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From Chow Yun-fat, above, left, with Cherie Cheung in a still from 1987’s “An Autumn’s Tale”, to Leslie Cheung and Anita Mui, gangster films and adults-only movies, the 1980s was a rich era in Hong Kong cinema, and a time of change. Photo: D&B Films

Lifestyle Entertainment

Explainer | 1980s Hong Kong cinema: From Chow Yun-fat, Leslie Cheung and Anita Mui to gangster films and adults-only movies, it was a rich era

In Hong Kong cinema in the 1980s, martial arts films were updated to modern settings and bloodthirsty gangster films took off along with Chow Yun-fat
The big studios were losing their iron grip on the industry, and the Category III classification brought a new soft-core porn genre to Hong Kong cinema

Asian cinema: Hong Kong film

Richard James Havis

Published: 4:15am, 2 Jul 2023

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The 1960s, 70s and 90s are all considered golden ages for Hong Kong cinema – but what about the 80s?

It was an era when home-grown Cantonese-language films outperformed Hollywood films at the local box office, “heroic bloodshed” became a genre, and Chow Yun-fat became a superstar.

Below we revisit what happened in this less discussed but equally rich era of Hong Kong filmmaking.

Cinema started to reflect modern Hong Kong life

From left: Sam Hui, Sylvia Chang and Karl Maka in a still from “Aces Go Places” (1982). Photo: SCMP

The 80s was when Hong Kong cinema became truly local and started to reflect the daily lives of the then-British colony’s inhabitants.

The urban films of the 50s and 60s had been idealised and moralistic, and martial arts films – the backbone of the industry in the 60s and 70s – mainly set in historical China.

“The more traditional genres with historical backgrounds in China gave way to more Westernised urbanised genres,” critic Sek Kei wrote in 1991, in a survey of the 80s.

Hong Kong New Wave cinema: the directors and their groundbreaking movies

Following the lead of Michael Hui Koon-man in the previous decade, popular comedies like the Aces Go Places series were set in modern Hong Kong, and Sammo Hung Kam-bo updated the settings of his kung fu films to modern times.

As in the West, the late 80s also saw a mini-genre of “Yuppie films” like The Yuppie Fantasia, which reflected the changes in Hong Kong society and were popular with middle-class cinema-goers.

But by the 1990s, period films were back with a vengeance.

Lawrence Cheng (left) and Carol Cheng in a still from “The Yuppie Fantasia” (1989).

Hong Kong finally got an adults-only rating

Hong Kong lacked an adults-only rating until 1988, and this meant films could be banned or cut because of their content – sex scenes were sometimes excised – and for their political and social ideas.

Those banned included the gay film The Boys in the Band and the crime movie Shaft, the latter because the censors thought it gave the impression citizens should take the law into their own hands.

Leslie Cheung and Shu Qi in a still from “Viva Erotica”, a Category III film released in 1996. Photo: SCMP

The Film Censorship Ordinance of 1988 established the adults-only Category III rating, and film buffs thought this would enable more progressive foreign art-house films to be shown in the colony.

In fact it triggered an explosion of local soft-core porn films, which became a genre of their own.

Gangster films took off; the ‘heroic bloodshed’ era dawned

Director John Woo Yu-sum’s 1986 gangster drama A Better Tomorrow was such a big box-office hit, it launched a genre of triad films – dubbed “heroic bloodshed” in the West – which would dominate Hong Kong cinema screens until the end of the decade.

Chow Yun-fat in a still from “A Better Tomorrow” (1986). Photo: ISD Photo

Scores of violent and bloody gangster films of varying quality were released until 1989, when the genre began to fade. These films brought technical innovation and helped modernise Hong Kong cinema.

“The 80s saw a greater emphasis on special effects hardware and more stunt work to make the gun battles seem more gory and real,” wrote Sek Kei.

“This development in adding special effects and action stunts [was] the major technical achievement of Hong Kong cinema in the 80s.”

The era of the big studios ended

Shaw Bros, Hong Kong’s premier old-style studio, ceased producing films in 1984 with the powerful martial arts drama The Eight Diagram Pole Fighter.

This marked the end of the classic studio era that had dominated Hong Kong. Smaller, independent producers became the order of the day.

Gordon Liu in a still from “The Eight Diagram Pole Fighter”. Photo: Shaw Brothers

Shaw’s rival Golden Harvest continued to thrive, powered by Jackie Chan’s hits. Company boss Raymond Chow Man-wai had developed a looser production system whereby films were co-produced with smaller companies, rather than the monolithic top-down approach of Shaw mogul Run Run Shaw.

Oddly, the star system – through which the major film studios created and manipulated stars – continued after the studios declined.

This was down to the success of Cantopop, which dominated the Hong Kong music scene in the late 70s and 80s. Music companies groomed stars such as Leslie Cheung Kwok-wing and Anita Mui Yim-fong, who then crossed over to appear in films.

Leslie Cheung and Anita Mui in a still from “Rouge” (1988), directed by Stanley Kwan. Photo: Golden HArvesy

Martial arts out, comedies in

Viewers had become exhausted by the onslaught of wuxia and kung fu films in the late 60s and 70s, and comedy – laced with action and often featuring James Bond-style gadgets – became the dominant genre in the first half of the decade.

“Action and comedy were a good combination for box office returns,” declared critic Law Kar. Production house Cinema City was the box office champion with the goofy action-oriented Aces Go Places comedy series.

In the latter half of the decade, Wong Jing’s lowbrow humour took over and master of mo lei tau slapstick comedy Stephen Chow Sing-chi became a superstar.

Ng Man-tat (left) and Stephen Chow in a still from “Tricky Brains” (1991), directed by Wong Jing. Photo: Newport Entertainment

Martial arts did not disappear entirely, turning up in the popular kung fu comedies of Sammo Hung Kam-bo and others.

Chow Yun-fat was the face of the decade

After a long time in television and some false starts in the film industry, Chow Yun-fat leapt to fame in Woo’s A Better Tomorrow and became a fully fledged superstar in the director’s The Killer.

“Not only the most popular, but the best actor in Hong Kong,” wrote then Post critic Paul Fonoroff in 1991. “Something of a trend in himself, having starred in some three dozen films between 1986 and 1989.”

Chow Yun-fat (left) and Danny Lee in a still from “The Killer” (1989). Photo: Film Workshop

The 80s saw the rise of Michelle Yeoh, while Caucasian karate expert Cynthia Rothrock was also popular. Comic sidemen like Richard Ng Yiu-hon were ubiquitous.

Funny horror stories

Ringo Lam Ling-tung’s Esprit D’Amour (1983) modernised the ghost genre by using special effects, but it was the comic-horror Mr Vampire series that hit it big at the box office.

The slapstick films about zombies controlled by a priestly corpse-driver had their basis in Chinese mythology, but the settings were once again updated to modern times.

A still from “Mr. Vampire” (1985). Photo: Golden Harvest

Still, the Chinoiserie of the films kept a connection with historical China when most other genres had moved on.

Hong Kong art-house films appeared

The New Wave of the late 1970s, led by filmmakers like Ann Hui On-wah, Patrick Tam Ka-ming and Allen Fong Yuk-ping, flourished during the first half of the decade. Some of these filmmakers were absorbed into the mainstream.

The 1984 Joint Declaration to return Hong Kong to China and the 1989 Tiananmen crackdown worried and horrified filmmakers, but the events were not addressed directly in feature films.

In this regular feature series on the best of Hong Kong cinema, we examine the legacy of classic films, re-evaluate the careers of its greatest stars, and revisit some of the lesser-known aspects of the beloved industry.

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