Mr. Vampire 4: Quick Takes

It's sans Lam Ching Ying for the 4th installment of the Mr. Vampire series so Ricky Lau and Sammo Hung did some rethinking, albeit less radical than in the first sequel. The idea hatched was to bring back Anthony Chan's Taoist master character that appeared briefly in the first film and then pair him up with a more mellow buddhist monk (Wu Ma). Thus creating the odd couple act needed and Chin Siu- Ho's brother, equally acrobatic Chin Kar-Lok takes up the lead role as more of a love struck pupil rather than a naughty, annoying one. The dynamic in the select locales works very well, with Chan and Wu Ma providing bickering of decent quality. Director Ricky Lau even takes the opportunity to think up a few clever visual tricks along the way in addition to working out a good looking frame with his cinematography team. Then the last half hour eventually brings in the ferocious hopping vampire of the piece and Sammo's stunt team gets the film into high gear. It's nothing groundbreaking but the frantic pace injected as well as Sammo's flavour to a requisite power within the struggles makes Mr. Vampire Saga 4 a very worthy entry. It probably could've done with another movie title however as it's more of a spin-off. Yuen Wah co-stars (and acted as co-action director), hinging onto typical flamboyance but with a great sense of fun. Also with Loletta Lee and Chong Fat.