Top Ranked Films from China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan
by LawrenceJoseSinclair | created - 05 Jul 2011 | updated - 06 Jul 2011 | PublicI took all the film polls I could find, and threw them all into a spreadsheet, and ranked the results. I posted the Top Ranked 1000 Films first, then an alphabetical list of all 2260 titles that made polls. I'm now posting sub-lists like this one. I combined China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan because so few from each country made the top 1000, only 20 in all, so I extended my list to the top 30 ranked titles. The complete and original lists can be found at [link]http://worldsbestfilms.blogspot.com[/link] .. "Your results may vary"
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1. In the Mood for Love (2000)
PG | 98 min | Drama, Romance
Two neighbors form a strong bond after both suspect extramarital activities of their spouses. However, they agree to keep their bond platonic so as not to commit similar wrongs.
Director: Kar-Wai Wong | Stars: Tony Leung Chiu-wai, Maggie Cheung, Siu Ping-Lam, Tung Cho 'Joe' Cheung
Votes: 166,963 | Gross: $2.73M
Beautifully shot film with cinematography by Christopher Doyle, and Wong Kar-Wai's impeccable direction.
2. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000)
PG-13 | 120 min | Action, Adventure, Drama
A young Chinese warrior steals a sword from a famed swordsman and then escapes into a world of romantic adventure with a mysterious man in the frontier of the nation.
Director: Ang Lee | Stars: Chow Yun-Fat, Michelle Yeoh, Ziyi Zhang, Chang Chen
Votes: 281,673 | Gross: $128.08M
Ang Lee's epic ode to the martial arts film, a beautiful romance.
3. Yi Yi (2000)
Not Rated | 173 min | Drama, Romance
Each member of a middle-class Taipei family seeks to reconcile past and present relationships within their daily lives.
Director: Edward Yang | Stars: Nien-Jen Wu, Elaine Jin, Issei Ogata, Kelly Lee
Votes: 28,430 | Gross: $1.14M
4. Chungking Express (1994)
PG-13 | 102 min | Comedy, Crime, Drama
Two melancholic Hong Kong policemen fall in love: one with a mysterious female underworld figure, the other with a beautiful and ethereal waitress at a late-night restaurant he frequents.
Director: Kar-Wai Wong | Stars: Brigitte Lin, Takeshi Kaneshiro, Tony Leung Chiu-wai, Faye Wong
Votes: 95,850 | Gross: $0.60M
Wong Kar-Wai's crime film is a visual work of art, and with it's sequel, Fallen Angels, inspired Tarantino's Pulp Fiction. This is far better.
5. Raise the Red Lantern (1991)
PG | 125 min | Drama, Romance
China in the 1920s. After her father's death, Songlian is forced to marry the wealthy Master Chen. With three wives already, each living in a separate house, there is fierce competition for his attention and the privileges that are gained.
Director: Yimou Zhang | Stars: Gong Li, Jingwu Ma, Saifei He, Cuifen Cao
Votes: 35,361 | Gross: $2.60M
This film of a wealthy man's fourth wife put director Zhang Yimou on the map in the west.
6. Days of Being Wild (1990)
Not Rated | 94 min | Crime, Drama, Romance
A man tries to find out who his real mother is after the woman who raised him tells him the truth.
Director: Kar-Wai Wong | Stars: Leslie Cheung, Maggie Cheung, Andy Lau, Carina Lau
Votes: 25,508 | Gross: $0.14M
Another from Hong Kong master Wong Kar-Wai.
7. Hero (2002)
PG-13 | 120 min | Action, Adventure, Drama
A defense officer, Nameless, was summoned by the King of Qin regarding his success of terminating three warriors.
Director: Yimou Zhang | Stars: Jet Li, Tony Leung Chiu-wai, Maggie Cheung, Ziyi Zhang
Votes: 187,683 | Gross: $53.71M
My favorite film from China is its top-grossing of all time; for me, this is Zhang Yimou's masterpiece, a poetic and beatifully film story of three assassins and the King of Q'in.
8. Farewell My Concubine (1993)
R | 171 min | Drama, Music, Romance
Two boys meet at an opera training school in Peking in 1924. Their resulting friendship will span nearly 70 years and endure some of the most troublesome times in China's history.
Director: Kaige Chen | Stars: Leslie Cheung, Fengyi Zhang, Gong Li, You Ge
Votes: 33,175 | Gross: $5.22M
Chen Kaige's epic about lovers during wartime and other decades.
9. A Time to Live and a Time to Die (1985)
Not Rated | 138 min | Biography, Drama
The semi-autobiographical film on director Hou Hsiao-Hsien's childhood and adolescence, when he was growing up in Taiwan, living through the deaths of his father, mother and grandmother.
