Set your cinema quality alert to orange. Not only is Marriage with a Liar directed by Hong Kong’s highest profile purveyor of quality-impaired cinema, Patrick Kong a.k.a. Yip Lim-Sum, it also happens to be produced by Hong Kong’s most famous schlockmeister Wong Jing. Marriage stars ubiquitous and curvaceous Chrissie Chau as Kiki, a hot Hong Kong honey who wakes up one morning after a roll in the hay with Jack (Taiwan model Z.O.). Cue the first of many flashbacks, as Chrissie recalls the hours leading up to her tryst. We discover that she’s engaged to hunky cop Jerry (Him Law), and her infidelity was the result of an evening of circumstance, including heavy drinking, a run-in with Indian bar bullies, and the fact that her wedding is due to happen very soon. She didn’t mean it, but Kiki boo-booed. Don’t we all.

Kiki still wants to marry Jerry, but Jack offers something Jerry can’t: some supposedly guilt-free action for her final days of single womanhood. And why wouldn’t Kiki want extra bedroom fun on the side? Anyway, she’s always dressed for it. True to Chrissie Chau form, the (in)famous model parades about the screen in super-short skirts and cleavage-baring tops, and characters constantly make reference to her state of (un)dress. Hormone-wise, Chau is a step up from Patrick Kong’s usual leading lady Stephy Tang, who starred in all of Kong’s previous films before Chau snagged the lead role this time. One would hope that the Tang-to-Chau switch also includes an acting upgrade, but Chau’s limited emotional range makes Tang look like an award-winning thespian. It’s obvious where Chau’s talent(s) lie, but subtlety and character are things she needs to work on.

However, Chau isn’t even the worst actor in the movie. That honor could be reserved for either Him Law, who’s shrill and uncharismatic as drama king Jerry, or Carol Yeung, who plays Jerry’s other love interest Bobo with the overbearing cuteness of a chirpy hamster. The two characters engage in their own potential tryst once Jerry’s side of the story comes to light, with Bobo offering Jerry the same thing that Jack offers Kiki – some no-strings-attached bedroom action only days before Kiki and Jerry’s coming wedding. Oddly, there’s only three days left before the ceremony and apparently nobody has to deal with the wedding preparations, i.e. they both have time to leave town for side affairs. Who's going to pick up the flowers and yell at the photographer? Blatant unrealism of their wedding planning aside, Jerry and Kiki are now on a collision course for a possible cancelation. Can Kiki and Jerry pull it together before their 30-table banquet becomes a disaster?

Actually, we have no idea how big the banquet is because the filmmakers don’t even bother to shoot it properly. Like many a Patrick Kong production before it, Marriage with a Liar is noticeably cheap, with art direction, lighting and staging handled in a manner suggesting a pro-bono student film shot on a shoestring budget on the weekends. In Hong Kong, films are notoriously regarded as quickie product, but Kong’s films seems to take that fast-food mentality too far, making one of film’s obvious attractions (i.e., how they look) and crapping all over it. Kong doesn’t skimp on his writing, however, delivering the same sensationalistic and negative observations on Hong Kong love that have become his calling card. The film does possess some incisive ideas on how young lovers think, but the characters inevitably display an ugly cynicism and self-absorption that would be excessive even by soap opera standards. There’s entertainment value here, but it’s most assuredly guilty.

But hey, that’s what Patrick Kong’s films are: guilty entertainment. It’s hard to recommend a Patrick Kong film because they’re atrociously made and terribly acted, but they do reflect certain aspects of the Hong Kong dating experience – and they do it well. Also, despite possessing more flashbacks than the entire six seasons of Lost, Marriage with a Liar runs at less than ninety minutes, turning what could have been an interminable, trashy youth romance into just a trashy youth romance. Wong Jing may be the one to thank here; someone seems to have advised Kong to do away with his usual endless running times, with the result being a snappily-edited, faster-paced movie than Kong’s usual marathon efforts. The short running time allows the film’s obvious negatives to bother but not aggravate, with the whole thing becoming instantly forgettable and possibly even entertaining, if one enters with the right mindset.

And what is that mindset? That it’s fun to rubberneck, it’s even better when everyone has a super-sized chest (Chrissie Chau, Carol Yeung and even Him Law all possess splendid upper bodies), and it’s always guilty fun to play voyeur. Marriage with a Liar resembles viral YouTube sensations where youngsters break up while shouting, screaming and also bemoaning their “poor me” love lives. The attraction here is obvious; many people agree that love sucks and that their love life is the pits, and it’s fun seeing that self-absorption played out onscreen. Another selling point: the film possesses racier-than-normal love scenes, plus bareback exposure from the actresses and even some side-breast nudity (Yow!). Patrick Kong knows what he’s doing here: this is his usual product, but he’s upped the game slightly for his fans, giving them hotter actors, more flesh, and even more canned, cynical platitudes about love. It’s just another day at the office for Patrick Kong. For audiences, it’s more of the same too. (Kozo 2010)

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