Brilliant slapstick! Great laffs with Chow as a conniving illiterate with a heart of gold who can't help but succeed, as he manages to win lots of babes and wealth and the trust of the Emperor, while simultaneously becoming leader of a rebel "Down with the Ching, return the Ming" sect! Ng Man Tat as a wacky eunuch, funny as always but a little heavy handed. Chingmy Yau plays the Emperor's brother and is quite cute; still, the sequel, in some ways, is an improvement, if only because it has much more of a sense of closure than this film does, plus Brigitte Lin Ching-Hsia.

(3/5)