Mr. and Mrs. Incredible delivers a premise you probably didn't ask for: superheroes in Ancient China! However, instead of fighting crime and saving the world, these heroes muddle through their retired married life. If that sounds super exciting to you then you're in luck. If not, then get in line, because from this angle a superhero movie about mid-life marriage blues makes about as much sense as South Park in 3D. Then again, they used a similar premise in Pixar's The Incredibles, so it's not like this couldn't work, and director Vincent Kok has handled the character meets comedy thing quite well before. So is Mr. and Mrs. Incredible a triumph instead of trash?

Best answer: it's something squarely in between, and which direction it leans depends on what you're looking for. Calling this film a "superhero movie" is problematic because that genre classification promises a level of screen excitement that Mr. and Mrs. Incredible never approaches. There’s little awe in seeing what Gazer Warrior (Louis Koo) and Aroma Woman (Sandra Ng) do with their superpowers; outside of save pets, stop robbers and generally be good role models, they mostly putter around their home and recall their first throes of romance. As the story goes, both were super heroes who went on a super date and before long, they got super married and became a super family with super household chores and super seven year-itch. It could be your dream superhero film. Let's see Christopher Nolan top this bad boy!

I'm not selling this film well because it's not easy to sell to everyone. Mr. and Mrs. Incredible just doesn't create the excitement one expects from a "superhero film," and thus it's hard to recommend on those grounds. What makes it a likeable and even worthy film is the chemistry between the stars, and also their relationship, which is both charming and surprisingly believable. Louis Koo and Sandra Ng have one of those playful marriages that, when portrayed correctly onscreen, is relaxing and enjoyable to witness. The risk to this sort of character dynamic is when the actors behave in a saccharine and overly cute manner, with hives and gagging usually being the audience response. Thankfully, that's not the case here; Koo plays a bit older than his actual age while Ng is her usual dependable self, and the two present their union in an enjoyable and genuine-seeming way.

Koo and Ng’s pairing resembles the marriage between Stephen Chow and Carina Lau in Vincent Kok's 1996 action-comedy Forbidden City Cop - a generous comparison as the Chow-Lau relationship in Cop was a high point in a film already filled with them. However, in Cop those scenes amounted to probably less than 20% of the film. In Mr. and Mrs. Incredible, the interplay between Koo and Ng measures out to a good 60% of what happens. That's a whole lot of wandering around the kitchen or wondering what's for dinner. Here's where you jump on or off the bandwagon: if you like the idea of seeing Louis Koo and Sandra Ng engaging in situation comedy while sometimes playing superhero on the side, then Mr. and Mrs. Incredible is the movie for you. If you crave superhero action or visual effects-enhanced period costume shenanigans, Mr. and Mrs. Incredible will likely disappoint those expectations. Scratch that: it will disappoint those expectations.

Is that a problem? Again, not really. Even though Mr. and Mrs. Incredible doesn’t fit the superhero movie mold, it does deliver some genre fun. While Gazer Warrior and Aroma Woman fight over possible third party Phoenix Bleu (Li Qin), a martial arts tourney is going on in the background. The competition is supposedly friendly, except the megalomaniacal Baixao (Wang Bo-Chieh of Bodyguards and Assassins) has plans to subvert the competition and rule jiang hu with powers collected from other clan leaders. The whole thing gets resolved with a CGI-enhanced martial arts ending that’s similar to many early nineties Hong Kong movies, right down to the liberal overacting and wide angle lensing. The nostalgic genre fun kicks things up a couple of notches, and helps to compensate for the film's generally languid pacing for the first two acts. It takes awhile for Mr. and Mrs. Incredible to get going, but once it does the result isn't bad. Those looking for something extraordinary may be unimpressed, but those looking for something pleasant and likable - and who happen to like Louis Koo and Sandra Ng – may find this a good match. Like many commercial films, this one really comes down to the stars. (Kozo 2011)

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