Evengyny Thanks for the memories!

Stometer Save your money for something good and enjoyable

Curapedi I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

Erica Derrick By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

BA_Harrison Yang Tieh of the Poison Clan (Sheng Chiang) is instructed by his dying master to seek out the venoms—five former pupils known for their particular styles of kung fu—to see if they have turned bad. Yang is also instructed to find wealthy ex-Poison Clan teacher Mr. Yuen to try and convince him to donate his money to good causes. Unfortunately, Yuen falls victim to two of the five venoms, Snake and Centipede, who are keen to get their hands on his fortune. What follows is a tale of deception, betrayal, torture, and murder, with Yang caught in the middle. But not much fighting.Directed by the legendary Chang Cheh, The Five Venoms is often cited as one of Shaw Brothers' best martial arts films by those in the know, which made it rather disappointing for me to discover that there is actually very little kung fu until the inevitable final battle between the heroes and the bad guys, intrigue and suspense taking precedence over punching, kicking, jumping and flipping. This mightn't have been so bad if the mystery had been utterly compelling, but to be honest, I just wasn't gripped by the whole 'who are the venoms and what has happened to the money?' storyline.The aforementioned showdown between the goodies, Yang and Lizard, and the baddies, Snake, Centipede and Scorpion, is certainly a lot of fun, each fighters signature move allowing for some creative choreography, but getting there… not so much.4.5 out of 10, rounded up to 5 for the 'iron coat' torture scene. Nasty!

Dash123 Five Deadly Venoms is a movie which never pretends to be more than it is. A rock-em sock-em, poorly dubbed Chinese Kung Fu masterpiece. The poster and cover draw a fairly clear idea of what the film inside contains, and anyone pulling this item from the shelves should know that full and well going in.On top of being exactly what you expect (and hopefully ergo, what you wanted to watch) the story line and plot points are generally well put together, unlike a lot of movies of this era which tend to draw cob-web patterns of politics which become a headache to keep up with.One of my personal favorite things about this film (and others like it) is the quintessential "slap" sound effect that happens just about any time a person makes skin-to-skin contact. You'll find just about every typical Kung-Fu trope at some point along the story and anyone who's surprised by that fact probably shouldn't have jammed this 97 minute thrill-ride into their players in the first place.

Don Bendell "In the world of old-school kung fu movies, where revenge pictures came a dime a dozen, it took a lot for a film to stand out -- and even more to make it a fan favorite after all these years. What is arguably Chang Cheh's finest movie continues to hold influence over the Hong Kong movie industry, from the themes of loyalty, brotherhood and revenge as explored by John Woo (who got his start in the HK movie industry working for Chang) during the heyday of heroic bloodshed during the late 1980's, to more modern movies like A Man Called Hero, which sports a character in a costume inspired by this film. The influence has also carried into other areas as well, from music such as the Wu-Tang Clan, TV commercials for Sprite and video games such as "Mortal Kombat." So what makes this movie so special? The plot -- on the surface -- is pretty simple. It deals with members of a rogue group known as the "Poison Clan" who are searching for a treasure hidden by their sifu. All of the members of the clan have extraordinary kung fu abilities, denoted by their animal styles, or "venoms" (the lizard can climb walls, the scorpion has a deadly strike, etc.). The twist is that since the clan always wears masks, not all of them known who the others are. Thus a simple plot becomes almost a suspense thriller. We're not talking The Usual Suspects here, but it's far above many other kung fu movies of the time. Supposedly, Golden Harvest was not too happy with Chang's script -- like most of his movies, they felt it was too dark and violent -- and they actually wanted him to add broad comic relief to it. Thankfully, Chang stuck to his guns and stayed with his original script, which has since has become revered as one of the best for the films of its time, if not ever, completing an almost perfect dramatic arc and providing the perfect backbone for the extraordinary action sequences.But what really solidifies the movie are the venoms themselves. Chang Cheh hit upon a magical formula with the cast -- not only did he gain talented martial artists (whose moves, competed without the aid of wires or other special effects, put most modern martial artists to shame) but great actors as well. The formula proved so popular that Chang usually had one or more of the venoms in his later movies. Getting back to matters at hand, in most old-school movies, the actors seem to playing out cardboard cutouts, but here the actors actually create characters. It seems that everyone has a favorite venom (mine is Philip Kwok -- best known to many as Mad Dog from Hard-Boiled -- as Lizard) and it is this personal connection to the characters that The Five Deadly Venoms generates which makes it a true classic of the genre. Even if you're normally not a fan of old-school movies, you need to check The Five Deadly Venoms out, if for nothing else to see where modern movies got their inspiration from."

unbrokenmetal I've watched quite a lot of "Shaw Brothers Classics" in the (amazingly well restored) DVD series recently, and "The Five Venoms" is 1 of my 3 favorites so far. The movie tells the story of a young man who is sent by his teacher to find out what the masters of 5 very different styles are up to: Centipede, Toad, Snake, Scorpion and Gecko. It appears soon that some of them are involved in a murder, but the identity of each of the five is secret. Who is the Snake, who is the Scorpion... who is the murderer? Thus, besides the original fighting styles superior to most kung fu flicks, we also get a lot of suspense until all masters are ready for a final fight. Two cruel torture scenes made me wonder why this is rated FSK-16 here instead of FSK-18, but nevertheless: watch it!