A six-movie series – known as the Shaolin Cycle – amounts to a more-than-worthy binge watch for any fan of the old-school kung fu movie genre. During the kung fu craze of the 1970s, no studio contributed more standout martial arts movies than Shaw Brothers, who led the way with more than 300 films in the medium between the late 1960s and the mid 1980s.
The vast majority of those films were standalone movies, although some fit into larger stories, such as the Brave Archer series and the deeply beloved 36th Chamber trilogy. Others fit into more loosely connected sagas, not unlike the approach Sergio Leone took with his Clint Eastwood Spaghetti Westerns, the Dollars Trilogy.
Something similar can be said of some of Shaw Brothers’ best martial arts movies, including a few that belong to Chang Cheh’s Shaolin Cycle.
Chang Cheh’s Shaolin Cycle Explained
Between 1973 and 1976, Shaw Brothers’ top director, Chang Cheh, helmed six old-school kung fu movies now collectively referred to as the Shaolin Cycle. All six starred Alexander Fu Sheng, who played the legendary Chinese hero Fong Sai-yuk in half of the films in the series.
Every movie in the series revolved around the same historical event, which was the fall of the Shaolin Temple during the Qing Dynasty. Heroes Two, Men from the Monestary, and Shaolin Martial Arts all offer their own fictionalized takes on the efforts of the rebels and surviving monks to fight the Qings after they burned down the Shaolin Temple.
Alexander Fu Sheng headlines all six of Chang Cheh’s Shaolin Cylce movies, but in two of the six entries into the series, he shares the spotlight with other stars. Both Five Shaolin Masters and Shaolin Temple are ensemble martial arts epics.
Meanwhile, Five Shaolin Masters, Shaolin Temple, and The Shaolin Avengers are more concerned with the battles between the Shaolin-trained fighters and the evil Qings ahead of – and during – the fall of the Shaolin Temple.
The Shaolin Cycle Is A Must-Watch Martial Arts Movie Series
When watching the six Shaolin Cycle movies, it’s not hard to see why Chang Cheh is widely considered among the greatest martial arts movie directors of all time. Each entry contains beautifully choreographed action sequences, aided in large part by the involvement of some of the studio’s best martial arts actors, including Ti Lung, Chi Kuan Chun, and Fu Sheng himself.
The basic premise of the Shaolin Cycle also allowed the movies to offer some of the best themes associated with old-school kung fu movies. There’s betrayals, revenge plots, intense rivalries, unbelievable – yet incredibly fun – physical feats, and of course, exciting and creative training sequences for the main characters to endure.
Each Shaolin Cycle film is great in its own right, but arguably the most entertaining out of the pack are the two ensemble efforts, Five Shaolin Masters and Shaolin Temple. In both movies, Chang Cheh amasses a stunning amount of star power to underscore the high-stakes and epic nature of the fight between the freedom fighters and the Qings.