God bless Wong Jing - not only does he direct, write and produce movies at an astounding pace, guaranteeing us addicts a never-ending supply, but he has also developed a formula that offers a little bit of everything for everyone. Much of the humour is hit and miss, but it's always worthwhile sticking around because you just know that the lame TV commercial parody you're looking at will be over soon, and then there will be a kung fu fight, or a car chase, or a bomb going off, or some cheap titillation, or a mix of all of it. His movies are a mixed bag, and they certainly aren't classics, but he does deliver in terms of sheer popcorn and fluff...

Tricky Master is like the gazillionth gambling movie he's done, and this time he pushes Nick Cheung as a funny man. The problem - Nick ain't that funny! Even the presence of Stephen Chiau and Sandra Ng (who gets slapped and thrown around quite a bit - one of the less pleasant aspects of a Wong Jing movie) can't quite save the movie on that front. As a starring vehicle for Nick Cheung, the film is a failure. Thank goodness there are enough setpieces and sightgags thrown into the mix to make the film as a whole enjoyable, regardless of the shortcomings of the star.

The plot is pretty much just a mix of genre cliches, with Nick playing an undercover cop investigating a conman named Ferrari (played by the maestro Wong Jing himself). With the help of sexy bombshell Kelly Lin, Ferrari gets the better of our man Nick, and he is left to disgrace and public embarassment. He decides to take revenge by enlisting the help of legendary conman Wong Sifu (Stephen Chiau). Further aided by his girlfriend Pizza (Suki Kwan) and her sister (Sandra Ng), they take on Ferrari, and after much hilarity, and some violent action scenes, the movie arrives at the final showdown, which of course takes place at a gambling table.

The movie is mindless fun, with plenty of extremely silly scenes ranging from gratuitous cleavage, to Matrix references, to parodies of TV commercials (and plenty of other material in between). It's all quite sloppy, and never reaches the levels of a good Stephen Chiau movie, but if you're in the mood for some cheap escapism, the film delivers.