The Happy Ghost I - V
As founding members of the film production company
Cinema City, Karl Maka, Dean Shek and Raymond Wong were each responsible
for bringing product to the screen. One of their more popular series of
films – though not on par with the Aces Go Places series – was The Happy
Ghost series that ran for five films from 1984 to 1991. These films were
the work of Raymond Wong who produced and acted in all five of them – and
in fact took the series with him after leaving Cinema City. The films were
in fact quite popular initially, but waned dramatically after leaving the
sponsorship of Cinema City:
1984 Happy Ghost – directed by Clifton Ko -
12th at the box office
1985 Happy Ghost II – directed by Clifton
Ko - 10th at the box office
1986 Happy Ghost III – directed by Johnnie
To - 11th at the box office
1990 Happy Ghost IV – directed by Clifton
Ko - 30th at the box office
1991 Happy Ghost V – directed by Norman Chan/Raymond
Wong - 46th at the box office
The films primarily attempted to appeal to
a teenage audience with their youth oriented cast (except for Raymond of
course), often times low brow humor and situations that dealt with the
problems of teenagers – school, parents, romance and ghosts. Well, perhaps
ghosts don’t play a large part in the lives of most teenagers – but the
supernatural is what ties these films together and gives them an enjoyable
element over other teenage films of the time. Raymond Wong plays a ghost
from the Ching period that turns up in the modern age and invariably gets
his friends into and out of trouble. Raymond’s ghost is an amiable one
– in the tradition of Topper or Casper – rather than a typical HK revenge
seeking ghost - not a scare in him and his main enjoyment is playing practical
jokes on targets of authority – pompous people, teachers etc.
Much of Raymond’s Cinema City output is held in
some disdain by Western HK film fans for the type of juvenile humor he
indulges in, the innocuous plots and his preference to cast nubile teenage
girls. Most of his films star a series of young starlets – and though nothing
is ever shown of a sexual nature there clearly exists a distinct if faint
Lolita like undercurrent with Raymond often clothing them in swimsuits,
short skirts and tight shorts. He clearly had an eye for female talent
though – and was responsible for introducing such actresses as Loletta
Lee, Fennie Yuen, May Lo, Bonnie Law, Charlene Chan and Anne Bridgewater
to the screen. They would become known as The Happy Troupe Girls and all
but Ann would appear in this series.
In general, I have to admit that I enjoy these
films to some degree on a couple of levels. From the perspective of today,
the films seem wonderfully innocent even if at times they deal with serious
subjects like abortion, the triads and death. It is almost like looking
through a window at a different time – though I can’t imagine school life
in the 80’s was quite as innocent as it appears here – look at Ringo Lam’s
School on Fire for a very different version of school life in the 80’s
(and which co-incidentally stars one of the Happy Troupe Girls Fennie Yuen
and the sister of another, Sara Lee). The humor is often puerile
and rarely inspired, but is often just silly or genial enough to be contagious
and make you laugh. The special effects are low tech for the most part,
but they are enjoyable and occasionally clever and I have always been a
sucker for these kinds of things. Finally, I think these actresses are
great fun – and throw in Maggie Cheung who appears in one of them – and
a real pleasure to watch in their early work. At this point, I would not
say they are good actresses but they bring a real exuberance and sweetness
to their performances that is infectious.
Happy Ghost
In the first of the series, Raymond introduces
Loletta Lee and Bonnie Law to the screen. They and a few of their friends
(Lam San-san the bespectacled one and Sara Lee in a small role) go camping,
but when it begins raining they find shelter in a nearby temple. Inside
is residing the un-reincarnated ghost of a Ching scholar who committed
suicide long ago. Bonnie unthinkingly brings back the rope that he used
to kill himself with and it turns out his spirit has been captured in this
rope. Raymond jumps out of the rope and after initially scaring Bonnie
they become the best of friends.
It turns out that having a friendly ghost can
be very useful at her all-girls Catholic school. He helps Bonnie at a track
event by sabotaging her main competitor and by carrying her shot put a
long ways and then carries Bonnie herself in the long jump. Once Bonnie
introduces Raymond to her buddies Loletta and Lam San-san all four of them
have a great time together. Their prime target of fun is the head nun –
Teresa Carpio – who is intent on enforcing all the very strict rules of
the Catholic all-girls school – low hemlines and no fraternizing too closely
with the boys from another school.
