Love | 愛 [ Movie Review ] ★★★

The Pitch

No, this is not the movie installment for the popular long running Taiwanese television series that just ended it's run in Singapore. This is Doze Niu's Taiwanese rendition of "Love Actually" that's out to wrestle with Sammi Cheng's Romancing in Thin Air and Ah Niu's The Wedding Diary for the Asian Valentine Day box office profit love.

Love 愛 comes with a stellar cast of actor and actress from Taiwan (and China). Shu Qi and Zhao Wei probably needs no introduction in this part of the world.  Ethan Ruan, Mark Chao, Eddie Peng, Ivy Chen and Amber Kuo are the new upcoming good looking Taiwanese young stars who each had participated in at least one movie that was shown in Singapore cinema recently (Monga, Hear Me and Au revoir Taipei).

But personally, the main attraction for Love 愛 would be due to Doze Niu's participation in this movie as the director and actor.  His previous two full length features "What on Earth Have I Done Wrong?" and "Monga" (which he directed and acted) were pretty enjoyable and it made him one of my "Asian directors to watch out for" list.
 
It's not easy to make a "Love Actually" type of movie and quite a few had already failed badly (Valentine Day and Hot Summer Days). It's not easy to manage multiple plots and numerous big stars but I am having good vibes that Doze Niu might be able to deliver this.

(Special Thanks to Festive Films for a chance to preview Love 愛)

Love In Space | 全球熱戀 [ Movie Review ] ★★★

The Pitch

Love In Space (全球热恋) is the romantic comedy follow up to last year Hot Summer Days (全城热恋). Directed by Wing Shya (夏永康) and Tony Chan (陈国辉) with an ensemble of well known Asian celebrities, these two movies basically presents a variety of love stories like what Love Actually did.  

Hot Summer Days was one of my top ten worst movies of 2010. It was a fumbling attempt to ape Love Actually's success and it drown in it's arsenal of cardboard characters and multiple weak storylines. But Hot Summer Days must have done well at the box office since a follow up had been green lighted. 

The Plot  

Love In Space follows a mother (Xu Fan 徐帆) and her three grown daughters as they juggle their unexpected love encounters in a space station, Sydney and Beijing.

In Space, No one can hear your sweet nothing

In a space station, Rose (René Liu 刘若英) is unexpectedly reunited with her ex boyfriend Michael (Aaron Kwok 郭富城). With only the two of them working in a confined space, romance started to blossom. They tried to suppress their underlying love for each other as the issues that caused them to break up at the first place remained unsolved.

When Garbage Met Disposable Gloves

In Sydney, Lily (Gwei Lun Mei 桂纶镁) had a love at first sight encounter with Johnny (Eason Chan 陈奕迅). Their relationship wasn't a easy one as Lily suffers from anxiety disorder (OCD) with cleanliness and he works as a garbage man. But fate kept pushing them together and it's up to them to overcome their status quo for their love to blossom.

Proof that Clark Kent disguise work

Lastly, Peony (Angelababy 杨颖) is a well known celebrity in China but credential wise, she just got the worst actress award. In order to perform better for her next movie, she went undercover to work as a waitress to study her role. What she didn't expect was that she would fall for a failed writer Wen Feng (Jing Boran 井柏然) there. Relationship bliss would not be easy for her as she is under contact with her agency and it's forbidden for her to date for the next five years.

 The Perspective

Love In Space is a marked improvement from Hot Summer Days. The most obvious improvement would be reduction of love stories between five couples to three. Concentrating on only three couples gave more time to build up the chemistry between characters. But then again, these three love stories are still rather predicable and the only thing that saved it from being a yawn fest would be their rather interesting setups.

The most enjoyable love story among the three would be the one between Lily and Johnny. The quirkiness of their situation and the actors performance made it a pleasure to sit through this section of the movie. 

The most gimmicky portion of Love in Space would be the romance between Rose and Michael. I was interested to see what tricks would a China film use to depict the zero gravity environment. While the mixture of wires and computer generated images were not top notch Hollywood standard, they were not too bad. The romance were passable largely due to charisma of the two actors.

Last but not least, the Beijing love story which features Angelababy in various outrageous costumes. I am not sure why Angelababy and Jing Boran were paired up for the second time. It seemed that the China audience like them as a couple but I felt that the chemistry between them was lacking. Or perhaps I am just not used to the China style of romance which this segment is catering for.

