Last Updated on January 21, 2021 by rob
Two women named Butterfly and Chow (Maggie Shiu and Teresa Mo) are accidentally caught up in a gang murder so try to throw off the cops by blaming the incident on a fictional 1960’s Hong Kong movie heroine known as Black Rose. But the pair are kidnapped by two of Black Rose’s ageing students (Bo Bo Fung and Wong Wan Si) who take exception to having their mistress blamed for murder and live in a strange old house full of booby traps. Meanwhile the gang of killers are hot on the women’s trail as is Butterfly’s secret admirer, a handsome cop played by Tony Leung. Who will get to them first?
A splendid Hong Kong comedy featuring a barrage of physical and verbal jokes poking fun at the golden age of Cantonese cinema but really elevated by a superb cast, all of whom give the impression of having the time of their life. Tony Leung is just hilarious playing a character who’s stepped straight out of an early 60’s HK movie. Immaculately groomed and hilariously formal, he’s secretly in love with Maggie Shiu’s down on her luck screenwriter but once he makes it to Black Rose’s mansion has to contend with not only rescuing her but fending off Bo Bo Fung’s batty amnesiac who believes he’s her long lost lover. Anyone familiar with Shaw Bros movies, James Bond and HK cinema generally (several times here Leung, Wong Wan and Bo Bo even burst into song but it works splendidly) should have an absolute blast with this. The gags are often very funny, the actors all have good chemistry together and there’s a cracking old school Kung Fu climax in which a knock on the head restores Bo Bo Fung’s forgetful student to her rightful place as… well, maybe you can guess… and in the process deliver one righteous Shaw Bros level ass kicking to the villains. Terrific stuff.
