Young and Dangerous 5 (98古惑仔之龙争虎斗)

Young and Dangerous 5 (98古惑仔之龙争虎斗) is a 1998 Hong Kong action film, the fifth mainline installment of the Young and Dangerous triad series, directed by Andrew Lau Wai-Keung and written by Manfred Wong, with Ekin Cheng returning as Hung Hing triad leader Chan Ho-nam.¹ It was released in Hong Kong in January 1998 as a Lunar New Year picture and continues the story after the 1997 handover, when the Hung Hing society adapts to the changed political and social climate under its leader Chiang Tin-yeung.^{1 • 2}

Production

The film came from the team behind the whole series. Andrew Lau, who had been a cinematographer before turning director, directed and shot the Young and Dangerous films, which adapt Cow Man's popular comic book about Hung Hing member Chan Ho-nam; Lau and Wong had formed the production company BoB & Partners Co., Ltd. with Wong Jing in 1995, and BoB is credited as the shooting company for this installment.^{8 • 4 • 3} Everwide (H. K.) Limited is credited as the production company, Gala Film Distribution Limited as distributor, and the film's library sits with Warner Bros.³ Music was composed by Chan Kwong-wing, and the action direction was credited to Dion Lam Dik-On and Li Chung-Chi.^{6 • 4}

The supporting cast is large, listing 81 people on HKFACT, and includes series regulars Jerry Lamb (Pou-pan, called "Foreskin"), Jason Chu (Banana Skin), Lee Siu-Kei (Kei), Sandra Ng (Sister 13), Vincent Wan (Ben Hon), Alex Man (Chiang Tin-yeung), Anthony Wong Chau-Sang, Wong Tin-Lam, Billy Chow, Law Lan, and Kwan Hoi-San.^{3 • 4}

Cast change: no Chicken

The most visible difference from earlier installments is the absence of Jordan Chan as Chicken, Chan Ho-nam's closest friend, because Chan was too busy to appear.⁴ Reviewers treated this as a real loss: LoveHKFilm's Kozo wrote that without Jordan Chan the series loses its best actor and most compelling character, and the hkfilm.net series review called the missing Chicken one of the film's huge holes, arguing that Ho-nam cannot carry the movie alone.^{4 • 10} The film also leans on older or secondary characters, such as Sister Thirteen and Ben Hon, in place of the young core group, and Chan Ho-nam spends nearly the whole film in a suit and tie, which one reviewer read as a sign that the series was no longer so young and dangerous.⁴

Reception

Contemporary and later reviews ranked the film low within the series. LoveHKFilm called it decent but by far the weakest of the bunch, while praising Mark Cheng's villain and Shu Qi's performance.⁴ The hkfilm.net series review rated it 3 out of 10, calling it the worst of the series and criticizing a script that drops a promising rivalry plot in favor of real estate fraud and then a kickboxing tournament between the gangs.¹⁰ On Rotten Tomatoes the film has no critic reviews and a 53% audience score from more than 500 ratings.¹¹

The film's commercial result was modest for the series. HKFACT records HK$12,875,820 at the Hong Kong box office, and the Golden Harvest database lists HK$12,875,420, placing it 18th for the year; Baidu Baike gives a cumulative figure of about HK$12.86 million as of 2007.^{3 • 5 • 12} The Malaysian release version was cut, with slightly different Cantonese dubbing.³

Place in the series

Young and Dangerous 5 sits late in a franchise that the South China Morning Post described as the most sustained series to emerge in Hong Kong cinema after the industry's mid-1990s depression: six mainline films released between 1996 and 2000, all directed by Lau, alongside spin-offs and imitators.¹³ The SCMP retrospective notes that this installment is set after the 1997 handover, with Ho-nam advised by his bosses to take a more corporate approach to business and avoid street fighting so that crime stays under the authorities' radar, a shift reflected in the suited Ho-nam that reviewers remarked on.^{13 • 4} The mainline story concluded two years later with Born to Be King (2000), and a prequel, Young and Dangerous: The Prequel, appeared in July 1998, months after this film.^{7 • 4}

References

1. 98古惑仔之龙争虎斗 (1998), 1905电影网
2. ９８古惑仔龍爭虎鬥 劇情簡介, WMOOV 香港電影
3. 98古惑仔之龙争虎斗, HKFACT
4. Young and Dangerous 5 (1998) review by Kozo, LoveHKFilm
5. 98古惑仔之龍爭虎鬥（1998）ゴールデン・ハーベスト大全, KUNGFU TUBE
6. 98古惑仔之龙争虎斗 演职员表, 1905电影网
7. Young And Dangerous Movies & TV Shows, FlixPatrol
8. 香港影人小傳檢索：劉偉強, 香港電影資料館
9. 98古惑仔之龙争虎斗剧情介绍, 电视猫
10. Young and Dangerous series review, hkfilm.net
11. Young and Dangerous V, Rotten Tomatoes
12. 98古惑仔之龙争虎斗, Baidu Baike
13. Why the Young and Dangerous film series remains the ultimate 1990s Hong Kong triad saga, South China Morning Post

Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Franchise and series entries as standalone works › Action, thriller, and crime series film entries › Entries released in the 1990s

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026

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