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The Best Movies of Hong Kong, China

Wong Kar-wai's neon reveries, heroic bloodshed and the martial-arts canon — the cinema of Hong Kong, China, ranked by our composite score.

In the Mood for Love (2000) leads with a composite score of 5.13.

  1. 1
    In the Mood for Love2000 · Wong Kar-wai · Hong Kong, China / France / Thailand · romance, drama
    5.13

    Sight & Sound 2022 critics' poll #5 · Rolling Stone 100 Best of the 21st Century #2 · Sight & Sound 2022 directors' poll #9

  2. 2
    Still Life2006 · Jia Zhangke · China / Hong Kong, China · drama
    2.50

    Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2007 #1 · Venice Golden Lion winner 2006 · Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 2007 #2

  3. 3
    Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon2000 · Ang Lee · United States / Taiwan, China / Hong Kong, China · romance, fantasy, action
    2.44

    TIFF People's Choice winner 2000 · Oscar Best Picture nominee 2000 · Film Comment year-end poll 2000 #6

  4. 4
    Chungking Express1994 · Wong Kar-wai · Hong Kong, China · comedy, drama, romance
    1.92

    Sight & Sound 2022 critics' poll #88 · Hoberman's annual top 10 1994 #2 · TIME All-TIME 100

  5. 5
    Happy Together1997 · Wong Kar-wai · Hong Kong, China · drama, romance
    1.47

    Sight & Sound 2022 critics' poll #225 · Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 1997 #6 · Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 1997 #9

  6. 6
    20462004 · Wong Kar-wai · Hong Kong, China / China / France · romance, drama
    1.30

    Film Comment year-end poll 2005 #2 · Sarris's annual top 10 2005 #1 · Hoberman's annual top 10 2005 #7

  7. 7
    A Touch of Sin2013 · Jia Zhangke · China / Japan / Hong Kong, China · drama
    1.27

    Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2014 #3 · Cahiers du Cinéma annual top 10 2013 #5 · Film Comment year-end poll 2013 #5

  8. 8
    To Live1994 · Zhang Yimou · China / Hong Kong, China · drama
    1.13

    Cannes Grand Prix winner 1994 · Sarris's annual top 10 1994 #4 · NYT Best 1,000 Movies

  9. 9
    The Assassin2015 · Hou Hsiao-Hsien · Taiwan, China / China / Hong Kong, China · action, drama
    1.02

    Film Comment year-end poll 2015 #2 · Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2015 #5

  10. 10
    Black Coal, Thin Ice2014 · Diao Yinan · China / Hong Kong, China · thriller, film-noir
    1.00

    Berlin Golden Bear winner 2014

  11. 11
    A Touch of Zen1971 · King Hu · Taiwan, China / Hong Kong, China · fantasy, action
    0.92

    Sight & Sound 2022 critics' poll #225 · TIME All-TIME 100 · Criterion Collection spine #825

  12. 12
    The Killer1989 · John Woo · Hong Kong, China · action, crime
    0.83

    Kehr's annual top 10 1991 #4 · Empire 500 (2008) #202 · Criterion Collection spine #8

  13. 13
    Fallen Angels1995 · Wong Kar-wai · Hong Kong, China · drama, romance, crime
    0.60

    Hoberman's annual top 10 1998 #2 · Hoberman's annual top 10 1999 #null · Sarris's annual top 10 1998 #null

  14. 14
    Infernal Affairs2002 · Andrew Lau, Alan Mak · Hong Kong, China · crime, drama, thriller
    0.57

    Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2003 #9 · Criterion Collection spine #1159 · Edgar Wright's 1,000 favorite movies

  15. 15
    House of Flying Daggers2004 · Zhang Yimou · China / Hong Kong, China · fantasy, action, romance
    0.48

    Sarris's annual top 10 2004 #3 · Film Comment year-end poll 2004 #19

  16. 16
    Ashes of Time1994 · Wong Kar-wai · Hong Kong, China · action
    0.47

    Film Comment year-end poll 2008 #28 · Sarris's annual top 10 1996 #9 · Rosenbaum's Essential Cinema

  17. 17
    Hard Boiled1992 · John Woo · Hong Kong, China · action, thriller, crime
    0.42

    Criterion Collection spine #9 · Kehr's annual top 10 1993 #10 · Edgar Wright's 1,000 favorite movies

  18. 18
    Kung Fu Hustle2004 · Stephen Chow · China / Hong Kong, China · comedy, action
    0.38

    Film Comment year-end poll 2005 #23 · Kehr's annual top 10 2005 #8

  19. 19
    Vengeance2009 · Johnnie To · France / Hong Kong, China · thriller, action, crime
    0.36

    Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2010 #6

  20. 20
    Exiled2006 · Johnnie To · Hong Kong, China · action, thriller, crime
    0.32

    Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2008 #8

  21. 21
    Twilight of the Warriors: Walled In2024 · Soi Cheang · Hong Kong, China · action, thriller, crime
    0.32

    Kinema Junpo Best Ten (International) 2025 #8

  22. 22
    The Grandmaster2013 · Wong Kar-wai · China / Hong Kong, China · biography, drama, action
    0.23

    Film Comment year-end poll 2013 #20

  23. 23
    Drug War2012 · Johnnie To · China / Hong Kong, China · crime
    0.18

    Film Comment year-end poll 2013 #43

  24. 24
    Last Hurrah for Chivalry1979 · John Woo · Hong Kong, China · action
    0.16

