Hark Tsui’s popular slapstick-romance (rom-slap?), in many ways a typical ‘80s Hong Kong comedy (very bright/very breezy/loud & overplayed – now restored; see poster), opens in sweet & sour fashion, as real tragic events (the late ‘30s invasion of Shanghai by Japan) set up a meet-cute for two lost souls taking shelter under a bridge during the bombardment. Promising to return to the spot after the war, the two are soon lost in the city’s confusion. Eight years pass before they return to Shanghai, where they separately discover the bridge underpass now taken over by disabled war vets & vagrants. Instead, they unknowingly find apartments in the same crumbling tenement building. She’s on the third floor; he’s just above on the fourth. But will they even recognize each other, or find others before reuniting. That’s the basic setup which Tsui rings his slapstick variations and chases on; with all sorts of comic characters (most with nightclub connections) missed meetings; misunderstandings, missed clues, etc. But it’s the madcap milieu of bustling, fast recovering Shanghai and the constant flow of comic action amid street events, pedicab chases, parades, shopping & meals, close calls in apartments that function as mazes, pushed to their limits thru Tsui’s use of compound slapstick gags that recklessly pile up. The mayhem more Frank Tashlin anarchy than Blake Edwards elegant precision. Put together piecemeal style via matched edits that rely on concept rather than execution to make their mark. At times you wish he’d slow down to better introduce his mixed up farcical plot and mismatched friends & lovers.
DOUBLE-BILL/LINK: Around the same time, Jackie Chan was bringing this sort of Hong Kong action slapstick (minus the romance) to world cinema. He’s still at it. But the one that makes me laugh the most is KUNG FU HUSTLE/04. https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2016/04/kung-fu-hustle-2004.html
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