Towards the end of the film, it turns more serious
– Loletta gets pregnant, the pressure of succeeding in exams makes one
of the girls get caught cheating with the accompanying shame and the nuns
finally get wise to having a ghost in the school. With a strong knock on
religious intolerance, the story has the nuns attempting to destroy Raymond’s
spirit by exorcising the rope, while the girls attempt to save him and
allow him to reincarnate.
Much of the story is on par with the Haley Mills/
Gidget films of the 60’s – innocent fun with a large sprinkling of goofy
humor and enjoyable performances from the girls. It tends to be more sweet
than funny.
My rating for this film: 6.5
Happy Ghost II
At the end of the first Happy Ghost, the Ching
scholar was able to reincarnate and returns as Loletta Lee’s baby! How
weird is that. Even stranger is the time warp that takes place in the second
film of the series. The baby grows up into Raymond Wong – but no time actually
seems to pass – the first film clearly takes place in the 1980’s with references
to Boy George and so does the second film – even though in theory some
25 years must have passed. Just one of those movie things you have to overlook!
In this one Raymond introduces three more actresses
who went on to reasonably successful careers – Fennie Yuen, May Lo (now
also the wife of Jacky Cheung) and Charine Chan. They are members of a
group at another all-girls school who call themselves the “Meanies”. Their
mission in life is to simply be mean to people – in particular boys and
especially teachers. Their assorted bag of tricks includes the basics –
glue on the chair, rats in the drawer, a bucket of water atop the door.
These pranks have driven away seven teachers - but their new teacher
Raymond has a bit of an advantage over the previous teachers. Since being
born, he has had magical powers – amazing strength and the ability to make
objects do all sorts of things. For him though it has been more a curse
than a blessing because these powers have caused him to have lots of personal
problems.
The film predictably turns into a mushy To Sir
with Love riff as the girls test him – get him fired but eventually realize
how important he has become to their lives. One of their jokes leaves him
deserted on an island – the same one in which Loletta and company had visited
years before in part one. He ends up in the same temple and runs into his
ancestor and complains to him about how these powers have made his life
miserable – so the ghost takes them away. Soon of course Raymond wishes
to have them back to help the girls and to fend off his love rival, Melvin
Wong.
The film is harmless enough – not particularly
amusing but genial in its way. It suffers from the too brief screen time
of the ghost who made the first one click to a large degree. The girls
are again the strength of the film - in particularly Fennie as the “Chairman
of the Meanies” who cuts an attractive figure with her sleek short haired
look.
My rating for this film: 5.5
Happy Ghost III
In part three Raymond returns again as a teacher
– as do Fennie Yuen and Charine – though they seem to be playing different
characters. This film though gets a strong jolt of star power with the
inclusion of Maggie Cheung. I am not really one to use the word cute too
often, but there is no other way to describe Maggie Cheung in this film.
She almost overdoses on cuteness. This was an early film of hers – and
she really wasn’t much of an actress yet so she pretty much depends on
winning the audience over with her pouts and grins. Needless to say, I
fell victim to every pout and every grin. Maggie just affects me that way.
There really isn’t a lot more going on in this
film though it certainly has its pleasures and it supplies some innocent
laughs along the way. Maggie is dead when the film begins – but Maggie
is pretty cute even when she is dead. She is up in heaven getting ready
for reincarnation. Tsui Hark - in a cameo - is in charge of matching up
folks with their new lives and Maggie convinces him to find her a musical
family because she was a failed singer in her previous life. Tsui finds
just the right family and tells Maggie that she will be more popular then
Teresa Teng, Paula Tsui and Anita Mui when she grows up. He tells her where
she has to go to be reincarnated and at what time she has to be there.
If you didn’t know already, the spirit has to jump into the womb just as
birth is about to take place. You can’t be too late or too early. As in
all things – timing is everything.
Everything gets bungled because of Raymond Wong
and Maggie is told that she has to wait a month for the next opportunity
for reincarnation. With a lot of time on her hands, Maggie decides to make
life miserable for Wong for messing up her reincarnation. All of this is
fairly pie in the face/falling trousers type of harmless stuff. Maggie
can also possess other people and does so with Fennie Yuen, a student of
Wongs, causing further complications with some triad folks.
