligent, and beautifully-made martial arts epics. This stands alongside The Deadly Breaking Sword and The Kung-fu Instructor as one of his very best. It’s not so much the plot – a master swordsman protects a treasure chest on a dangerous journey – that makes this great, but what Sun does with it, inspiring the cast and crew to some of their finest work.

Leaving behind an inch of sword in the spent corpses of his opponents, Tuan Changqing is known as the Deadly Breaking Sword. After barely surviving a duel, one of his foes is treated by the diabolical Dr. Kuo, who uses his powers of mind control to transform the man into a somnambulistic killer. After Tuan Changqing teams up with Rabelaisian gambler Xiao Dao, the story proceeds as a comical kung fu buddy flick.

Three martial arts directors united for this unique anthology film. Yueh Feng writes and directs a clever love-and-kung-fu triangle, Cheng Kang both writes and directs kung-fu courtesans battling brigands, and the "godfather of the kung-fu film," Chang Cheh, creates a cliff-hanging, swashbuckling mini-movie with maxi-action.

1979 Hong Kong kung fu film. A young warrior takes revenge on the man who killed his master.

A recently jailed martial arts master teams up with a wronged woman to take down the man's brother, a coal baron who rules a small town with an iron fist.

Don't expect a long life if you are one of the emperor's fourteen sons! For instance, Ninth Prince meets an "accident" while hunting. The (unnamed) Manchu emperor is old and ill, and speculation about his successor is rife. But the powerful Lord Long, who is not a son of the emp, wants the throne as well. To stay alive, Fourth Prince keeps secret his kung fu lessons and plays the fool. Fourth Prince then leaves palace life to live among the poor. He befriends a ragged band on commoners and, eventually, returns to the palace to prevent Lord Long's rise to the throne after the last prince is killed.

Traveling swordsman Shen Sheng-yi (Ti Lung) and his lady friend match wits and swords with the last surviving member of the once great Murung family who is determined to rule the martial world by stealing plans to crafting firearms.

A murderer, with the help of Chinese vampires, does battle with the ghost of a dead gambling lord's wife and the gambling lord's living brother. A cut n paste movie that uses footage from The Stunning Gambling (Taiwan) mixed with new footage.

Director Chu Yuan was one of the new breed of directors at Shaw who raised the bar of martial arts films, by adding compelling storylines and a good dose of drama. Despite being without his regular cohorts Ku Lung and Ti Lung here, Chu shows his master stroke as he delves into the dastardly ways of evil warlords in China back in the 1910’s. Drama and action both take centre-stage as Tsung Hua and Ching Li fall prey to a lecherous general (Stanley Feng Tsui-fan) who rapes and forces the latter to become his concubine. With the help of two street performers (the deft and agile Chen Kuan-tai and Shih Szu) he once helped, Tsung hatches a plot to save his beloved – with deadly consequences.

The plot involves patriots during the Sung Dynasty and their attempts to rescue a kidnapped prince from Ching troops who have invaded the north of China. The patriots are led by Ti Lung who recruits a mysterious but seemingly superhuman fighter played by David Chiang to find a way to cross a perilous bridge to enter an impregnable fortress to locate and rescue the imprisoned prince.

It's a no-holds-barred battle to the death for possession of the invaluable Purple Sword. Assistant director Wang Po-yi also wrote this entertaining and exciting adventure which could have also been called "The Five Tigers" since there's no doubt that this quintet is the highlight of the action. Huang Tsung-shun is "Fierce Tiger," Hung Liu is "Drunk Tiger," Hsu Erh-niu is "Lame Tiger," award-winning actor Ku Feng is "One-eyed Tiger" and respected director/actor Wu Ma is "Sick Tiger" in a tangle of tussles and thrills

Nobody would think that Bruce Li and Yuen Wo Ping has much in common but this epic film proves otherwise. After the death of Bruce Lee a new star is chosen and mayhem follows. The whole Yuen Clan contributes in what could be Li's greatest action scenes.

Wong Hsia Yuan is an old-fashioned martial arts master who's so behind the times that he'd rather his school be destroyed than change its ways. He may get his wish, thanks to the young, beautiful, intelligent Chan Mei Ling, who arrives from the states to open a new branch of the school. Armed with an unfamiliar, modern way of thinking, Mei Ling goes about recruiting new students in strange, and sometimes questionably legal ways. Yuan is furious, but when the local triads enter the picture, the two put their differences aside to take back the neighborhood.

Legendary director Chang Cheh teamed his latest big star, Alexander Fu Sheng, with future Venoms Lo Meng and Kuo Chue to create another winner in his vaunted filmography. Joining them were the top supporting actors and the prettiest starlets, for an entertaining, exciting tale of a kung-fu blacksmith taking on four famous robbers while a villainous gambling boss plots to destroy them.

Veteran action actor and director Lu Chun-ku set his sights on a tale of Ching Dynasty royal intrigue as an excuse to hire his favorite action stars, gather three choreographers, and film one fight-filled conspiracy after another. Liu Hsueh-hua is the title character caught between battling princes. Then there's award-winning actor Ku Feng, "Bastard Swordsman" Hsu Shao-chiang, "King of Shaw Brothers' Screen Villains" Wang Lung-wei, "Venom" Sun Chien, and even the director shows up to get his kicks in this danger-fraught adventure.

Master of the "swordplay thriller" genre, Chor Yuen and renowned kung-fu choreographer Tang Chia tell the fabulous tale of the "Fastest Swordsman in the World" facing the "1000 Face Devil" and no less than seven murderers.

