---
title: "The best Chinese movies for learning Mandarin: 117 films ranked by how much a learner understands"
description: "We counted the subtitles of 117 Mandarin films against the HSK list. Modern dramas and romantic comedies are easiest, with up to 90% of words at HSK 1–4; martial arts and history epics are hardest."
canonical: "https://mandarinthewild.com/guides/chinese-movies-for-learning-mandarin"
published: "2026-10-26"
updated: "2026-10-26"
author: "Mandarin The Wild"
---

# The best Chinese movies for learning Mandarin, ranked by how easy they are

Pick a film you understand most of, watch it with Chinese subtitles, and look up the rest as you go.

By Mandarin The WildUpdated 26 October 20264 min read

We make Mandarin The Wild.

The short answer

The easiest Chinese movies for learning Mandarin are modern-day dramas and romantic comedies. We counted the subtitles of 117 films made in Mandarin: in the easiest, Return Ticket (到阜阳六百里), HSK 1–4 words are 90% of what is said, and in the typical film 80%. Martial arts, war and history epics are hardest: in Hero (英雄), HSK 1–4 words are only 61%. Learners understand and learn most from material they mostly follow, so start at the top of the list.

## How we ranked them

We took each film's simplified Chinese subtitles, cut them into words and checked each word against the 2025 HSK list.12. A film ranks higher the more of its words are HSK 1–4. Names are left out, and a subtitle written in traditional characters is read as its simplified words, so it isn't scored as harder. Each film's names, year, original language and genre come from Wikidata, and only films whose original language is Mandarin are ranked.3

Why the words you know matter: reading and listening with ease takes knowing 95–98% of the words, and people learn more words from watching when they already follow more of it.45. No film reaches 95% on HSK 1–4 alone; the [comprehensible input guide](https://mandarinthewild.com/guides/comprehensible-input-chinese) shows how to close the gap.

周末我们一起去看电影吧。

diànyǐng: “Let's go and see a film together this weekend.”

电diàn影yǐng

Noun

movie; film

Also written 電影

## The 20 easiest Chinese movies for learners

Characters a second is how fast the lines go by while they are on screen: under 3.5 is slow, over 4.5 fast.

| Film | HSK 1–4 | HSK 1–6 | Characters a second |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1. [Return Ticket (到阜阳六百里, 2011)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Return_Ticket) | 90% | 95% | 4.0 |
| 2. [Curiosity Kills the Cat (好奇害死猫, 2006)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curiosity_Kills_the_Cat_%28film%29) | 88% | 96% | 3.2 |
| 3. [Driverless (无人驾驶, 2010)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driverless_%28film%29) | 88% | 95% | 3.7 |
| 4. [Spring Subway (开往春天的地铁, 2002)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spring_Subway) | 88% | 95% | 3.7 |
| 5. [So Close to Paradise (扁担·姑娘, 1998)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/So_Close_to_Paradise) | 88% | 94% | 2.7 |
| 6. [Eternal Moment (将爱, 2011)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_Moment) | 87% | 94% | 4.6 |
| 7. [The Terrorizers (恐怖分子, 1986)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrorizers) | 87% | 95% | 3.4 |
| 8. [Buddha Mountain (观音山, 2010)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddha_Mountain_%28film%29) | 87% | 94% | 3.9 |
| 9. [Eighteen Springs (半生缘, 1997)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eighteen_Springs_%28film%29) | 86% | 92% | 4.2 |
| 10. [Sophie's Revenge (非常完美, 2009)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sophie%27s_Revenge) | 86% | 94% | 4.0 |
| 11. [Together (和你在一起, 2002)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Together_%282002_film%29) | 86% | 91% | 3.2 |
| 12. [Go Lala Go! (杜拉拉升职记, 2010)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Go_Lala_Go!) | 86% | 94% | 4.8 |
| 13. [Starry Starry Night (星空, 2011)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starry_Starry_Night_%28film%29) | 85% | 93% | 3.8 |
| 14. [Waiting Alone (独自等待, 2004)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waiting_Alone) | 85% | 94% | 3.4 |
| 15. [The Sun Also Rises (太阳照常升起, 2007)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sun_Also_Rises_%282007_film%29) | 85% | 92% | 3.3 |
| 16. [Keep Cool (有话好好说, 1997)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keep_Cool_%28film%29) | 85% | 94% | 3.7 |
| 17. [Everlasting Regret (长恨歌, 2005)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Everlasting_Regret) | 85% | 92% | 4.1 |
| 18. [Be There or Be Square (不见不散, 1998)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Be_There_or_Be_Square) | 85% | 93% | 4.3 |
| 19. [Aftershock (唐山大地震, 2010)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aftershock_%282010_film%29) | 85% | 91% | 3.8 |
| 20. [Jade Goddess of Mercy (玉观音, 2003)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jade_Goddess_of_Mercy) | 84% | 91% | 3.7 |

Most of them are about people's lives today: a long trip home for New Year in Return Ticket, a young woman climbing the office ladder in Go Lala Go!, two Beijingers falling in love in Los Angeles in Be There or Be Square. Their talk is everyday talk, the words the HSK list teaches first.

