I absolutely love to watch TVB series, 90% of them. But it really pisses me off because of the poor quality of chinese films. They're very cheap and unoriginal. The plots are crap compared with TVB series. I have heard a lot of complaints of HK movies nowadays cos 95% of them, are all rubbish. So why is that do you guys think? Why is there a big difference between series and movies? Why do producers make good series but crap movies?

i agree too!!! so far i dink twins effect..n andy n sammi n miriam's movies are good..da rest are crap..i dink is because dey don't use enough money n time 2 do their job...dey use good cast to interest pplz to watch their movies..but tvb series dey use way more time n money to do their series..n da actors n actresses all prolly started from acting not like movies mostly are singers 1st n got into acting..n tvb actors have more skills in acting because dey were trained for a really long time..dat's what i think..n talking about producers.. series n movie producers are different theyre not da same pplz..dat's y u see a huge difference n + series are mostly 20 esps dey have time to build a plot but movies are only 1 half-2 hrs long da producers basically dunnoe how 2 make a great movies wif 2 hrs..omg if u compare american movies wif chinese o god is the biggest difference ever!

I agree too. The only HK Movie that I'd say was about equivalent to a Hollywood movie would be Infernal Affairs. The plot was original with big actors and it showed that the cast and crew put in a lot of effort. Other movies just lack originality and it's basically the same plot over and over again. Not only do I see this in movies, TVB series are starting to lack quality as well. I used to be OBSESSED with TVB series. There were a lotta classics like Healing Hands, Golden Faith, Where the Legend Begins and so on, but now it just seems like TVB's willing to produce any ol' plot and throw in popular actors just to make money. Mostly the ancient ones, because they're starting to really get outta hand. I mean, what's up with all the computer graphics to make "magic" and stuff? It looks totally fake and ruins the plot within what, the first 5 minutes? Oh well, this is all my opinion, if you don't agree with me don't cuss at me either

Yes I agree. TVB series are pleasing to watch. There are really some with good plots and actors. Though, I don't quite like the new batch of artistes from TVB, but I still think the producers and directors group in TVB had did a great job so far. =)

As for the movies, I think they are not as good as series. Sometimes they are completely no storyline, just gather some famous artistes together to make a scene. =P I agree there are some good ones but the rest are just commercial movies that are quite shallow. =P

Ye, what's up with Wong Jing's films? They just don't make sense at all!! The jokes are lame and it has no storyline wotsoever

Some stories make absolutely no sense, but I believe TVB make the series according to the viewers tastes. Think about it, do you think ppl would approve of shows similar to say... Six feet under, or Queer eye for the straight guy. They would never make such series, as they are too controversial. Compared to American style tv shows, TVB & ATV are much more tame, and for good reason....different views and culture, chinese ppl are more conservative when it comes to what can be shown/said on TV

Most ppl just prefer the feel good/righteous movie with good guys and bad. There will always be series about family feuds and love triangles...Just with different context, they just need to find creative ways to present it so that we dont have time to think its unoriginal.

Havent been watching much movies lately, i used to, but they got really boring, no story line. There was this one movie, can't remember the name, i watched 10mins of it, and didnt know what it was about, i got really annoyed and turned it off. I agree that some comedies today are just plain retarded and a waste of time and money.

These are my 2 cents.

i think most HK movies are ok. Some are good, like running on karma, one nite in mongkok, breaking news and some more. but there are only a few that could be on the level of hollywood movies, and i think Infernal Affairs is better than some of hollywood's movies.

I usually stick with the series too. I don't usually like most of the HK movies. The only recent ones which I actually like is the Infernal Affairs trilogy.

I was a big fan of both HK series & movies. But now, I spend majority of the time watching series instead of movies. THe quality of the movies had really gone down. I was so disappointed after watching a couple of movies with Twins that I've lost interest in all! I hope they will mass producing movies and make some good quality ones!

I don't watch much TVB series anymore. It seems like after the first few episodes, you can predict who's gonna die, and who's gonna stab who in the back, and so on and so on...
The problem seemed to be that there isn't a lot of other choices in HK, only TVB and ATV primarily producing all the series, so they're doing too many series in a year, and have to recycle their plots.
HK movies hayday is over. The new scene is now the emerging Korean movie industry, and HK is now like the big older brother in the Asian movie market: unexciting but an old fav.