In The Master Strikes Back, Hong Kong's Steadicam pioneering director Sun Chung brings back legendary Ti Lung to play famous weapons instructor Tung Tieh-cheng, who is invited to teach a Ching official's soldiers, in this unofficial sequel to The Kung-fu Instructor. But after his son is kidnapped and castrated what follows is a chaotic, human whirlwind of slicing and dicing compliments of the highly touted martial arts director and one of Jackie Chan's kung-fu classmates, Yuan Te.

A small village is taken over by the nasty Japanese, who kill the town's top kung fu fighter in order to scare the populace into submission. Escaping the wrath of the Japanese, the son of the master flees into the hills, where he trains with a group of rebels led by Gam Kei-Chu. Fast-forward ten years, and Chuen returns to the village armed with his father's secret technique of the Thunderbolt Fist with the hopes of killing the leader of the Japanese.

Renowned writer Shen Chiang had become so popular for his scripts that the studio let him direct as well. Here he continued his winning ways with this tale of the end of the Sung Dynasty and the survivors who band together to save their prime minister. Shen outdoes himself with this bold and stirring story of daring Sung avengers (led by Shaws' first international star, Lo Lieh), who must fight their way out of trap after trap.

It's the year 1898 and government reformists are aggressively sought out and publicly executed by the Ching Dynasty officials. Master Wang, a leader of the reformist party, enlists the help of skilled fighters for reinforcements, including Cheong San, a longtime enemy of the treacherous Lord Wing. With the help of Lela Wong, Cheong San's betrothed, Cheong San and Master Wnag battle their nemesis to further their cause. What Cheong San's enemies believe to be his weak point they soon discover to be his source of power. He is most lethal when intoxicated, lending him the name of Drunken San. This is another must-see for classic kung fu combat fans.

Respected veteran Yueh Feng made this “Martial Arts World” saga of a masked master of the “Black Sand Hand Technique,” while Lily Ho, the star of "Princess Iron Fan" and "Angel With The Iron Fists", excels in a delightful dual leading role. When she teams up with Shu Pei-pei as a fellow swordswoman to vanquish a murdering robber, the comparisons to "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" are obvious, even though it came three decades later.

A group of evil bandits are terrorizing the land from their invincible mountain castle. The high commanding official decides to put a stop to this and commands one of his officers to gather a group of Kung Fu masters to put an end to the terror. But everything is not that simple and straight-forward, as we quite soon learn when the plot thickens.

Chen Wo-Fu plays construction worker Ku Ting, whose skill at "tai chi" (shadow boxing) is as great as his pacifism. But when his girlfriend is raped by vicious gangsters, he shows everyone the true power and beauty of tai chi.

Paul (Zhang Chong) is a businessman who gets caught up in an international espionage plot when he accidentally switches briefcases with a friend aboard a Singapore-bound plane. The friend turns up dead, and Paul discovers a small Golden Buddha inside the briefcase that contains a set of instructions. The instructions are only one of three parts, the other two being held in similar Golden Buddhas by Lo Wei (doing double duty as actor and director) and Lin Cui. When combined, the three Buddhas will lead the bearers to a buried treasure. But the nefarious Skeleton Gang is after the Buddhas, along with a buxom femme fatale (Fannie Fan) who isn't above showing a little skin to get her way. Luckily, Paul knows kung-fu, so the bad guys had better watch out!

Sun Chung had made a name for himself directing satirical comedies and modern day crime thrillers when he started exploring the kung-fu genre with this fascinating tale which mixes music and martial arts. Revered choreographer Tang Chia leads a great action cast in a tale of conflicting clans and a mysterious song called "The Proud One" which leads to slowly blossoming love as well as sudden death.

The plot follows the titular gang of misfits, gathered together by Chen Kuan Tai (a real life martial arts champion who starred in many films for the studio) in order to protect a patriotic general from a scheming usurper. To this end, the unlikely heroes act as the general’s escorts on a dangerous journey to a distant British consulate, beset by enemies and sinister Japanese interference along the way.

Award-winning actor Ku Feng is Lei Chen-tien, a vicious, cunning, murderous brigand who wants the title treasure. Tsung Hua is Tai Tien-chou, the handsome swordsman who wants to avenge his father's death. Wang Ping is Wu Hsiao-yen, the lovely girl who must disguise herself as a boy to take on this pirate. Tien Feng both directs and co-stars as The Senior Master in this blade and battle-filled adventure of intrigue, treachery, and tragic triumph.

Heroes of Sung stars one of the original kung-fu ladies of the silver screen Shih Szu playing swordswoman Meng Hung who must work with Fan Tien-fu, played by perennial Shaws bad guy Lo Lieh (although he's good in this) to find then protect the royal seals of the Sung Dynasty. If they should fail, the dynasty will fall. Shih's magnificent performance earned her the female hero role in the Shaws-Hammer Studio hit "Dracula" and the 7 Golden Vampires.

After a career spanning more than forty years and dozens of films as director or writer, Yueh Feng used everything he learned on a final few martial arts epics, of which this is one of the most memorable. It's not easy to forget a hunchbacked, one-armed protagonist, nor the "Poisonous Dragon Sword" style, nor the luminous and lethal Shih Szu as the title swordswoman, who is out to avenge her father's death at the mid-autumn festival.

Two tough gangsters try to outdo each other to become Shanghai's top gangster and take control of the Wharf area. Some brilliant fights from top kung fu stars Wilson Tong and Philip Ko.