The Best Action-packed Movies to Watch on Criterionchannel

Director Jim Jarmusch audaciously combined the DNA of French noir classics with that of samurai and mafia movies to produce this utterly original film. As advised by the ancient Japanese manual it often quotes, though, Jarmusch’s movie also “makes the best” out of its own generation by adding hip-hop into its wry genre blend. The […]

“It is better to live miserable than to die happy,” or so says one of the characters in Jia Zhangke’s anthology film A Touch of Sin. On its surface, the “sin” referenced in the title might pertain to the acts of murder that the four protagonists commit, but in the context of China’s rapidly changing […]

Admittedly, the English dub of Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky can sound quite goofy. The American-accented voices don’t quite match the Asian characters, and because the characters are easily provoked into violence, they all talk in an exaggerated way. As such, the film is absurdly funny. It’s unclear whether or not that was intended. The […]

After an initially disappointing breakthrough attempt to Hollywood, Jackie Chan pivoted back to Hong Kong, unexpectedly creating an iconic film franchise and maybe perhaps one of the best martial arts movies ever made. Police Story seems to be a simple story at first, but it was through this film that Chan’s spectacular stunts evolved for […]

If you are a fan of Hong Kong martial arts films, you probably already know who Jet Li is. The iconic action star has plenty of great titles in his filmography but the work that shot him to continent-wide stardom was Once Upon a Time in China, and for good reason. His competitive background in […]

Before Wong Kar Wai made his signature romantic dramas, he first made his directorial debut As Tears Go By, a film that wouldn’t be out of place in the crime and action flicks that characterized 1980s cinema. There are moments that feel a tad derivative, such as the use of Take My Breath Away from […]

When forming a nation, governments would like to view the entire populace as one people– for example, the Norwegians live in Norway. But plenty of these nations have smaller populations of different ethnicities, some that have been on the land far longer than the nation itself. Pathfinder is the first ever feature film depicting the […]

Usually, when your film is over budget, you rewrite scenes, cut down production costs, or maybe even try to renegotiate with suppliers and crew members to fit within the budget. Allegedly, when Wong Kar Wai was making Ashes of Time, however, his friend Jeffrey Lau decided to help him out by creating The Eagle Shooting […]

Movie vampires are usually depicted in the spooky gothic way or the sexy, supernaturally romantic way. Mr. Vampire instead depicts this undead creature in a goofy manner, taking the Chinese jiangshi as an unfortunate mentorship program between Master Kau and his silly, incompetent assistants. It’s a bit corny, but director Ricky Lau creates action-packed yet […]