SYNOPSIS:
Millionaire Fu Ho founded the Fu Gui Mall. To reward the tenants,
he sets up a rental model with them. Each store can send a
representative to play Taiwan mahjong with him to substitute
rental every month. Gi is recommended by Sam to rent a store
there but she needs to learn to play Taiwan mahjong as a condition.
On the day Gi plays with Fu Ho, she is defeated but unexpectedly
pleases Fu Ho who decides to rent her a store.
Fu Ho's son, Sun Gui is planning to take over the business
and rebuild the mall. He sends Tat to set up stores in the
mall to hit the business of the tenants. He even engages 4
mahjong experts to gamble with them. Gi, Sam, Lam and everyone
become losers; they not only lose their money but also their
livelihood. With the help of a mahjong expert, they finally
turn defeat to victory in order to face their final opponent,
Tat...
MOVIE
REVIEW
While
it is no fault of this reviewer that he knows nuts about mahjong,
he promised that he would be objective as possible when he
was asked to review this Hong Kong movie.
But alas,
whether you are an expert at the game or not, this slipshod
production is an obvious no-go, right from the start of its
89-minute runtime.
Dayo Wong
Chi-Wah, Same Lee and Cheung Tat-Ming are friends who play
mahjong to pay off rent for their shop-houses. Throw in a
few other inconsequential roles played by Candy Lo, Rain Li
and Elanne Kong and you have a messy movie about, well, people
playing mahjong to pay off debts.
The most
jarring aspect of this movie is its cheap production value,
because every scene, every location and every prop looks and
feels like a television-movie (well, that explains why this
flick did not make it to local cinemas here). The uninspired
camerawork and sloppy attempts at incorporating computer-generated
effects are painful to watch.
It is
a pity then, because the actors are capable of much more.
Cheung starred in indie hits like Edmond Ho’s AV (2005)
while Lee is a ferocious killer in Cheang Pou-Soi’s
Dog Bite Dog (2006). Why actors take up projects like that
continues to puzzle us.
It’d
been nice to hear the actors in their original Cantonese soundtrack,
but what we have here is a Mandarin-dubbed track that further
makes this movie disengaging.
Let’s
see, you won’t care for the story, you won’t care
for the characters, and you won’t care who wins the
final mahjong deal - who should be blamed?
Director
Marko Mak did a decent job in his last big screen outing Operation
Undercover (2006) starring Francis Ng and Jordan Chan.
Here, Mak has to deal with an uninteresting script, a motley
crew of uninteresting characters and an impossible task of
explaining what mahjong is all about to this unknowledgeable
reviewer.
MOVIE RATING:
Review
by John Li
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