A Nite in MongKok (2004)

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June
Love is a Many Stupid Thing (2004)
Special Tribute Review:
Blackie Ko's Life Express (2004)
Dating Death (2004)
Miracle Box (2004)
Itchy Heart (2004)
Enter the Phoenix (2004)
Breaking News (2004)
Silver Hawk (2004)
Love Battlefield (2004)
Around the World 80 Days (2004)

September
Hidden Heroes (2004)
Dumplings: Three Extreme (2004)
Windstruck (2004) &
OUATIC 2 (1992) &
Summer Breeze of Love (2002) &
OUATIC (1991) &
Audition (2000) &
My Wife_is_18 (2002) &
Azumi (2003) &
A-1: Headline (2004)
Six Strong Guys (2004)

October
Avalon (2001) &
Escape from HK Island (2004)
My Sassy Girl (2001) &
My Sweetie (2004)

Jet Li's Once Upon A Time in China (Box Set DVD)

Another week or should I say another HK movie and yet another romantic comedy, and yes it is absolutely predictable and cliché. Man, I am really beginning to get sick of seeing a movie and within the first minute or even just looking at the cover you will already guess the ending without thought. Romantic Comedies are always like this: the y argue or dislike each other in the beginning and ends up lovers, yeah what a formulaic and stupid one too, but somehow it has manage to be the key box office element for success for at least the past 5 years. Geez, Needing You as good as it was, started a bad trend or following up. Usually on mention of romantic comedies, you will think of Louis Koo and Lau Ching Wan, but today what makes this film slightly different is a new lead in Sammy, the usual support for Ronald Cheng. It is good to see at least a 20 something not so good looking guy getting the role than the 40 years of Lau Ching Wan pairing with like Ah Sa, you know something is wrong when you think about it. So what are the positives of this movie, well there isn't anything new, except for adequate performances from Sammy and Stephy.

The story or should I say, the routine story goes like this: (Official synopsis) Strong and Sammy use to be rivals since childhood are put together by their boss for a new project. During the period, Sammy and Strong know more about each other and love starts growing between them. Will Strong accept Sammy's love and have a happy ending? What a stupid question to ask, but then again, today romantic comedy either have a happy ending.... or an existential one like: just when they get to love each other, one of them dies in a car crash or hit by a truck or some stupid shit. But then again, Director Lim is not even that brave enough to do that, though this aren't to say this is a bad movie as it is not a bad one at all, and in fact pretty fun to watch. 

Sammy performance here is more restrain than his stints with Ronald Cheng and the irony here of Ronald and Miriam's cameos is that he is the lead and there are his support, showing that if you have talent, and work your way up, it is better in the long term and also people will treat him with more respect. That's probably a direct comment on Jaycee but then again, too many singers are becoming actors just to boost their popularity instead of any form of acting talent. However, this is not to say Sammy has lotta talent, as he doesn't but it is just a movie which shows that hard work and supporting roles can get you a lead eventually (if you are lucky). In this movie, I don't wanna comment too much, cos I would rather spent my time reviewing a movie like New Police Story than this one. As for Stephy her performance is good and is an actress on the rise as she seems to mature and improve as each movie goes on. I see a future in Stephy and quite possibility a future award (maybe a long time to go) if she does improve like she is doing.

As I say before I will keep this review short as it is nothing special, nor is it a totally bad movie, but it is underdeveloped and the changes of humanity in the movie goes too fast and ultimately despite feeling in a pretty good mood and with likable lead performances, this movie seems all too routines and all seen before. Personally I have a love hate relationship with romantic comedies, but then again, if you minus all romantic comedies, HK cinema will go down the drain as the amount of movie produced will probably no more than 10-15 a year. So perhaps, it is up to the audience to get bored or sick of it, that HK cinema can raise again, or else we will be struck with 6-7/10 movies like this one and many before it as well. But this movie does have some saving grace, and with Sammy developing into a lead, at least we don't have to see father/child romance all too often.

I rate it 6.5/10.

Reviewed by Andrew (Neo) - October 2004