1983 • Hong Kong • Directed by Hua Shan

The master of the modern day crime thriller lends his directing skills to this amazing kung-fu crime fantasy. Hua Shan impressed audiences with such films as The Criminals trilogy, then dazzled them in an entirely different way by helming the superheroic Super Inframan and Flying Guillotine 2. He combines those two genres in this “Martial Arts World” adventure of a mystical mass murderer loose in the underworld. Noble Pai Piao discovers that the killings are the work of a living statue trained to assassinate by the titular demon… and that more murderous statues are on their way if he doesn’t stop them. The poison darts and booby traps start flying as the heroes struggle to discover the real kung-fu criminal behind the deaths. Pai Piao, long the favorite “go-to guy” for most of Shaw Brothers’ best kung-fu filmmakers, shines as the star in this unusual and popular epic. This is the Mandarin version.