As in the United States, Hong Kong experienced a booming middle-class in the 1950s, and as a British colony, its citizens were up on the latest western fads, including rock ‘n’ roll. And yet there also was a longing for mainland China, now a forbidden territory since the communist revolution of 1949.

That cultural tug-of-war informs a delightful five-film Berkeley Art Museum Pacific Film Archive series “Chinese Musicals from 1957 to 1963,” which features the full power of Hong Kong’s vibrant mid-century studio system that produced nearly as many movies as Hollywood.

There are old-school Chinese opera movies such as “The Love Eterne” (7 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 21) and “A Maid from Heaven” (7 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 22), both from 1963.

But the beating heart of the series is Grace Chang, who was as big a star as anyone during her 33-film, 11-year career (she turned 90 in June). In 1957’s series opener “Mambo Girl” (7 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 19) she’s a college girl who’d rather dance than study; In 1960’s “The Wild, Wild Rose” (Oct. 28) she’s a “hot-tempered nightclub temptress surrounded by bad love, bad men, and a worse fate in this fevered film noir musical of cigarettes, songs, and flair to burn,” a film the Hong Kong Film Archive calls “One of the best films in the history of Hong Kong cinema.”

— G. Allen Johnson