Raymond first summons the Happy Ghost and but
then decides the best plan is to romance Maggie. In a musical video number
Maggie dances the night away. Problems lie ahead of course for this happy
couple.
My rating for this film: 7.0
Happy Ghost IV
There were four good reasons for me to watch
this fourth installment in the Happy Ghost series. They are Loletta Lee,
Fenny Yuen, Charine Chan and May Lo – The Happy Troupe Girls. All these
actresses had been discovered by Raymond Wong and had appeared earlier
in the series – but here was an opportunity to see them all together.
Regrettably, it turns out that they have little screen time to display
their charms in the film.
Four years after the previous installment in 1986,
Raymond Wong returns with this film. Unlike the previous ones, this one
was not produced by Cinema City (which was in it’s death throes at the
time) but the formula is much the same – a mix of the supernatural, comedy
and teenage hijinks. Unlike the earlier ones though that tended to focus
on Raymond and a supply of young female cuties, here it is primarily between
him and the pop group Beyond (called Behind in the film) with some time
left for his relationship with Pauline Yeung. Beyond is fine for what they
do – sort of Monkeys like antics – and they sing three decent tunes, but
to my eyes they had no screen personas to differentiate themselves from
one another and they lack the spark that the Happy Troupe Girls had. Speaking
of which – they are in the film but actually only appear in two musical
video type interludes in which Beyond is trying to pick them up – without
success. They are corny but enjoyable scenes and I wish the girls had stuck
around.
Not that many people write about the Happy Ghost
series as far as I know, but what little I have seen seems to suggest that
most consider the last two in the series – IV and V – to be much weaker
than the others. Perhaps so – but I was actually surprised at how amusing
this was at times - I almost felt guilty to be laughing at much of this
because the humor is so sophomoric – but I couldn’t help myself. Some of
it is inspired while other bits were clearly stolen from inspired sources
– but whichever - I still found it cracking me up throughout – in particular
during the second half when it really gets going. Sure watching Charlie
Cho urinate after his bottom and his genital area have magically been switched
or Tommy Wong futilely attempting to kill Raymond Wong without realizing
that Raymond was already in a state of death or having Lau Shun’s head
being batted around until it lands in an aquarium might not sound all that
funny but depending on your mood it just might!
Charlie Cho is not happy with the fact that Raymond
is wooing his girl, Pauline, and after his slight bottom/genital mishap
he orders his right hand man Tommy to kill him – the results are often
hilarious. At the same time four of Raymond’s students, Beyond, discover
an old suit of armor in a cave and bring it back to their apartment. Within
it lies the spirit of an evil swordsman, Lau Shun, who comes back and possesses
them to help him out. He needs to murder the woman who’s ancestor killed
him hundreds of years previously – this is Pauline Yeung. With the help
of his Ching ancestor’s ghost, Raymond, does his best to protect her.
The special effects are quite good in this film
– heads flying around, invisibility – and Tsui Hark adds some animation
to the pot. By the way, don’t worry Raymond comes back to life and it all
ends happily.
My rating for this film: 6.0
Happy Ghost V
Clearly devoid of all ideas, Wong still makes
one more in the series – a serious mistake. This film is an absolute horror
– not a redeeming moment in it and not an ounce of the charms from the
previous films. I believe there was an American film in which a dog turns
into a human made around this time and Wong takes this idea and makes a
hash of it. The PR for this film was it’s casting – Raymond somehow talked
Kris Aquino – the daughter of the then President of the Philippines, Corazon
Aquino, into taking a part. In the outtakes in the end, they show a press
circus during an interview so I guess it was a big deal.
Not to be cruel – but Kris is not all that attractive
and not a very good actress. Here she plays a woman who loves her dog,
Magic, more it seems than her boyfriend. The boyfriend does seem a bit
of a jerk though and manages to lose Magic while Kris is away on a trip.
Well as things often go – Magic saves the “life” of our old friend from
the Ching dynasty and he allows Magic to turn into a human for 49 days.
Long enough to be very irritating I have to say. He runs into Kris of course
and they become friends - though thankfully never have sex!
My rating for this film: 1.0