Current crop of HK movies are so crappy. I luv HK movies from the 80's and early nineties. Great martial arts movies and romantic comedies. Now most of the movies don't make sense and storyline will bore u to death.

Problem with TVB series it that the first few episode is good then it goes downhill. And the rush ending doesnt help either.

I always feel like HK movies are all cheap budget these days even though they might be big productions. Alot of them have them standing around not doing much or trying to be a bit surreal and weird.
I liked the old movies from the 80s to early 90s more. Especially the ghost movies. Just plain old fun.

I agree with Alpha that the TVB series have good beginnings which get you interested but then they seem to wander because they have to keep the story going for at least 20 episodes so they introduce all kinds of love triangles, some of which don't even make sense. A lot of the endings seem so rushed as they are trying to tie up all the loose ends in the last episode.

In my opinion I think the reason why most HK movies are crap, is because they start filming movies without a script, don't know how it's recently but it used to be like this before I've heard.
So if you don't have any kinds of schedules or anything, then it would be quite difficult to create a good storyline. Unless the movie has some very exciting action scenes, like Jackie Chan movies, that'll make people forget the crappy storyline. Look at Armour of God for instance.
The second reason is maybe that they film way way too many scenes, and then they have to edit it down to a 2 hour movie, so lots of good scenes gotta go, and the continuity of the movie is ruined.

Heeh, maybe that's why many tv-series are so good in the beginning and middle-part, but start falling apart by the end. In the beginning they don't have to throw away too much materials, just add it to the next episode. But till the end they have to trim down scenes so that the series for instance will end at exactly episode 20 or 30 or 40...and that'll sometime lead to rushed,illogical and bad endings. Just watch the ending of ATV's King of Gambler, now that's the worst ending I've ever seen in my life, period.

heh well most of them are geered to fullfill the main target of promoting new ppl like all the movies with twins in them (1 or both of em) are basically cheesy crap movies (sorry twins fans hahaz)
of course there are good hk movies but nowadays only a few of them actually are

There are still some good producers left but most of them are either retiring or moving to Hollywood to film

Personally I find that TVB series has gone downhill since early 90's. Old series were more captive, suspense toward the ending, most likely you can't predicted what is the ending. Especially with ancient series, you get to see actual Martial Arts motion. Nowaday you can pretty much predicted as each episode prevail and they usually overdramatized the strength of Martial arts. Movies I don't even bother to watch anymore, because they don't make sense. Alot of time I find myself finished a movie and wondering what was the plot and what was the ending. Real confused.

I feel alot of the HK movies now are trying so hard to mimic the USA style of directing...i guess after the success of John Woo alot of the directors want to hit the USA market so they come up with ideas similar to the USA style.
Any comments on this?

CC

Think HK movies become less and less good. The old ones are better, and they make sense. Recently, I've watching a film with Edison Chen and Nicholas Tse (New Police Cadets, 2004, the title is something like that in English), the ending is nonsense. How can you encourage your husband to go to kill people ? And then, tells your kid that his father is a brave guy ? =( Really not understand this kind of thinking.

TVB series are not as good as they used to be... in my opinion i think ATV series are alot better. TVB series are all predictable and uses the same stories over and over again

Well the economy in Hong Kong isn't really good these couple of years. So many bosses won't take money out to make high quality movies and series. Therefore, we are left with loww budget and low quality movies and series. I really how the Hong Kong economy can improve a little more.

tvb series was crappy sometime ago for their stupid and rushed endings.... but i guess they got a lil bit better now.... hk movies....argh... unpredictable.... some are good some are not....

I am really agreed that HK movies have lost a lot of quality. If you live outside Asia and you walked to your nearest DVD-store, you will find only the old classic HK movies, like old Jackie Chan movies, Chow Yun-Fat movies, Young and Dangerous etc. In HK it likes that the reason to visit a cinema is the big/popular names of actors and singers. You can not be serious if you find that Twins really can act.

Back to the topic; the TVB-series have always good quality. Every year they have some really good series. This year like: To Catch The Uncatchable, To Get Unstuck in Time, War and Beauty and more(hopefully). TVB have a big collection of actors and actresses, like Alex Fong, Bobby Au, Jessica Huan, Kenix Kwok etc.

