Cantonese: Siu lam saam sap luk fong
Mandarin: Shao lin san shi liu fang
English: Shaolin 36th Chamber

Alternate English Title: Master Killer, Shaolin Master Killer

Boasting outstanding martial arts and fascinating training sequences, this Lau Kar-leung favorite is often cited as the greatest kung fu movie produced to date, a reputation that is well-deserved. After his family and friends are massacred by Manchu soldiers (under the command of General Tien, played by Lo Lieh), ethics student Liu Yu-te (Gordon Lau Kar-fai, aka Gordon Liu) journeys to Shaolin Temple and becomes a monk, so that he may learn kung fu and get revenge. Re-named San Te, he spends the next year doing menial tasks before beginning his martial training. He must pass through 35 chambers in which he will be instructed, via torturous tests of endurance, on how to increase speed and improve his balance. After a year of instruction in these areas, he progresses on to weapons training. The most proficient and talented student in the history of Shaolin Temple, San Te masters every technique in only five years and even invents a new weapon: the three-section staff. Ejected from the temple because he wished to teach Shaolin techniques to the people (the 36th chamber of the title), San Te proceeds to recruit a group of students (including Wong Yue and Norman Tsui Siu-keung) and take revenge on those who murdered his family.

While it does not fully dispense with the vengeance theme found in far too many period kung fu yarns, the emphasis on training here is a welcome departure. The exercises are quite ingenious in form and function and the director presents each new challenge with enough visual flair and gentle humor to engender and maintain viewer interest, as San Te gradually makes his way through each consecutive chamber. With his angelic face, expressive eyes, and superb skills, Gordon Lau proved himself one of the greatest kung fu stars of the 70s and, thanks to this film's international success, all but found himself typecast as a monk from then on. Hsiao Hou and Peter Chan Lung can be glimpsed among the monks and the latter also plays one of San Te's teachers; Lee Hoi-sang, Simon Yuen Siu-tien, Chan Shen, and Wilson Tong Wai-shing also appear. A marginally related and predominantly comic sequel, RETURN TO THE 36TH CHAMBER, followed in 1980. The director's brother, Lau Kar-wing, appears briefly as a doomed rebel general.

THE 36TH CHAMBER OF SHAOLIN is available at Poker Industries.