Blades of the Guardians

At 80, Yuen Woo Ping, the man who choreographed the fights in 'The Matrix', 'Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon' and 'Kill Bill: Vol. 1', is back in the director's chair with 'Blades of the Guardians', a wuxia epic set in the deserts of western China. It's adapted from 'Biao Ren', Xu Xianzhe's hit manhua, first published in 2015.

During the Sui dynasty, Dao Ma is a former soldier making a living as a bounty hunter in the lawless frontier lands, always with a young boy in his care. He refuses to side with the warlords and rebels fighting the empire's officials, until his friend Lao Mo, a tribal chief, asks him for a favour: to escort a mysterious masked rebel to Chang'an, a man with a fortune on his head.

Lao Mo's daughter Ayuya, a deadly archer, rides with them, and before long the group has bandits, bounty hunters, the ruthless governor Chang Guiren and Di Ting, a swordsman with an old score to settle with Dao Ma, all on their trail. And between them and the capital lies the Taklamakan Desert.

Wu Jing, who directed and starred in 'Wolf Warrior 2' and got his big break with Yuen on 'Tai Chi Boxer' in the 90s, plays Dao Ma. Alongside him are Jet Li as the villainous Chang Guiren, Nicholas Tse, Tony Leung Ka Fai and Chinese opera star Chen Lijun, in a cast that mixes Hong Kong action veterans with younger faces such as Yu Shi and Liu Yaowen.

It opened in China on 17 February 2026, for Chinese New Year, and took more than 1.3 billion yuan, making it the highest grossing wuxia film ever at the Chinese box office. International critics mostly praised the fights, though some found the plot far too tangled. The 20 outlets collected on Movienco give it an average of 7.6 out of 10.

• Action
• Adventure
• Drama