Director: Hsiao-Hsien Hou | Stars: Chia-bao Chang, Neng Chang, Chih-Chen Chen, Han-wen Chen
Votes: 3,516
IF I have the right film, this is Hsiao-Hsien Hou's The Time to Live and the Time to Die
10. Infernal Affairs (2002)
R | 101 min | Action, Crime, Drama
A story between a mole in the police department and an undercover cop. Their objectives are the same: to find out who is the mole, and who is the cop.
Directors: Andrew Lau, Alan Mak | Stars: Andy Lau, Tony Leung Chiu-wai, Anthony Chau-Sang Wong, Eric Tsang
Votes: 131,490 | Gross: $0.17M
This average police film was the basis for Scorsese's The Departed, which was far better.
11. The Killer (1989)
R | 111 min | Action, Crime, Drama
A disillusioned assassin accepts one last hit in hopes of using his earnings to restore vision to a singer he accidentally blinded.
Director: John Woo | Stars: Chow Yun-Fat, Danny Lee, Sally Yeh, Kong Chu
Votes: 51,090
John Woo's gangster film is ok, but not as good as some others; I prefer his The Replacement Killers to this, much more action.
12. A City of Sadness (1989)
157 min | Drama, History
The story of a family embroiled in the "White Terror" that was wrought on the Taiwanese people by the Kuomintang government after their arrival from mainland China in the late 1940s.
Director: Hsiao-Hsien Hou | Stars: Tony Leung Chiu-wai, Shu-Fen Hsin, Sung-Young Chen, Jack Kao
Votes: 6,102
13. House of Flying Daggers (2004)
PG-13 | 119 min | Action, Adventure, Drama
A romantic police captain breaks a beautiful member of a rebel group out of prison to help her rejoin her fellows, but things are not what they seem.
Director: Yimou Zhang | Stars: Ziyi Zhang, Takeshi Kaneshiro, Andy Lau, Dandan Song
Votes: 116,279 | Gross: $11.05M
Zhang Yimou strikes again, this time with a group of female assassins who want to kill the king because he's always at war with neighboring kingdoms.
14. 2046 (2004)
R | 129 min | Drama, Romance, Sci-Fi
Several women enter a science fiction author's life over the course of a few years, after the author has lost the woman he considers his one true love.
Director: Kar-Wai Wong | Stars: Tony Leung Chiu-wai, Ziyi Zhang, Faye Wong, Gong Li
Votes: 61,800 | Gross: $1.44M
Wong Kar-Wai's loosely-tied sequel to In the Mood For Love - it does take place in the future but the title is the number of a motel room where the lovers met in the first film.
15. Happy Together (1997)
Not Rated | 96 min | Drama, Romance
A couple take a trip to Argentina but both men find their lives drifting apart in opposite directions.
Director: Kar-Wai Wong | Stars: Leslie Cheung, Tony Leung Chiu-wai, Chang Chen, Gregory Dayton
Votes: 34,064 | Gross: $0.19M
Another Wong Kar-Wai film
17. Spring in a Small Town (1948)
98 min | Drama, Romance
A lonely housewife finds her monotonous life altered when her childhood sweetheart returns to town.
Director: Mu Fei | Stars: Chaoming Cui, Wei Li, Yu Shi, Wei Wei
Votes: 3,355
18. Last Train Home (2009)
Not Rated | 85 min | Documentary, Drama
A couple embarks on a journey home for Chinese new year along with 130 million other migrant workers, to reunite with their children and struggle for a future. Their unseen story plays out as China soars towards being a world superpower.
Director: Lixin Fan | Stars: Changhua Zhang, Yang Zhang, Suqin Chen, Qin Zhang
Votes: 3,717 | Gross: $0.29M
19. Flight of the Red Balloon (2007)
Not Rated | 115 min | Drama, Family
A little boy and his baby-sitter inhabit the same imaginary world: through their adventures they are followed by a strange red balloon.
Director: Hsiao-Hsien Hou | Stars: Juliette Binoche, Hippolyte Girardot, Simon Iteanu, Fang Song
Votes: 4,178 | Gross: $0.46M
Another from the Taiwanese master Hsiao-hsien Hou.
20. A Brighter Summer Day (1991)
Not Rated | 237 min | Crime, Drama, Romance
Based on a true story, primarily on a conflict between two youth gangs, a 14-year-old boy's girlfriend conflicts with the head of one gang for an unclear reason, until finally the conflict comes to a violent climax.
Director: Edward Yang | Stars: Chang Chen, Lisa Yang, Kuo-Chu Chang, Elaine Jin
Votes: 12,789
This is the last film of this last in the top 1000 (ranked #937), from Edward Yang of Taiwan.
