Shaw Brothers first began back in 1924 when the movies at the time were only played in silence, at the time they felt frustrated by local film makers so they went ahead to set up their own cinema called “The Empire” to screen thier movies.
The company was run by two brothers Run Run Shaw and Runme Shaw and it wasn’t until 1933 when movies started to bring sound, that the company started to bring in more money. They then produced a movie called Platinum Dragon about a chinese opera group and that brought them a break through to the Hong Kong and Singapore audiences.
By 1939 the brothers had 139 cinemas across the east of asia but by the time the war ended, the japanese had already invaded and taken most of the shaws money and assets, also they were foreced to use their studio and cinema to show Japanese movies. After the war was over the shaws got back in charge of their business and started to expand it across asia and make it bigger than anyone had ever seen.
First Major Breakthrough
It was a movie called “The Kingdom And The Beauty” (1958) which was a global success and brought quiet a bit of money in, then in 1962 another movie hit the screens which would win the “Grand Prix” at the cannes film festival called “Magnificent Concubine“. Another movie around that time which was shown was King Hu’s “Come Drink With Me” which made a new path for Wuxia-Pian movies.
One Armed Swordsman - a true classic
In 1967 a director called Chang Cheh made a brilliant movie called “One Armed Swordsmen” starring the legend Jimmy Wang Yu and it broke box office records at that time breaking the $1,000,000 mark. After this film Chang Cheh went on to make a movie called “Vengence” (1979) and many say that this is the first real kung fu movie , the movie also brought together for the first time the great Ti Lung and David Chaing. By the end of the 70′s the success was beyond what they could have dreamed off. Shortly followed was the international hit movie “The Five Venoms” which to this day is still being bought and shown all over the world.
By 1973 they had started their own tv station TVB, the also began working with international productions with movies like Blade Runner and Seven Golden Vampires and by the mid 70′s they owned 230 cinemas and another 500+ cinemas in distribution deal and over 1 million people per week went to watch a shaw brothers movie.
Major stars and Directors
Well the Five Venoms movie the business had made some new stars. These five were Lo Mang, Lu Feng, Sun Chien, Chiang Sheng and Kuo Chui, who had been stars in the Shaw studio for years, but did not become memorable faces until the Five Deadly Venoms. Of course in the 70′s as mentioned before we had Ti Lung and David Chaing but in the middle of that decade the duo were overshadowed by the rise of Alexander Fu Sheng who had played supporting roles opposite them on many occasions. Fu was eventually killed in 1983 in a car accident, at age 28, ending a brief but spectacular career. Members of the Peking Opera School, including Jackie Chan and Sammo Hung, played extras and bit parts in several Shaw Brothers films in the 1970s, although they were obviously unknowns at the time.
A major name involved with shaw brothers was ofcourse Lau Kar Leung, In the 1960s he became one of Shaw Brothers’ main choreographers and had a strong working relationship with director Chang Cheh, working on many of Chang’s movies as a choreographer, including The One-Armed Swordsman, as well as other Shaw Bros Wuxia pictures, such as The Jade Bow. After a split with Chang on the set of Marco Polo, Lau evolved into a director during the sudden boom of kung-fu movies in the early 1970s. He occasionally did choreography work for non-Shaw movies as well, such as Master of the Flying Guillotine.
Some of his biggest work include movies like 36th chamber of shaolin, Legendary weapons of kung fu, Heros of the east just t name a few.
Recent Years
The last real shaw brothers kung fu movie was Drunken Monkey starring legends Lau Kar Leung and Gordon Liu and also rising star Wu Jing. The movie wasn’t as big a success as they had hoped for although seeing the two legends back on screen and also fighting each other made up for that fact.
The recent output from them was the new action film Laughing Gor also starring Yuen Biao in a cameo role as a officer. The company is still a big factor today in the kung fu movie making and will continue to make big movies and bring through new talent.
Really wish for atleast one more movie with Lau Kar Leung infront and behind the camera, one last classic from the master of fight choreography, who to me only has one equal in that field and that is…… Sammo Hung.
