As the above quotations demonstrate, Chow Yun-fat's image as a good actor is widely acknowledged by film professionals, both inside and outside the Hong Kong film industry. This can also be confirmed by the list of numerous acting awards that Chow won, as mentioned briefly in the Introduction. To elaborate on this point, we could take a look at the Hong Kong Film Awards nomination list. Between 1985 and 1996, Chow was nominated almost every year, and in some years he even received two or three nominations. In 1987, for instance, in addition to winning Best Actor for playing Mark Gor in A Better Tomorrow (1986), Chow was also nominated for Best Supporting Actor for his role as Detective Lan in Love unto Waste (1986). In 1988 he had three Best Actor nominations for playing Boat-head in An Autumn's Tale (1987), Chung Tin-ching in Prison on Fire (1987) and Ko Chow in City on Fire (1987), the last role winning him the title. Acting in a wide range of film genres, including melodrama, action, comedy, romance, thrillers, biopics and Westerns, Chow is indeed one of the most versatile and acclaimed actors in the local film industry.

As a leading TV star in the late 1970s and early 1980s, Chow's TV stardom opened the film industry's door for him. However, many of his early films, such as Massage Girls (1976), Bed for Day, Bed for Night (1977) and Miss O (1978) only earned Chow a reputation as ‘box-office poison’ (Pan 1987: 23). It was not until 1986 that Chow achieved both commercial and critical success for his performance in A Better Tomorrow. Since then, Chow's image as a mega film star and as a fine actor has been widely acclaimed in the media.