In summary, Love in Space turned out to be more enjoyable than expected. The reduction of stories worked well and the set up here were so much better than Hot Summer Days. It might not go down as a classic love story like Love Actually but it would do to pass time with a love one.

Recommended.

It's a Great Great World | 大世界 [ Movie Review ] ★★1/2

Last Year Eric Tsang's 72 Tenants of Prosperity was a success at the Hong Kong Lunar New Year Box Office. The movie basically reminiscence the past with various Hong Kong movies actors and TVB television actors. This year, he is back with I Love Hong Kong and here in Singapore, we are getting It's a Great Great World 大世界, a He Sui Pian with similar structure from director Kevin Tong (Rule #1) and the Singapore MediaCorp Artistes.

For the younger folks who don't know about the Great World Amusement Park, it was one of the three amusement parks in Singapore. Back then, they were Singaporean's top choice of entertainment before the onslaught of television and shopping centers. It's kinda ironic that the movie about the Great World Amusement Park are performed with the local television actors. The same bunch of people who are drinking from the well that killed Great World. Bet you never thought of it that way.

Anyway, It's a Great Great World is a rojak mix of good stuff and the not so good stuff. There are moments that it hits the sweet spot that it was going for and there are moments that it just flounder badly.

The film starts with a young fashion photographer, Ah Min (Olivia Ong) doing a final walkthough at her late grandma (Yvonne Lim) photo studio before closure. She came across some of her grandma's favorite photo and decided to set out to find the owners of those photos. Using her grandma's phone book, she managed to locate Ah Meng (Chew Chor Meng), one of the guy in the four photos.

This grumpy old man turned out to be a lok lok (assorted dip snack) seller at the Great World Amusement Park and he went on to tell her about the four individual stories that are attached to those old photos. It felt kinda strange that for someone who missed her grandma funeral and will be heading overseas the next day for work would want to undertake such a mission. But if Ah Min never persisted in such a strange awkward mission, we won't be getting the following four stories.
 
The first story is about Ah Boo (Henry Thia), a middle age guy who getting all dress up to meet Elizabeth Taylor when she visited Great World Amusement Park's Sky Theatre for a movie premiere. He got his roses and photographer ready but his boss, the ringmaster appeared out of nowhere and forced him back to work. It turned out that Ah Boo was a clown and his boss is a meanie that like to torture his staff to amuse the young audience.

The issue here would be how the filmmakers and cast tried to squeeze humour out of the segment. Is it funny to see a drunken ringmaster bullying his performers? Is the movie trying to say that the kids back then enjoyed such mean-spirited acts? The freak show that the segment is trying to muster is so poor constructed that if that was the kind of acts performing in Great World Amusement Park, it's understandable why the park had to close down. Then there's the lame ideas of helping Ah Boo achieving his objective with Elizabeth Taylor.

However, all the issues with this segment aside, when the movie revealed the final act of the segment, it has a touching quality that was quite unexpected. It has such a heartwarming moment that made all the poor buildup bearable.

The second story is about romance between Mei Juan (Joanna Peh) a game stall vendor and Ah Leong (Zhang Zhen Huan) an ointment seller from a Malaysia kampong. While Joanna Peh and Zhang Zhen Huan looked good as a couple, the setup for these two to fall in love was weak in many ways.

For example, Ah Leong was fleeing from some unsatisfied customers who happened to be gangsters and in an attempt to get away with it, he decided to kiss Mei Juan as a cover up. It's an overused film trick that poor executed here. The situation was not properly set up to make it seems like he had no choice but to force his way with her to escape those that are chasing after him. In fact, it would have been better if he just hide behind the game table. It just hard to believe that the female game stall vendor didn't struggle harder to break away from him (and thus exposing him) and those gangsters would miss all those smooching right in plain sight.

But then again, this segment did managed to have moments that generate the sizzle between these two. Especially the part when Ah Leong dared Mei Juan to take the ghost house ride. It's easily the most funny moment of the show and in the midst of all the spooky comedy, romance between these two character started seeping through. There's also feisty moments when Mei Juan tore down Ah Leong's attempts to be suave that a delight to watch. In the end, it managed to make one root for their unlikely romance and given the weak introduction to these characters, it's impressive in it's own right.

