Continuing his role of 007 (Lung Lung Fat) he made infamousin From Beijing With Love, Stephen Chow goes back several centuries to play a cop in the ancient capital. It starts off with a hilarious parody of the opening animated sequence of the James Bond movies, and from here, there's no turning back. Like most movie comedians, Chow is largely dependent on his material to make his movies work; where the sudden burst of creativity came from in an otherwise stagnant HK movie scene, we'll never know. But he plays the comedy better than ever. Turns out that an evil outlaw with no face has designs on taking over the empire. He invites all of the doctors in the land to a convocation in order to dissect a magical fairy. Lung, however modest in his skills, crashes the meeting with his wife Yip Koo Shing (Carina Lau) after being snubbed by the emperor. The fairy turns out to be a ringer for the so-called alien they showed on Fox TV last year, and that the recently kidnapped emperor is inside. Meanwhile, the faceless man's henchmen have killed nearly all the physicians, the first step in his somewhat confused plan for a takeover. The remainder of the film revolves around Lung's ef forts to secure a bride for the emperor, a legendary beauty from the Gam Kingdom (soon-to-be legendary beauty Carmen Lee), and his desperate attempts to remain true to his wife. Carina Lau is a real charmer here, the first time Chow has had somebody this good to bounce his lines off of. It's the funniest Chow comedy yet (which is saying something), and shorn of the obscure HK references that make most of these comedies so baffling for domestic audiences. Fu, fun, babes, Chow...this one may not have it from start to finish, but it definitely has it all.

(3/4)



[Reviewed by Steve Spinali]