    Criterion Collection spine #1174

  25. 25
    Boat People1982 · Ann Hui · China / Hong Kong, China · drama, documentary
    0.16

    Criterion Collection spine #1113

  26. 26
    Police Story1985 · Jackie Chan · Hong Kong, China · comedy, action, crime
    0.16

    Criterion Collection spine #971

  27. 27
    Rouge1987 · Stanley Kwan · Hong Kong, China · drama, romance, fantasy
    0.16

    Criterion Collection spine #1129

  28. 28
    Police Story 21988 · Jackie Chan · Hong Kong, China · action, comedy
    0.16

    Criterion Collection spine #972

  29. 29
    Throw Down2004 · Johnnie To · Hong Kong, China · action
    0.16

    Criterion Collection spine #1092

  30. 30
    Queen of Temple Street1990 · Lawrence Ah Mon · Hong Kong, China
    0.16

    Hoberman's annual top 10 1990 #8

  31. 31
    A Simple Life2011 · Ann Hui · Hong Kong, China · drama
    0.14

    Ebert's annual top 10 2012 #10

  32. 32
    King Boxer1972 · Jeong Chang-hwa · British Hong Kong · action, drama
    0.11

    Edgar Wright's 1,000 favorite movies

  33. 33
    Project A1983 · Jackie Chan, Sammo Hung · Hong Kong, China · comedy, action, adventure
    0.11

    Edgar Wright's 1,000 favorite movies

  34. 34
    Wheels on Meals1984 · Sammo Hung · Hong Kong, China · comedy, action, adventure
    0.11

    Edgar Wright's 1,000 favorite movies

  35. 35
    A Better Tomorrow1986 · John Woo · British Hong Kong / Hong Kong, China / United States · crime, action, drama
    0.11

    Edgar Wright's 1,000 favorite movies

  36. 36
    A Better Tomorrow 21987 · John Woo · Hong Kong, China · crime, action, drama
    0.11

    Edgar Wright's 1,000 favorite movies

  37. 37
    A Chinese Ghost Story1987 · Ching Siu-tung · Hong Kong, China · romance, fantasy, horror
    0.11

    Edgar Wright's 1,000 favorite movies

  38. 38
    Dragons Forever1988 · Sammo Hung · Hong Kong, China · comedy, action, crime
    0.11

    Edgar Wright's 1,000 favorite movies

  39. 39
    Days of Being Wild1990 · Wong Kar-wai · Hong Kong, China · drama, romance, crime
    0.11

    Rosenbaum's Essential Cinema

  40. 40
    Riki-oh: The Story of Ricky1991 · Lam Nai-Choi · Hong Kong, China · action
    0.11

    Edgar Wright's 1,000 favorite movies

  41. 41
    The Day the Sun Turned Cold1994 · Yim Ho · Hong Kong, China · drama
    0.11

    Rosenbaum's Essential Cinema

  42. 42
    Comrades: Almost a Love Story1996 · Peter Chan · Hong Kong, China · comedy, romance, drama
    0.11

    Rosenbaum's Essential Cinema

  43. 43
    Shaolin Soccer2001 · Stephen Chow · Hong Kong, China · comedy, action
    0.11

    Edgar Wright's 1,000 favorite movies

Hong Kong made films the way its harbour made money — fast, in enormous volume, and for export. At its early-1990s peak the colony was turning out more than two hundred features a year, which made it the world's third-largest producer and, from the 1970s through the 1990s, the second-largest film exporter on earth after Hollywood. What survives that torrent on our list is not, mostly, the pulp that paid for it. The composite score keeps sorting the flood toward the two ends the rest of the world eventually came to prize: the swordplay tradition at one edge, the arthouse at the other.

Blood and swords

The martial-arts line is the older one. King Hu's A Touch of Zen (1971) is the wuxia film that turned bamboo-forest combat into something close to ballet, and it sits high enough on our list to argue that the genre's ceiling was set early. The 1980s traded the sword for the pistol: John Woo's The Killer (1989) is the emblem of "heroic bloodshed," the operatic gunfight cinema he refined through A Better Tomorrow (1986) and Hard Boiled (1992), all of them present below. Jackie Chan's Police Story (1985) carries the other half of the action inheritance, the stunt comedy that made him Asia's biggest box-office draw for two decades, and Johnnie To extends the crime tradition into the 2000s with Exiled (2006) and Drug War (2012). This is the cinema that Golden Harvest — founded in 1970, dominant once Shaw Brothers stopped producing in 1985 — sold to the world.

Neon and elsewhere

The higher reaches of the list belong to the "Second Wave" arthouse that grew up alongside the pulp. Wong Kar-wai leads everything: In the Mood for Love (2000) is our top Hong Kong entry by a wide margin, and Chungking Express (1994), Happy Together (1997) and 2046 (2004) cluster beneath it — more of his films in the upper list than any other director's.

How to read our list

Membership here is drawn from Wikidata's country-of-origin field, not from a definition of "Hong Kong film," which is why the ranking looks less local than you might expect. The two entries just below In the Mood for Love — Ang Lee's Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000) and Jia Zhangke's Still Life (2006) — carried Hong Kong co-production money and so inherit the tag, even though their centres of gravity lie in the mainland and Taiwan. Read the list, then, as the score reads it: the films the wider world kept, weighted by accumulated canonical standing rather than by where the box office was counted.