| A box-office success but in reality not a product Michael Hui can and should endorse as intensely as his prior classics such as The Private Eyes. Under Clifton Ko's rather lazy direction, Hui is allowed be lazy too but manages to get in a few solid laughs as a village Mainlander traveling to the big Hong Kong city to live with his sister (Olivia Cheng). On home turf, Hui's Ngan is a crafty fella who can jump between coconut trees and put out cigarette butts from a distance with his spit. When changing locale, he's more of a retarded, fish out of water country bumpkin. Shacking up with the sister, her husband (Raymond Wong) and a rather big family that also has the flower vase-role of the piece unashamedly assigned to Joey Wong, Ngan's innocence will generate annoyance but life affirming lessons about appreciating your loved ones. It's witty to no degree whatsoever as Ngan catches sights of the wonders of modern toilet flushing, find creative ways to not exhale cigarette smoke and accidentally travel to Africa where stupid Africans reside (enter rather poor taste from the filmmakers). Hui, in a role Stephen Chow would adopt at many times to great success, sells the silly gags well during quite few times but is not catering to the audience that liked his clever reason for doing comedy bits in the first place. No satire, no commentary, just a far cry off legendary celluloid and simple fun disappears to a dangerous degree as we move along. Ricky Hui and Mario Cordeo also appear while a host of stars make cameos including Simon Yam, Tony Leung Ka-Fai, Fennie Yuen, Rachel Lee, Lowell Lo and Teddy Yip. |
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