Ti Lung (狄龍; Di Long), born Tommy Tam Fu-Wing (谭富荣, Tan Fu-rong, born 19 August 1946) is a Hong Kong actor best known for the various martial arts movies he made with Shaw Brothers and, later on in his career, a wide range of Heroic Bloodshed films.
Starting his career as a model, Tommy Tam made his debut in the second installment of the One-Armed Swordsman movies, before his role in Dead End made him a fan-favorite. Recognizing the potential in Tommy Tam, Shaw Brothers director Chang Cheh quickly groomed him into a replacement for Jimmy Wang Yu, after Wang-yu jumped ship and terminated his contract with Shaw Brothers. As his career snowballs from one role to another and he started becoming a household name, Tommy Tam soon adopts the name "Ti Lung", a slightly modified spelling of "Delon" (Lung's childhood hero) as his stage name.
After starring in Vengeance! (1970), where he had a minor supporting role which is a Small Role, Big Impact, Ti Lung would become fast friends with his onscreen younger brother, David Chiang, and the two of them would star together in several films consecutively. Together with their mentor Chang Cheh, the combined star power of Ti Lung, David Chiang and Chang Cheh would be referred to as "Shaw Brothers' Golden Trio" in the early 1970s.
Churning out one martial arts epic after another, the long-running collaboration between Lung and Chiang eventually comes to an end after Blood Brothers, where Ti Lung won the Special Award for Outstanding Performance at the 11th Golden Horse Awards. Lung would terminate his contract with Shaw Brothers in the 1980s, and would find better opportunities in Golden Harvest after being cast as Sung Tse-ho in A Better Tomorrow, putting aside his presence in wuxia cinema in favor of heroic bloodshed shoot'em ups.
Despite their separation, Lung and Chiang still maintains a close friendship with each other, showing up in martial arts alumni reunions and social gatherings.
His only child, son Shaun Tam Chun Yin, is also an actor.
Not to be confused with Di Lung, who's known for his catchphrase, "Watch where you're goin', ya fool!"
Tropes relating to this performer:
- Bash Brothers: With David Chiang.
- Chronically Killed Actor: Tends to die a lot in his wuxia films, until the twilight of his career in the late-1970s.
- Cool Old Guy: Keeps on kicking ass in movies... even into the late 90s and early 2000s when he's over 70 years of age!
- Good Old Fisticuffs: In most of his movies.
- Mr. Fanservice: I mean, look at the above image!
- Walking Shirtless Scene: His older movies entitles him to remove his shirt and bare his abs for at least 15 minutes per film.
Ti Lung's notable films:
- One-Armed Swordsman - he had a guest appearance in the second movie before playing a key role in the reboot, The New One-Armed Swordsman
- King Eagle
- Vengeance! (1970)
- Delightful Forest
- Duel of the Ironfist
- Duel of Fists - and it's sequel, The Angry Guest
- The Anonymous Heroes
- The Deadly Duo
- The Heroic Ones
- Four Riders
- Five Shaolin Masters
- Blood Brothers (1973)
- Death Duel (The Cameo, he reprise his role as Fu Hung-hsueh from The Magic Blade)
- Have Sword, Will Travel
- The Pirate (1973)
- 7 Man Army
- The Singing Killer (The Cameo)
- The Snake Prince
- Soul of the Sword
- The Spiritual Boxer - The Cameo
- Trilogy of Swordsmanship
- Flying Guillotine - he appears in the sequel
- The Avenging Eagle
- Clan Feuds
- The Savage Five
- The Magic Blade and its sequels, Pursuit Of Vengeance and A Warrior’s Tragedy
- The Water Margin and its sequel, All Men Are Brothers
- The Shaolin Temple (1976)
- The Sentimental Swordsman - appears in all three films of the trilogy
- Heaven Sword And Dragon Sabre - in the third movie, The Hidden Power of the Dragon Sabre
- Iron Chain Fighter
- Ten Tigers From Kwangtung
- Jade Tiger
- The Young Rebel
- Mercenaries from Hong Kong
- The Naval Commandos (Death by Cameo)
- Shaolin Prince
- A Better Tomorrow - he appears in the first two films
- City War
- Tiger on Beat (cameo)
- A Killer's Blues
- Drunken Master - he appears in the second movie as Jackie Chan's dad
- Three Kingdoms: Resurrection Of The Dragon
- The Warrior's Way
