AFGA Is Bringing 30 Shaw Brothers Classics Back To Theaters, That's Your Cue To Cheer

This news has been floating around for at least a day or two, so it’s not the freshest dish, but I can’t stop thinking about it and getting really, really, ridiculously excited. It is, definitively, the best news. 30 amazing Shaw Brothers joints have been refurbished and are coming back to theaters.

A team headed by the American Genre Film Archive, “the world’s larges non-profit genre film archive,” has joined forces with the mighty Shaw Brothers to bring a ton of the studio’s restored Hong Kong classics back to the big screen. AGFA has the shiny new renovations in their hot little hands and will be reissuing them to theaters throughout the year. Again, if you didn’t already grasp the concept, this is the best news.

AGFA director Joel Ziemba said, “It’s a dream come true to help a new generation of film lovers discover the Shaw Brothers catalog. These movies deserve a new life on the big screen, where they can fulfill their destiny of melting as many minds as possible.”

And the list of titles is absolutely bonkers. Check it out:

• THE 36TH CHAMBER OF SHAOLIN
• THE AVENGING EAGLE
• BASTARD SWORDSMAN
• BLACK MAGIC 2
• BLOOD BROTHERS
• THE BOXER’S OMEN
• THE BRAVE ARCHER
• BUDDHA’S PALM
• COME DRINK WITH ME
• CRIPPLED AVENGERS
• DIRTY HO
• THE DUEL
• THE EIGHT DIAGRAM POLE FIGHTER
• THE FIVE VENOMS
• GOLDEN SWALLOW
• THE HEROIC ONES
• HOLY FLAME OF THE MARTIAL WORLD
• HUMAN LANTERNS
• INTIMATE CONFESSIONS OF A CHINESE COURTESAN
• KING BOXER
• LEGENDARY WEAPONS OF CHINA
• MAD MONKEY KUNG FU
• MASKED AVENGERS
• MARTIAL ARTS OF SHAOLIN
• THE MIGHTY PEKING MAN
• ONE-ARMED SWORDSMAN
• SHAOLIN TEMPLE
• THE SUPER INFRAMAN
• VENGEANCE
• THE WATER MARGIN

There are bonafide martial arts classics like The 36th Chamber of Shaolin, Five Deadly Venoms, and The Eight Diagram Pole Fighter. And while I’m pretty jazzed up about these three, the two I’m giddy for, the ones that the very thought of seeing on the big screen makes me tingle like I licked a battery, are The Boxer’s Omen and Holy Flame of the Martial World. Them’s both all kinds of crazy awesome and will certainly accomplish Ziemba’s mind melting goals, especially in a theater.

Here’s a trailer for Holy Flame:

And one for Boxer’s Omen:

There are, of course, a ton of other fantastic titles in this collection, including a bunch I haven’t seen. So, here’s hoping they all make the rounds with a lengthy stopover in Seattle. Just throwing that out for anyone who does things like book movies at movie theaters and that sort of thing. I want these all in my brain at the earliest possible convenience.