But it seems like a the movie- and tv-industry are losing their originality. It counts for the western industry as well. It likes they have used every storylines, hopefully they will get back their inspiration

I agree that TV series, especially TVB are a lot better than the movies that they make nowadays. I think that the most important difference is the plot. Most of the movies made in Hong Kong now seem to focus on selling the famous celebrities rather than working on the movies themselves. The focus on special effects now is also a big negative problem in Hong Kong. If you look at the special effects made in U.S and compare it to those in Hong Kong, there is a big difference. Maybe its because the movie industry in Hong Kong make nowhere near as much money as those in U.S. I also think that older martial art tv series are a lot better than the ones now. They actually used to show martial arts. Now, its all about using computer generated effects to make people fly and shoot stuff out from their hands. I think the hand to hand fighting in the older tv series are much better than the special effects.

I totally agree. TV series are a lot better than movies! There aren't many good HK movies nowadays. They are either slapsticks that make no sense or they try too hard to imitate Hollywood action movies. With the exception of Infernal Affairs though...Let's just say that series make more sense than movies do. I've seen a couple of chinese movies (and by that i mean HK movies) lately but I am not impressed by any of them. If anything, it seems to me that movie producers are banking too much on pop-stars to sell their movies rather than having a good storyline or real actors/actresses...

tvb series are not as good nowadays. like to get unstuck in time for example, it's realy confusing. and many movies are not orignial plots like they just copy some other movie's plots or got it from a book or a novel the movies are all right i guess. but i raeally feel tha thk and tvb movies and series can be a lot beter. the cast in many movies are good though. so that's ok. well, i still think that american movies are better. and hk really really need to work on horror movies. like this one with cookies and kenny (from boyz) it was horrible. it was stupid and definitely not scary. the whole movie was just boring and easy to guess... i mean the storyline. not craetive. i cant believe i actually went and watched that. well, so much for my complaints and lil praises. haha.

I find that HK movies nowaday are boring, i can barely survive past the first 10 mins and switch it off. Most of them have no storyline at all and they just end it abruptly as if to finish their work. On the otherhand, TVB series is getting better to those made in the earlier days. Once i tried to re-watch Duke of Mount Deer by Andy Lau & Tony Leung. I recalled i absolutely love this series back then but when i re-watch it again, i find that the quality, the costume, the background everything seem to be old fashion.

i love tvb series'. they r so good! but wut really pisses me off are really bad endings! like the whole show goes so well nd then suddenly someone leaves or dies! it like omfg! and hong kong movies are horrible! ive only seen a couple, i dunno if its becuz i get mine from the video store and they re record them, but the graphics are horrible! ne ways tvb rocks!

hk movies are pretty crappy lately. case in point, silver hawk. This movie was so bad, it was turned off almost imediately. there are also alot of bad movies i scene lately that i couldn't remember, and im glad i couldn't. The only good movie that i seen lately that was remotely good was exlixir of love. That had some funny moments.

I must agree that most of tvb series are pretty good.
But lately that is also going down.
Some of the actors and actresses are payed more to go to the other companies.
Personally i think that tvb like to take in new actors and actresses, because it cost less.
The mainland and the taiwanese chinese film industry are also getting better.
The storyline are getting better.

TVB series are far better then ATV series..at least the actors are more famous. The story line are very good.. well sometime there are one or two series which is pretty boring, but most of it is very good.

There aren't much movies are good. doesn't seem there is a interesting movie.
hoping to see more good movies coming out

seriously, i think hk movies are pretty bad. it just seems producers keep spitting out a whole bunch of movies with the weirdest plots (or no plots at all) with the same casts over and over again. or they use people who cannot act at all but are recognized as singers (who, actually, can't even sing!) for instance, there was that new one with miriam yeung eating... embryos or something? the strangest storylines.......

i like tvb series much better. though the latest series don't seem as good as the older ones with the older actors like gallen lo, louis koo and well, jessica hsuen and ada choi appear less. i guess one thing is that this new 'class' of young actors (myolie, S4, rain li, chris lai, etc.) are the main people now.

i think that tvb series are the best out of any other hong kong company. they have good actors and actress and there quality of the movie is very attractive!!

I agree that the TVB tv series is much more better than the hk movies. When I was young I still enjoyed going to the cinema to watch movie, but now i just don't want to waste my money and time to go to the cinema but just buy VCD as i can stop watching if i think it is boring

same here, some of the hk movies (with famous stars) you even don't know what the movie is about.

