The Tang emperor is betrayed by one of his generals, who installs himself as emperor in the East Capital. The son of one of his slave workers escapes to the Shaolin Temple, learns kung fu, and sets out to kill the traitor who killed his father. Based on a true story from Shaolin folklore, but highly fictionalized.
Several slaves abused for not working hard enough. Some related scenes: one where a character witnessing the death of several animals; one scene of ritual moxibustion, where a character has to tolerate burning mugwort stuck on several parts of their forehead.
Small amounts here-and-there; average for this kind of movie. One early scene has a villain attack another character, miss, and do heavy damage to a corpse instead. A scene where some sheep are bloodily massacred. A monk is shot with several arrows.
Two characters strongly implied to die this way; though the actual event isn't shown, the last we see of one is in a bonfire, the last of another falling into one.
Some ritualised head-shaving (the protagonist is a monk), once to force a disguise. Nobody is injured during the shaving. One scene where a character has glued-on hair pulled off. Some mild blood loss caused, but not severe.
Several scenes where drunkenness is used as part of a fighting style; one scene where a man drinks heavily from long-held grief; one scene with a petty tyrant, drunk for fun.
One scene where a mosquito is killed because it stings the killer. One scene where a frog is killed for food. One scene where several sheep are killed to coerce their shepherd.