The Savage Five (1974)

People compare this movie to The Seven Samurai because of its similar theme. A village was being attacked by bandits. I can't remember exactly the story in The Seven Samurai, but I think the villagers invited outsiders to help them. In The Savage Five, the ones who would rescue them were insiders.

The first one was a thief, played by David Chiang. The people in the village don't have the heart to beat him although they had caught him, so he was happy to stay there.

The 2nd was a kungfu fighter, played by Ti Lung. He couldn't do anything than practicing kungfu, so all day long he just sat lazily and sang songs. He stayed at a wood-cutter's house, the wood-cutter played by Chen Kuan-tai. In this house also lived a beautiful woman, San Niang, played by Wang Ping-ping. San Niang was either the wood-cutter's wife or girlfriend.

Danny Lee played the village's silver-smith. He was handsome and village-girls had a crush on him. The 5th man was a street acrobat, played by Wang Chung. Among the 5 perhaps he was the most capable and the strongest during a fight, but he was gravely sick when the bandits came. He was actually an outsider, but when the bandit came he had been staying in the village's inn for days [because he was sick].

The head village and the savage four (minus Danny Lee)

Twelve bandits came to the village and forced the silver-smith to open a safe they had brought with them. The silversmith left the village to alert the authorities and the bandits started to kill villagers one by one. The sick street-acrobat, who barely couldn't get out of bed, persuaded the thief, the kungfu fighter and the wood-cutter to gather the villagers to fight against the bandits. 'There are so many of us and only 12 of them.' Even San Niang sacrificed herself to save young girls from the bandits.

The savage four (minus Chen Kuan-tai)

When they thought they had been saved, the silver-smith came back with more bandits. And he thought he had invited the authorities...

The movie is very good with perfect pace. Most harrowing part is when San Niang returned to her home after she had sacrificed herself: the scene was accompanied with a haunting music. Recommended!