Production of Ching Siu-tung

1982: Duel To The Death
Every ten years a representative of the Shaolin school faced the representative of a Japanese school to determine who was the best of the two schools. Two warriors (Tsui Siu-keung and Damian Lau) were designated to fight 'til death, but they were victims of plots warped by their superiors.

Prolonging the interrogations which are posed by The Sword on the knighthood, Ching Siu-tung adds a visual processing by directing fast and very cut out fights. he does not hesitate to integrate some mild nutters ideas such as a bird which speaks or ninjas with supernatural capacities, even completely incredible scenes like the meeting of the Chinese epeist and his Master. Finally it is a film that oscillates between serious and jokes with a certain success.

1986: Witch From Nepal aka A Touch Of Love
Whereas a man from hong kong(Chow Yun Fat) was on holiday in Nepal with his girl friend (Cherie Chung), he saw mysterious young woman (Emily Chu). During an excursion, he saw her again before being victim of an accident. Hospitalized in Hong Kong, he was followed by the mysterious woman who said him that he is her Master and that he had to fight against the evil forces..

Especially known for his famous attack of evil-deads, the film is about a love trio. Unfortunately, in spite of a greet casting, Ching Siu-tung didn't make his love story attaching, like the mixture between the marvellous universe that incarne the " witch " and the contemporary world, that is not very convincing. The fantastic phenomena emerged without explanation and are consequently in opposite with the modern universe which is used.

1987: Chinese Ghost Story (Co-realization)
A young collector of taxes (Leslie Cheung) fell in love with a ghost (Joey Wong).

If this film is good thanks to Tsui Hark, Ching Siu-tung brings his rhythm on the scenes of combat.

1989: The Terracotta Warrior
One of the Generals of the emperor Qing (Zhang Yimou) fell in love with a concubine (Gong Li). When this love was discovered, the lovers have no choice, only give themselves death. But before dying, the concubine managed to give to her lover a pearl of immortality intended for the emperor. In the Thirties, the warrior was awaked by plunderers of tombs. They were accompanied by a young scatterbrained actress who looked like the ancient concubine.

Even if Ching Siu-tung does not manage to find the same attaching tone like in his last movie, the esthetism and the presence of very ostentatious scenes confer to this opposed relation a certain beauty. On the other hand the second part is definheely less convincing, especially because of the character of the young girl who is played by Gong Li and of the tone sometimes heavily burlesque of the film. It remains a very interesting reflexion on the past and the inexorable destroying work of time plunging the men and their time in the lapse of memory.

1990: Chinese Ghost Story 2
Ning (Leslie Cheung) is put in jail by error. The day of his execution, he managed to flee and met a young woman (Joey Wong) who resembled his died girl friend.

Freer than on the preceding episode, Ching Siu- tung falls into the trap of the higher bid. A crazy and cynical film whose chaotic environment is due to the events of tiananmen.

1991: Chinese ghost story 3
In the temple Lan Ro, a monk (Tony Leung Chiu-wai) was attacked by a ghost.

On this third episode, Ching Siu-tung was more free. He make a film with a completed esthetism, but the formal success makes him forget sometimes what constitutes the principal interest of the series : the relations between ghosts and human beings. Nevertheless the spectacle is quite good.

1991: The Raid

1992: Sworsdman 2 (co-realization)
Fox (Jet Li) and Kiddo (Michelle Reis) searched their companions. But the fights between clans would oblige them to give up their projects.

Tsui Hark and Ching Siu-tung find the good formula. The action, even if it is delirious, never fall into the grotesque. It's the same for emotion, some scenes come to underline it with accuracy. Obviously we didn't know who is truly the leading director.One can say that the political speech in the background is typical of the reflexions developed by Tsui Hark. A collective work thus. A great success in any case!

1993: Heroic Trio (again co-realization)
Babies were mysteriously carried away. Impotent, the police is fortunately helped by a masked woman (Anita Mui) soon joined by a head hunter (Maggie Cheung) and their enemies (Michelle Yeoh) who would adopt the cause of the good to overcome the evil.

Inspired at the same time by the universe of the American Comics and the wu xia pians, putting in scene heroins and warriors in the cantonese cinema in the Sixties, this film allured cause of this daring shock between the cultures and of the presence of three of the most beautiful actresses of the hong kong cinema. Realized with Johnny To, an old friend, Ching Siu-tung deals primarily with the scenes of action.

1993: Executionners aka The Heroic Trio 2 (co-realization)

After a nuclear war, the unpolluted water became a rare product. Controlled by a man who wanted to take power, water was used to generate a political instability favourable with a coup d'etat. Fortunately the heroic trio was here...

Johnny To and Ching Siu-tung realized with the same team, this second episode to deaden the too high budget of the first opus. Less imaginative, less action, less amazing, this film suffers from all the insufficiencies of sequels.

1993: Swordsman 3 aka The East Is Red
Asia the invincible came again to restore the order in the world of the martial arts.

Less controled by Tsui Hark, Ching Siu-tung multiplies the delirium. Very fun, sometimes very beautiful and having a splendid music, if this film does not reach the quality of these two predecessors, it remains quite better than all the copies generated by the success of the original series.

1994: Wonder Seven
Seven agents of continental China constituted a special brigade whose role was to track the criminals who acted between Hong Kong and the continent. Having to stop a dangerous trafficker of weapons, they fell into a trap. Abandoned by their superiors, our seven heroes had to react as fast as possible.

Due to the decline of the film in costumes, Ching Siu-tung tries to rebound with this contemporary film of action. But the director is satisfied with proposing an simple entertainment using his style to make him look like comics, which will amuse the lovers of the kind.

1996: Dr. Wai In " The Scripture With No Words "
Dr. Wai (Jet Li) had to recover a ancient parchment and to precede Japanese in this perilous company.

Taking as a starting point Indiana Jones, Ching Siu-tung manages to offer once again a film very distracting, but like most of his movies made apart from the Workshop, it is just a simple entertainment, it misses something.. It should be noted that the film exists in two versions. An international version stupidly linear. And a Cantonese version where the adventures of Dr. Wai are written by a writer who regulates his personal problems through the writing. This second version, definitely more subtle, doesn't put in scene in a convincing way the sentimental problems between the characters.

Laurent Henry.