On His Majesty's Secret
Service
Director: Wong Jing
Year: 2009
Rating: 4.5
If this
Wong Jing directed period comedy had been produced 15-years earlier, it would
likely have starred Stephen Chow. Even the Chinese title is a reference to
Chow's Forbidden City Cop. But by 2009 Chow was no longer acting and this
sort of comedy was no longer in fashion and feels as stale as week-old bread.
Perhaps with a young Chow, it would have been better but maybe not. Wong
seems to be compensating for not having Chow by over playing every character
and every situation. It feels like a second doesn't go by without someone
crying, vomiting or screaming. It gets tiresome fairly quickly which is unfortunate
because it gets off to a good start with a group of ninjas trying to assassinate
the Emperor (Liu Yiwei) and his contingent of Secret Service fending them
off in some well done wuxia like action choreography. But it soon devolves
into low brow humor that feels endless. Hell would be something like having
to watch this film for eternity. To be fair, the sets have that colorful
period look, the female extras are lovely and the action is at times (before
it becomes too cartoonish) solid.
But it always comes back to the actors and
it feels like Wong gave them all direction to be as irritating as possible.
They all follow their orders to a fault. Sanda Ng who I generally adore goes
back to her early over the top oafish roles and has a laugh that would make
cows stop giving milk. Kingdom Yuen and Leung Kar-yan as overbearing parents
are as funny as a rusty nail in your foot. Fan Siu-wong as the Eunuch simpers
to a fault. But much of the blame has to be placed on Louis Koo as the lead
in the film. Comedy as people have always said is hard. Timing has to be
just right. Reaction shots have to work. He looks lost in this film
but I don't know if he can really be blamed - it is so absurd with a constant
flow of idiocy, pranks, pratfalls, toilet humor that it would be a challenge
for any actor to keep up with it. Am I suppose to cry now or vomit?
Royal Dog (Louis Koo) is a member of the
Royal Guard, all martial masters as they show in the opening scene as they
crush the ninjas - except for him. He has no martial arts skills but is instead
an inventor who has an assortment of clever gadgets for every conceivable
occasion. From canons on a floating device to traps in his home. He has a
set of armor for the Emperor that can fly - but not land unfortunately. The
Emperor has only two women in his coterie - the Empress (Ng) and a transvestite
(Lee Kin-yan) who has five o'clock shadow by three o'clock. And everyone
wants to kill him or depose him - even the Empress. They have a daughter
(Song Jia) who they decide to marry off to the winner of a contest based
on smarts, knowledge, riddles and martial arts. All the real contestants
are killed off and their place taken by assassins. It is up to the
Royal Guard, Royal Dog's fiancé Faithful (Barbara Hsu) and her parents
to save them. And Gemini, a woman who everyone thinks is a man (Liu Yang).
And it goes on forever.