21. Up the Yangtze (2007)
Not Rated | 93 min | Documentary
At the edge of the Yangtze River, not far from the Three Gorges Dam, young men and women take up employment on a cruise ship, where they confront rising waters and a radically changing China.
Director: Yung Chang | Stars: Jerry Bo Yu Chen, Campbell Ping He, Cindy Shui Yu
Votes: 1,946 | Gross: $0.78M
22. Springtime in a Small Town (2002)
PG | 116 min | Drama, Romance
The eight-year marriage of Liyan and Yuwen has left them both unfulfilled and distant. A visitor arrives from Shanghai, a doctor who's an old school friend of Liyan's and, unbeknownst to her husband, Yuwen's childhood sweetheart.
Director: Zhuangzhuang Tian | Stars: Jingfan Hu, Jun Wu, Bai Qing Xin, Xiaokeng Ye
Votes: 1,366 | Gross: $0.04M
This is a modern remake of Fei Mu's 1948 classic ranked #17 (see above), Spring in a Small Town
23. Fallen Angels (1995)
Not Rated | 99 min | Comedy, Crime, Drama
This Hong Kong-set crime drama follows the lives of a hitman, hoping to get out of the business, and his elusive female partner.
Director: Kar-Wai Wong | Stars: Leon Lai, Michelle Reis, Takeshi Kaneshiro, Charlie Yeung
Votes: 50,919
Wong Kar-Wai's sequel to Chungking Express - the two were intended to be one film, but due to length he split them into two. They're both visual art, to me, great cinema.
24. The Puppetmaster (1993)
142 min | Biography, Drama, War
Puppeteer Li Tian-lu tells his life story, and through it, the story of Taiwan in the first half of the 20th century.
Director: Hsiao-Hsien Hou | Stars: Tien-Lu Li, Giong Lim, Kuei-Chung Cheng, Chien-ru Huang
Votes: 2,072
Another from Taiwan master director Hsaing-hsien Hou.
25. Yellow Earth (1984)
TV-PG | 89 min | Drama, History, Music
A communist soldier travels to Shanbei to collect folk songs for propaganda while visiting a poor peasant family, giving hope to the teenage daughter in escaping an arranged marriage.
Director: Kaige Chen | Stars: Xueqi Wang, Bai Xue, Quiang Liu, Tuo Tan
Votes: 2,573
aka Yellow Earth, in the west.
26. Flowers of Shanghai (1998)
Unrated | 113 min | Drama
In the "flower houses" (upscale brothels) of Shanghai, various interweaving stories of love, loyalty, and deceit play out subtly.
Director: Hsiao-Hsien Hou | Stars: Tony Leung Chiu-wai, Michiko Hada, Michelle Reis, Carina Lau
Votes: 4,079
Another from Hsaing-hsien Hou - nearly all of his films have won awards somewhere.
27. Red Sorghum (1988)
Not Rated | 91 min | Drama, History, Romance
When a leprous winery owner in 1930s China dies a few days after his arranged marriage, his young widow is forced to run the winery to make a living while contending with bandits, her drunkard lover, and the invading Japanese army.
Director: Yimou Zhang | Stars: Gong Li, Wen Jiang, Rujun Teng, Ji Liu
Votes: 9,879
Another from Zhang Yimou of China, this one is hard to find.
28. Ju Dou (1990)
PG-13 | 95 min | Drama, Romance
In rural China, the young bride of a tyrannical owner of a silk-dyeing business finds temporary solace in the arms of her husband's nephew, but problems arise when she becomes pregnant.
Directors: Yimou Zhang, Fengliang Yang | Stars: Gong Li, Wei Li, Baotian Li, Zhang Yi
Votes: 9,021 | Gross: $1.99M
Also Zhang Yimou of China, who directed the opening and closing ceremonies at the Beijing Olympics
29. Vive L'Amour (1994)
R | 118 min | Drama, Romance
Three lonely young denizens of Taipei unknowingly share an apartment used for sexual trysts.
Director: Tsai Ming-liang | Stars: Chen Chao-jung, Kang-sheng Lee, Kuei-Mei Yang, Yi-ching Lu
Votes: 4,799
In spite of the French title, from Taiwanese director Tsai Ming-Liang
30. The Big Parade (1986)
94 min | Drama
Stories occurred in the training days before the big parade in the 35th anniversary National Day of China in 1984.
Director: Kaige Chen | Stars: Qiang Guan, Lu Lei, Chun Sun, Li Tung
Votes: 197
This is Chen Kaige's King of the Children - he's pretty famous, dunno why there's no pic of this film. His Together (2002) is my favorite of his, about a father and his boy who is a music prodigy on the violin.
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