I Love Hong Kong | 我愛HK開心萬歲 [ Movie Review ] ★★★

Eric Tsang's previous He Sui Pian 贺岁片 (Asian movies made specially for the Chinese New Year period) 72 Tenants of Prosperity 72家租客 was a success. In the battle of Lunar New Year comedies, it defeated All's Well, Ends Well 2010 at the Hong Kong box office. "Critically" wise, 72 Tenants of Prosperity was my favorite He Sui Pian since the first installment of All's Well, Ends Well( that starred a certain Stephen Chow) With the success of 72 Tenants of Prosperity, Eric Tsang and his crew are back with I love Hong Kong 我愛HK開心萬歲 to usher in this Chinese New Year.

The setup for I Love Hong Kong would be as followed.

Ng Shun (Tony Leung Ka-Fai)'s  toy business just went bankrupt and had no choice but to relocate his family into his dad (Stanley Fung)'s place at one of Hong Kong old estates. It turned out that Ng Shun is not the only one returning to the old estate. His old friend Tok Shui Lung (Eric Tsang) and his old lover So Ching (Anita Yuen) had both return to the estate too. But it was not going to be an easy reunion as they have parted in a not-so amicable situation. Ng Shun still remember how Shui Lung ran away with the estate's charity funds 20 odd years ago and caused his dad to bear the loses.

Meanwhile Ng Shun's family is finding a tough time to adapt to the new life. Ng Shun's wife Shun So (Sandra Ng) rejoined the working class to help out with the financial burden. Work is not easy as her junior staff is now her immediate supervisor and she faced bullying in the workplace.

His son Ng Ming (Aarif Lee) is having troubles relocating back to the old estate as his job as a Food and Environmental Hygiene Department staff, he had caught many of his new neighbors. To make matter worse, his girlfriend (Fala Chen) is the daughter of one such hawker (Wu Ma) that was caught by him.

Lastly, Ng Shun's daughter Ng Chi (Mag Lam) is a model wannabe. The problem is that she lacks the figure and is unwilling to wear skimpy clothing to get ahead in the model industry.

The plot escalate when Shui Long promises to revive the old estate by revitalizing the current shop houses and allocate new cheap shop houses for the neighbors to start their own business. The neighbors rushed into signing a contact with Shui Long to capitalize in a deal that seemed too good to be true. It turned out that it might just be too good to be true as external developers turned up to buy over the old estate and Shui Long is no where to be found.

Comparing I Love Hong Kong to 72 Tenants of Prosperity, this one felt less comedic and is more prone to making social commentaries on some of the Hong Kong government bureaucracy. Although these social commentaries are intermixed with comedic set up (such as how the Ng family had to frighten a housing board officer off with spook story due to potential eviction), it can come off as a little too preachy for a He Sui Pian.

The story is also not well constructed and lacks a real direction as compared to 72 Tenants of Prosperity. Was it about the bonding between Ng Shun and his family members? or was it about old friendship and trust between friends? What was the story for the youngest member of the Ng family? I love Hong Kong took on too many elements and the various story arcs didn't gel well to bring out a decent story. 

But then again, the He Sui Pian's main function would be to bring in laughter for the festive seasons and it's been a long time since I laughed so hard in cinema.

Sandra Ng is the comedic gold for her performance in I Love Hong Kong. There are two Sandra Ng scenes that made me laugh out loud. The first one would be Sandra Ng getting all wrapped up in plastic for a slimming demonstration but no one bothered to unwrapped her afterwards. The poor Sandra had to find her way back home in a wrapped up situation. It's hard not to laugh when you see a Sandra Ng activate her smartphone with her hands all tied up.

The second one would be Sandra Ng accepting a stunt double job to meet TVB Wayne Lai. Needless to say, she got whack a lot and suffered plenty of bruises from that job. This kind of comedic setup had been done plenty of times but it's still exceptionally funny due to the precise timing and editing for this segment.

There are plenty of funny moments and celebrity cameo spotting opportunities in I Love Hong Kong. Though some of the celebrities might not be well known in Singapore (or at least I am unaware of them) and the story lacks a strong main driving force, I Love Hong Kong is still entertaining to catch during the Chinese New Year period.
megaupload streaming download rapidshare fileserve hotfile torrent bit asian 下载 subtitle avi