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Review
by Kozo: |
Wong
Jing mines the Infernal Affairs phenomenon for
Love is a Many Stupid Thing, his latest disposable
creation masquerading as film. The rotund producer-writer-director-actor-hack
attempts to double the ripoff potential by calling this
film Jing Jong Jui Nui Jai 2004, which roughly
translates as Deluxe Pursuit of Girls 2004. That
title (minus the 2004, natch) was used on the eighties
"classic" The Romancing Star and its
assorted sequels. What this means is that aside from
the Infernal Affairs riffs, Love is a Many
Stupid Thing depicts the wacky trials of a bunch
of boys (some questionably attractive) macking on a
bunch of girls (all totally attractive). Mix thoroughly,
then let stew for a couple of hours, and you get this
movie hodgepodge, which can entertain some, but is pretty
much a travesty of cinema. Yeah, we're snobs over here.
The Infernal Affairs parodies get kicked off right away with Nat Chan Bak-Cheung
essaying the Anthony Wong role from IA. He's
Inspector Lek, who chooses not one, but three undercovers
to leave the academy and join the triads. The three
guys: Chapman To, Shawn Yue, and fat Shaolin Soccer vet Lam Chi-Chung. In a minor twist, Chapman To gets
the Shawn Yue/Tony Leung Chiu-Wai role and not Shawn Yue. Why that happens is unknown, but Wong Jing chooses
to add three undercovers and not just one so he can
get the "Chasing Girls" format going. You
see, in The Romancing Star and the other "Chasing
Girls" flicks, there were usually a bunch of guys
chasing a bunch of girls using chicanery and lame hijinks.
To do that, you need more than one guy. Hence, there
are three, and they get to chase the girls, played by
Belinda Hamnett, Teresa Mak, Iris Wong, and 2R, a popstar
duo who are nowhere near as popular as Twins. It's like
a Hong Kong Cinema history lesson and math class rolled
into one.
The three guys attempt
to join the triads but aren't able to find a taker until
they approach Sam, who's played by Eric Tsang. Tsang
parodies his own performances from the IA films,
which means that he gets to spit on his own work—unlike
Chapman To or Shawn Yue. Here's the scorecard for those
who are lost: Eric Tsang gets the Eric Tsang role from IA, but Chapman To gets the Shawn Yue/Tony Leung
Chiu-Wai role. Shawn Yue plays a character with the same
name as Chapman To's in IA, and Lam Chi-Chung
plays a character with the same hairstyle as Chapman
To's in IA—though neither seems to be playing
Chapman To in IA. Weird.
Nat Chan gets the Anthony
Wong role, and Raymond Wong gets the Edison Chen/Andy
Lau role, of the triad mole who joins the cops. You
getting this so far? Hell, let's just get the rest out
of the way. Jerry Lamb gets the Francis Ng role from Infernal Affairs II. Candace Yu gets the Carina
Lau role. And finally, Tony Ho Wah-Chiu, who played
the triad interrogated by Andy Lau in IA1 gets
the Tony Ho Wah-Chiu role. That is, he's a gangster
interrogated by Raymond Wong, who's in the Andy Lau
role. Except this time, the gangster is gay, and spends
his time squeezing Raymond Wong's privates. Are you
angry yet?
Well, you should be. The
above description answers one of the two major questions
in Love is a Many Stupid Thing, which is: who
parodies who from Infernal Affairs? The second
question is: how do they parody Infernal Affairs?
The answer to that is: almost exactly, except they throw
in lots of crappy hijinks to pad things out. In addition
to scenes of the three undercover boys in drag, we get
aphrodisiac jokes, boys chasing girls in fast motion,
Belinda Hamnett in a wet t-shirt, bizarre musical numbers,
and a shrunken Eric Tsang (?) getting kicked around.
The Infernal Affairs parodies are almost dead
on, meaning they lift whole scenes, but throw in hijinks
and useless jokes.
Granted, some of the jokes can be
funny, especially the parody of Inspector Wong's death
scene in IA1. That, and Chapman To's overdone
Tony Leung Chiu-Wai reaction is probably worth a rental,
but everything else is your usual over-verbalized jokey
crap, which usually culminates in one character swearing
at another like it's supposed to be funny. We've seen
all this Wong Jing stuff before. And in case we needed
even more Wong Jing, the guy inserts himself into the
film as an afro-sporting aprhodisiac dealer. One of
his products makes people think they're looking at Athena
Chu, which means a stock footage Athena Chu appearance.
Woohoo! I'm in Hong Kong Cinema heaven.
At this point, about 30%
of the people reading this review should get upset and
launch hatemail to LoveHKFilm.com,
saying, "But Wong Jing movies are supposed to be
silly! He's just doing his job!" Well, I won't
dispute that he's doing what he intends to, which is
put together a bunch of silly stuff and pass it off
as entertainment. Yes, there is an audience for this
type of dopey parody cinema, which can be evidenced
by the fact that Wong Jing is still working. But really,
is this type of lazy cinema a good thing? Is Wong Jing
really giving people what they want, or is he simply
providing what people have come to expect?
By creating
these lazy jokefests, Wong Jing is doing two things.
One, he's lowering audience expectations, and furthering
the public notion that Hong Kong Cinema is just disposable,
unimportant crap. And, more vital to he and his backers,
he's hoping that his assortment of lazy jokes and name
actors gets people to part with their money. Judging
by the fact that I purchased this DVD, he suceeded,
and I've lost another ten bucks. If anyone besides me
would like filmmaker accountability, raise their hands.
When it comes to a movie
like this, you can't really review it. Serious critical
analysis of a non-film like this just begs for the age-old
rebuff, "Try to be less critical!", which
arrives once a week in the Webmaster's e-mail inbox.
To head that off, we'll just spell it out for you: if
you like this sort of silly Wong Jing stuff, then you'll
dig Love is a Many Stupid Thing. If you don't,
then you won't. If you're into Infernal Affairs,
and are curious of how Wong Jing might skewer it, then
perhaps Love is a Many Stupid Thing could interest
you. But don't kid yourself: this is a bad movie. You
might find it funny, but it's still bad. The big question
here isn't "Is the movie any good?", it's
"Do you like bad movies?" I personally don't,
but since I watched it, I can't blame anyone but myself.
Note to Wong Jing: you win, I lose. Again. (Kozo 2004) |
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