## The hardest

| Film | HSK 1–4 | HSK 1–6 | Characters a second |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 110. [Tai Chi 0 (太极1从零开始, 2012)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tai_Chi_0) | 66% | 77% | 3.8 |
| 111. [Three Kingdoms: Resurrection of the Dragon (三国之见龙卸甲, 2008)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Kingdoms:_Resurrection_of_the_Dragon) | 66% | 79% | 3.1 |
| 112. [Detective Dee and the Mystery of the Phantom Flame (狄仁杰之通天帝国, 2010)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Detective_Dee_and_the_Mystery_of_the_Phantom_Flame) | 66% | 78% | 3.3 |
| 113. [White Vengeance (鸿门宴, 2011)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Vengeance) | 65% | 79% | 3.0 |
| 114. [Curse of the Golden Flower (满城尽带黄金甲, 2006)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curse_of_the_Golden_Flower) | 65% | 76% | 2.9 |
| 115. [The Emperor's Shadow (秦颂, 1996)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Emperor%27s_Shadow) | 64% | 77% | 3.2 |
| 116. [The Assassins (铜雀台, 2012)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Assassins_%28film%29) | 63% | 76% | 3.2 |
| 117. [Hero (英雄, 2002)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hero_%282002_film%29) | 61% | 80% | 3.5 |

Epics set in the past use court titles, ranks, weapons and literary turns of phrase that no HSK level teaches. Save them for later, or watch them for the story with the words explained.

## Easiest by genre

| Genre | Films | HSK 1–4 (median film) |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Romantic comedy | 7 | 83% |
| Drama | 43 | 81% |
| Romance | 18 | 80% |
| Comedy | 8 | 80% |
| Thriller | 5 | 78% |
| Historical | 7 | 77% |
| Action | 22 | 76% |
| Fantasy | 12 | 75% |
| Martial arts | 16 | 73% |
| War | 6 | 71% |

A film can be in more than one genre.

## How to learn from a film

- **Pick one near the top that you would watch anyway.** You learn from what you finish.
- **Know about HSK 3 first.** Below that, more than a quarter of even an easy film is new. Graded stories in [the Library](https://mandarinthewild.com/library) get you there, and the [level test](https://mandarinthewild.com/level-test) shows where you are.
- **Watch with Chinese subtitles, not English.** On YouTube, Netflix, Disney+ and Viki, [Mandarin The Wild](https://mandarinthewild.com/extension) lets you point at a word in the Chinese subtitles to see what it means in that line.
- **Keep the words that come back.** Save them to your Backpack and meet them again in Review, so the second half of the film is easier than the first.

## Questions

### What is the easiest Chinese movie for learners?

In our count of 117 Mandarin films, Return Ticket (到阜阳六百里, 2011): HSK 1–4 words are 90% of its subtitles. Curiosity Kills the Cat, Driverless, Spring Subway and So Close to Paradise follow at 88%.

### Which Chinese movies are hardest for learners?

Martial arts, war and history epics. In Hero (英雄), HSK 1–4 words are 61% of the subtitles, and The Assassins, The Emperor’s Shadow and Curse of the Golden Flower are 63–65%.

### Are Chinese movies good for learning Mandarin?

Yes, once you follow most of the words. In the typical film we counted, HSK 1–4 words are 80% of what is said, so pick an easy film, watch it with Chinese subtitles and look up the words you don’t know.

### What about Chinese dramas?

The subtitles we counted are almost all films, so we haven’t ranked TV series. Among films, stories set today were easier than costume epics, so a drama set today is the safer start.

## Sources

Checked on 26 October 2026. Prices and features change; tell us if one has.

1. [Lison and Tiedemann (2016), OpenSubtitles2016: extracting large parallel corpora from movie and TV subtitles, LREC 2016 (the subtitles we counted)](https://aclanthology.org/L16-1147/)
2. [HSK: the official site of the Chinese Proficiency Test](https://www.chinesetest.cn/)
3. [Wikidata: each film’s names, year, original language and genres (read October 2026)](https://www.wikidata.org/)
4. [Nation (2006), How large a vocabulary is needed for reading and listening?, Canadian Modern Language Review 63(1)](https://www.wgtn.ac.nz/data/assets/pdf_file/0018/1626120/2006-How-large-a-vocab.pdf)
5. [Peters and Webb (2018), Incidental vocabulary acquisition through viewing L2 television and factors that affect learning, Studies in Second Language Acquisition 40(3)](https://doi.org/10.1017/S0272263117000407)

## Keep exploring

- [Guide喜欢Comprehensible input for Chinese](https://mandarinthewild.com/guides/comprehensible-input-chinese)
- [Guide电视剧Learn Chinese from TV shows](https://mandarinthewild.com/guides/learn-chinese-from-tv-shows)
- [Guide字幕Chinese subtitles with pinyin](https://mandarinthewild.com/guides/chinese-subtitles-with-pinyin)

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