Completely agree!!! Chinese movies tend to be stupid and have really no plot to them, the ones that really have any plot move on to the rest of thw world and how many of those movies actually have made that leap. Hollywood movies tend to have different kinds of plots and the special effects are way better too.

You can say hk movie are bad compare tho the hk movies from the 90s and 80s but you can't compare hk movies to hollywood. Low budget and bad quality? what do you expect when a big budget hollywood movies has a budget as high as $200 million. Try finding a hk moving with a $20 million hk dollar budget let alone u.s. dollar. The bad economy in hk also has alot to do with the movies being lower quality (lower budget) and the kind of movie it is producing which is funny and just get ppl to laugh (b/c of the tough times in hk now)

On the point about copying hollywood, wong jing does that alot but I can say that hollywood copies way more from hk movies. Most of the current hollywood action and fighing style is copy from hk movies of the 80s and 90s. Then there is the remake, whatever movie from asian that has a good plot hollywood just remake it for the americans.

ahhh their all good to me...i watch anythign that is new and not old.well soem old but mostly new

I have not seen any real action HK movies since the mid 90's. Those days when Jet Li, Chow Yun Fat, Stephen Chow, became famous, so were those movies. I have yet to see anything today that compares to the past.

Personally, I don't think Hong Kong movies are getting any better ... It's usually quite boring and no point .... Western movies are funnier and the plots are much better ...

the tvb series are ok but the hong kong movies has better quality?

I think for the most part, tvb series r much better than HK movies.. but of course there are some exceptions to that

the hk movie is better quality than TVB series.......
i think it is because of the equipment and the skill ......

the most important factor of all- THE COST
with more money, the better the production is.

in my opinion,

tvb needs improvement. tvb got very good screening especially the colors. they need more talent in actors/tress. i sees lack acting talent in tvb series. Most of them either came from beauty pagent or some kind of people from gossips turn famous. Very poor prob and setting. Same probs used again and again. Story lines always shows love is the greatest of all (still better than taiwan though)

Hk movies got far better talent. Most hk actors are very good actors. Some evn made it to Hollywood.

i sees a lot of improvement in mainland production. previous series like yong chen dynasty, kang xi ti guo, water margin, da zha men, and many more really impress me a lot. Although stories may be a little boring but the production is superb. With great acting talent and very nice probs and costume.
china movies are also improving. Those production like hero- really amazing.

I have not seen any real action HK movies since the mid 90's. Those days when Jet Li, Chow Yun Fat, Stephen Chow, became famous, so were those movies. I have yet to see anything today that compares to the past.

I agree that 95% of the HK movies are really bad. No story at all. But I come to like a few of the romantic ones (kinda old too), like My Left Eye See Ghost, Turn Left Turn Right, MTR.

As for kung fu movies, I think these really need big budget to be good. I hate it too after I watch an American movie, and see the exact same stuff got copied into some low budget HK movies.

BTW, did anyone goto the theatre to watch Hero in the US? I know it's really old, but it's such a nice movie to watch in theatre. It's one of the few Chiense movies that are in my opinion worth the money to watch a second time.

I heard Infernal Affairs are coming to the US too, but going to be acted out by some American actors. I wish I could see the original on theatre, too.

Maybe you could download it from somewhere...if you want , i could give u a BT link~

I also agree that most of the Hk movies are terrible..they mostly comedies that are just all laughs and no substance , though , some of the comedies are kinda stupid , like those Stephen Chow movies ...

As for TVB serial shows , i think that they are getting more adventurous in their
plots, they have more new inventive scripts that keeps the veiwers wanting for
more.

I agree with michelle_wuk2003, in the past movie were much better with Jet Li, Chow Yun Fat, Stephen Chow and Jackie Chan. They were my favourite actors. I was totally tuned into the Gambling series with Yun Fat, and Stephen, and Chan's police story series.

Now days, HK movies come in some numbers that have a good plot. Infernal Affair series is a good example, however Lau's 'Running on Karma' was crap.

TVB series like always have a better storyline than the movies. I enjoyed the past series and current series. Especially now that HK has handled CG pretty darn well.

the quality of the tvb series are much better than it used to be. i think the got more money to spend...