While I admit that the "Lucky Stars" brand of comedy, infantile as it may be, does have its moments, I think a little of it goes a long way. And those movies would be kind of a chore to sit through had it not been for the excellent action scenes. That is not the case with this one. I love the comedy here and find it more or less hilarious from start to finish. Sammo injects so much ingenuity, warmth, and great gags here that even without the action, the movie would still work as a straight comedy.

Sammo and the guys have great chemistry and timing. It is genuinely funny watching this gang of dimwitted misfits goofing around and getting into trouble. They are the perfect ensemble of talents, all with a specific role to play, and bringing their own personal touch to the proceedings. It also helps that they are backed by a truly impressive cast here. It is a veritable "who's who" of HK cinema, circa 1983. It is actually hard to think of anyone who wasn't in this movie.

Admittedly, it has less action and fights than the "Lucky Stars" flicks. But what there is is great and dispersed appropriately throughout the movie. Stuff like the roller-skate chase, the thirty car pile-up, and the warehouse fight just never gets old, which I think you can actually say for the movie as a whole. The comedy, as well as the action, holds up well to this day. A classic of the genre, and just a fun ride all together.

1. I saw My Lucky Stars first and I was kind of expecting the same cast from that one. Eric Tsang and the lovely Sibelle Hu are missing from this one so that was a little disappointing.

2. Jackie Chan is given top billing on the Fox rereleased DVD, but the real star of this show is the great Sammo Hung. Jackie has a few good action scenes in the movie and I thought his character would show up to give the Lucky Stars a hand once in a while. But his character does things like beat up suspects to get a confession, cause a twenty car pile-up after skating after robbery suspects and even gets into a sparring match with Yuen Biao (who has a cameo in this movie along with Moon Lee).

But the movie does have comical moments which make up for the lack of martial arts scenes, a Hong Kong style music montage of the Lucky Stars gang cleaning up things and so much more: this movie had 80s written all over it. There's even a scene where Sammo's character Teapot and Cherie Cheung's character Sis order food from a Hong Kong restaraunt called 'Maxims' and Ann Hui plays the cashier...she even gives a kid a toy for trying to memorize what Maxims is famous for. Looks like a good restaraunt and if I ever go to Hong Kong, I'll definitely try it out.

Give Winners and Sinners a try, but be warned: there won't be too much martial arts fighting in this one like in My Lucky Stars, but don't let that discourage you. I watched it and found it entertaining.

It isn't.

It's a blueprint; a not-quite-ripe-yet predecessor. Director/star Sammo Hung would later use many elements and cast members from this movie in "My Lucky Stars" and "Twinkle Twinkle Lucky Stars"...and some viewers will no doubt point to the name of the ex-cons' cleaning service, "Five Stars Cleaning", and shriek "I told you so, I told you so"...but Winners & Sinners does not fit into the true Lucky Stars continuity. The most obvious differences are the absence of Eric Tsang's character ("Roundhead") and the fact that Sammo's character ("Teapot") here meets the gung-ho cop played by Jackie Chan for the first time; in the other Lucky Stars films, they've known each other since childhood. Charlie Chin ("Vaseline") is still a womanizing jewel thief and Richard Ng ("Windpipe") is still nuttier than a Snickers bar, and Stanley Fung ("Ranks") is here too, but he's not the same as in the other films. By the way, these are the nicknames given on the Universe DVD; in other versions, they're a little different (Ranks = Rookie, Windpipe = Exhaust Pipe, etc.).

So, anyway. Our party of five (including "Curly", played by John Shum Kin-Fun, who appeared in a different capacity in Twinkle Twinkle Lucky Stars) get out of prison on the same day, crash at Curly's place, drool over his sister (Cherie Chung), and try to go legit. The plot, such as it is, mostly consists of a series of Sammo-ish comedic situations leading up to the protagonists' unwitting acquisition of a Triad leader's briefcase and the ensuing struggle over it. Outstanding among the bits of childish humor are an enormous vehicular pile-up and a scene in which Richard Ng believes himself to be invisible and struts around naked (although you can tell he's wearing shorts when he peeks at the chick in the bathtub). Action is sparse, but that's to be expected. Brief appearances are made by Mars, Lam Ching-Ying (R.I.P.), and Yuen Biao (who has a brief fight with Jackie; if this were a real Lucky Stars film, they probably would have recognized each other as cops, even if they weren't partners yet).

This isn't what I would call a great film, but the chemistry amongst the actors is certainly there, and it's a good sign of things to come in MLS and TTLS.

By the way...did I miss something, or did Sammo just immediately guess the briefcase combination?