Li Lianjie, better known by his stage name Jet Li, is a Chinese-born Singaporean martial artist, actor, and philanthropist. After three years of training with acclaimed wushu teacher Wu Bin, Li won his first national championship for the Beijing Wushu Team at age 11. Between 1974 and 1979, he won the title of Men's All-Around National Wushu Champion five times. After retiring from competitive wushu at age 18, he went on to win great acclaim as an actor, making his debut with the Chinese-Hong Kong martial arts film Shaolin Temple (1982), which instantly catapulted him to stardom in East Asia.
Martial arts films are a subgenre of action films that feature martial arts combat between characters. These combats are usually the films' primary appeal and entertainment value, and often are a method of storytelling and character expression and development. Martial arts are frequently featured in training scenes and other sequences in addition to fights. Martial arts films commonly include hand-to-hand combat along with other types of action, such as stuntwork, chases, and gunfights. Sub-genres of martial arts films include kung fu films, wuxia, karate films, and martial arts action comedy films, while related genres include gun fu, jidaigeki and samurai films.
Mo Tse is a Chinese actor and a martial artist who began his career as a child actor. He is known for his roles in Chinese action movies. He has starred as a father-son duo with Jet Li in the 1994 film The New Legend of Shaolin. He was also in The Champions, which was the opening film at the 2008 Chinese American Film Festival.
Yuen Woo-ping is a Hong Kong martial arts choreographer and film director who worked in Hong Kong action cinema and later Hollywood films. He is one of the inductees on the Avenue of Stars in Hong Kong. Yuen is also a son of Yuen Siu-tien, a martial arts film actor. He attended the China Drama Academy for one year as a day student of Master Yu Jim-yuen as well.
Cheung Cheun-Nam, known professionally as Yuen Qiu, is a Hong Kong actress and martial artist. She is an expert of both Chinese martial arts and Beijing-opera skills, and was apprenticed at the Peking Opera School under the same master, Yu Jim-yuen, as Jackie Chan and Sammo Hung.
Shou Wan-por, known professionally as Robin Shou, is a Hong Kong-American actor, martial artist and stuntman. Born in British Hong Kong but raised in Los Angeles, Shou's interest in martial arts developed during his years as a University student. This led him to win several championships as a martial artist, both in China and the United States. He entered the Hong Kong film industry as a stuntman in the late 1980's, and went on to star in films such as City War (1988), opposite Chow Yun-Fat, and Tiger Cage 2 (1990), opposite Donnie Yen.
Fearless, also known as Huo Yuanjia (霍元甲) in Chinese, as Spirit in Japan and as Jet Li's Fearless in the United Kingdom and in the United States, is a 2006 Hong Kong-Chinese martial arts film directed by Ronny Yu and starring Jet Li. It is loosely based on the life of Huo Yuanjia, a Chinese martial artist who challenged foreign fighters in highly publicized events, restoring pride and nationalism to China at a time when Western imperialism and Japanese manipulation were eroding the country in the final years of the Qing dynasty before the birth of the Republic of China. Li stated that the film was his last wushu martial arts film, a point also made in the film's television promotions and other publicity, although he would do action films with martial arts in them and did not rule out historical epics with martial arts.
Kung fu film is a subgenre of martial arts films and Hong Kong action cinema set in the contemporary period and featuring realistic martial arts. It lacks the fantasy elements seen in wuxia, a related martial arts genre that uses historical settings based on ancient China. Swordplay is also less common in kung-fu films than in wuxia and fighting is done through unarmed combat.
Wilson Yip Wai-Shun is a Hong Kong actor, filmmaker and screenwriter. His films include Bio Zombie, The White Dragon, SPL: Sha Po Lang, Dragon Tiger Gate, Flash Point and the Ip Man series.
The Forbidden Kingdom is a 2008 Chinese-American fantasy wuxia film written by John Fusco and directed by Rob Minkoff, starring Jackie Chan, Jet Li, Michael Angarano, Liu Yifei, Collin Chou, and Li Bingbing. Loosely based on the 16th-century Chinese novel Journey to the West, the plot revolves around Jason Tripitikas (Angarano), a modern-day American teenager who is transported back to ancient China after discovering the Monkey King's magical staff. He accompanies Lu Yan / Old Hop (Chan) and Sun Wukong / Silent Monk (Li) on their quest to return the staff to its rightful owner while trying to avoid the minions of the evil Jade Emperor (Chou). The action sequences were choreographed by Yuen Woo-ping.
The Clones of Bruce Lee is a 1980 Bruceploitation martial arts film capitalizing on the death of actor and martial arts star Bruce Lee in 1973.
Nina Li Chi is a retired Hong Kong actress. She is also known by her Chinese name Li Chi or Li Zhi. She is best known for being the wife of famous martial artist and actor Jet Li.
My Father Is a Hero is a 1995 Hong Kong action film starring Jet Li and Anita Mui, directed by Corey Yuen, who also co-stars in the film. The film was released in Hong Kong on 2 March 1995.
Dr. Wai in "The Scripture with No Words" is a 1996 Hong Kong action film directed by Ching Siu-tung and starring Jet Li.
Hong Kong Cinemagic, sometimes referred to as HKCinemagic, was a bilingual website providing a repository for information about Chinese language films from Hong Kong, China and Taiwan, and the people who created them. The website contained news, interviews, film reviews and a database of people, films and film studios as well as an illustrated glossary of terms. The web magazine existed in various forms for over two decades. As of March 2009, the database contains over 10,000 films. The site was updated for the last time in December 2017.
Jet Li is a Chinese-born Singaporean martial artist, retired wushu champion, film actor, film producer, and philanthropist. His first non-Chinese film role was as a villain in the 1998 buddy cop action film Lethal Weapon 4 with Mel Gibson and Danny Glover. His first leading role in a Hollywood film was as Han Sing in the 2000 martial arts action film Romeo Must Die with Aaliyah. He has gone on to star in other international action films, including the Luc Besson-produced French films Kiss of the Dragon (2001) and Unleashed (2005). He co-starred in The One (2001) and War (2007) with Jason Statham, The Forbidden Kingdom (2008) with Jackie Chan, the first three of The Expendables films with Sylvester Stallone (2010-2014), and as the title character villain in The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor (2008). In 2020, he portrayed The Emperor of China in the live-action fantasy drama Disney film Mulan.
Crazy Couple is a 1979 Hong Kong martial arts comedy film directed by Ricky Lau and starring Dean Shek and Lau Ka-yung.
Exorcist Master is a 1992 comedy horror Hong Kong film directed by Wu Ma and starring Wu Ma and Lam Ching-ying. It is a spin-off of the 1985 Hong Kong movie Mr. Vampire. Lam Ching-ying reprises his role as a Taoist priest.
Ng Kui Chuen, better known by his stage name Ko Lo Chuen, was a Hong Kong actor. Ko and his brother began acting in the 1930s.
Mike Leeder is an English casting director, producer and actor based in Hong Kong. Leeder has been responsible for DVD and Blu-ray special features for many Hong Kong productions. He worked on such projects as Fearless (2006), The Raid 2 (2014), The Man with the Iron Fists (2012), Man of Tai Chi (2013), Ultimate Justice (2016), Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016), Chasing the Dragon (2017) and Donnie Yen's Big Brother (2018).
