All's Well Ends Well

Chinese Title: Jia You Xi Shi (aka there is a happy function in the family)

CAST:
Stephen Chow as Sheung Fun
Leslie Cheung as Sheung So
Raymond Wong as Sheung Mun
Sandra Ng as Cheng Dai Sou
Maggie Cheung as Ho Lee Yuk
Theresa Mo as Leung Mo Seung

PROLOGUE:
All's Well Ends Well (AWEW) is another typical Stephen Chow movie, often categorised as 'mou lei tao' in Cantonese (meaning it has no point/purpose). Nevertheless, this Chinese New Year movie is a joy to watch where each and every segment will make you laugh till your knees bend. I could not remember exactly since when Chow started this 'mou lei tao' trend (it must be somewhere around the late 80s to early 90s). Many people got hooked on this and Chow became a household name whenever comedy is mentioned. In those days, I just couldn't understand how Chow got so famous. However, after re-watching this movie years later, I found out that I was quite impressed with the script!

Seriously, most of the comedies nowadays are almost similar. The plots (which are also meaningless) of comedies these days may offer a few laughs initially, but eventually fade away halfway through. Most do not contain good storylines and lack the ingredients that can sustain the viewer's interest. Due to this factor, I am glad to crown Stephen Chow as the King of Comedy!!!

SYNOPSIS:
This movie is about the 3 brothers of Sheung family and all three have different personalities. Most of the storyline features the 3 of them and their respective partners.

The eldest of the family, Sheung Mun, is supposed be celebrating his 7th wedding anniversary with his wife, Cheng Dai Sou (CDS). However, he has no intention of celebrating with CDS as he considers her a hag (or ‘wong min po’ in Cantonese). Instead, he goes out with his mistress for dinner on that particular night. Later on, Mun comes home drunk, with his mistress. CDS leaves the house and the mistress moves in. CDS works as a GRO in a karaoke lounge to earn a living. Realising he still needs his wife, Mun tries to woo CDS back.

Sheung Sou, the second of the siblings, seems to lack testosterone and is quite sissy. He teaches flower arrangement at a centre. His aunty (his parents’ cousin), Mo Seung, comes one night and ruins Sou’s dish. He iss so pissed off and the rivalry between them intensifies when MS decides to teach reflexology in the same centre as Sou.

Meanwhile, his youngest brother, Sheung Fun, is a DJ for a radio station. He is a womanizer and has a special kissing skill, which is said to have conquered all females. It is called “The double invented Eiffel Tower kissing technique”. Fun meets one of his listeners, Ho Lee Yuk, and wanted to court her. Yuk is a lady who is obsessed with Hollywood movies and imitates the characters in order to find her identity. Soon, they get together, but Fun still wants to play around with other women. In one accident, Fun injures his head and is down with some kind of strange disease. Yuk pretends to be a nurse to look after Fun and, at the same time, tries to take revenge on Fun for cheating on her.

After a string of events comes the 80th birthday function of their parents. By this time, Fun has already recovered from the disease, thanks to Yuk. Sou’s childhood friend, Yun Kwan, and MS’ pen-pal (I’m not very sure about this), Ka Ming, attend the function too. Sou and MS think of them as their future partners. To their horror, YK and KM will be getting married soon! Sou and MS are devastated and they end up together. After that, both of them change 180 degrees, with Sou being more masculine and MS being more feminine.

Since Sou and Fun have already found their true loves, the story continues with Mun trying to patch things up with CDS. There is a hilarious scene in the karaoke lounge where the Sheung family tries to support Mun and Fun sings CDS’s favorite song in Hokkien.

Just as the title has suggested, all of them end up happily ever after!

ON THE PLOT:
I must say that the storyline is quite well written, as it was able to keep me interested throughout the movie. The development of characters are also well-balanced and all 6 main characters have their fair share of the limelight. Some of the jokes and phrases were so perfectly written that they have become classics (most people can memorise them, no joke!).

There are only certain parts in this movie which I found quite irrelevant and illogical.
1. How could Fun get brain damage (that disease) when a bird’s egg (mind you, it's really small!) fell onto his head? Although the doctor explained that his skull was not fully developed yet, it just made no sense! When he was ill, he gave Mun’s mistress and Yuk a hard time as he played tricks on them. Sometimes it just makes me wonder if Fun was just pretending it or is it for real???

2. At the beginning of the movie, CDS always sang her ‘yum gor’ (favourite song in Cantonese) out of tune. Although her singing was quite ear piercing, it is a joy to watch! However, her singing improved drastically when she worked in the karaoke lounge. To be honest, she can sing quite well (at least she’s not out of tune). The question is, why was there such a massive difference when things happened in just a short period of time???

3. Sou and MS were fighting like cats & dogs and they just couldn't stop quarreling. They argued on the dinner table, at the center, at the mahjong table etc. As I have mentioned just now, they were so upset when their respective “partners” would be getting married. Both of them were crying in So’s bedroom and “CLICK”……they got together! …???… They were bitter rivals before this and ended up together in the next minute?! Ridiculous, is all I can say… I think the scriptwriter is trying too hard to match Sou & MS.

Nevertheless, since this is a typical Stephen Chow movie, just turn a blind eye on these as it doesn’t really matter anyway.

ON THE CHARACTERS/CAST:
The casting of AWEW is indeed very strong as all of the 6 main casts are experienced actors/actresses. Big names such as Leslie Cheung, Stephen Chow and Maggie Cheung were involved in this movie. Sandra Ng and the famous three I have mentioned above are all best actor/actress of local (and international) major awards. Meanwhile, Raymond Wong is one of the famous producers in the Hong Kong movie scene and he is well-known as the Vampire in “Happy Ghost”. Teresa Mo is one actress whose acting skills are well acknowledged and I do like her way of acting.

The list will follow the order of the Sheung siblings:

Raymond Wong as Sheung Mun:
He gave an average performance in AWEW. Maybe it was because Mun was not the main focus in the movie and there is not much challenge on it. Not much depth can be found in this character. The main contribution of Mun is to bring out the best from the character of CDS. The best scene with him is when Mun was buying jewellery in a goldsmith shop. The salesgirl was asking if he was buying it for his wife. Mun nodded his head and said yes. The salesgirl then commended him by saying it is good to be his wife. Mun nodded again and gave the same reply. The expression on his face was so natural and funny which made me thought that he was really buying it for CDS as an anniversary gift. Guess what, the next moment he was with his mistress at the dinner table and the gift was for her!

Sandra Ng as Cheng Dai Sou:
Sandra performed above par and showed us her skills in comedy acting. She acted brilliantly as CDS and made her one of the indispensable characters of AWEW. She showed the 2 sides of CDS excellently, the first one is when she was still a housewife and later as a GRO in the karaoke lounge. Although CDS looked different in the 2 stages, she was still somewhat “innocent”(can’t think of any suitable word to describe her) and joyful as usual. There are a few scenes which involved CDS and are really great! The best one is when she bought Mun 3 shirts as his anniversary gift. The colour of the shirt was so awful. But she admired herself for buying such “wonderful” clothes (in her context) at such a cheap price, 3 for HK$100. The look on her face was damn good and left me speechless.

Leslie Cheung as Sheung So:
The late Leslie was a wonderful and experienced actor who could act in movies of any genres. As Leslie’s appearance in comedies were mostly in the early 90’s, you won’t find him acting in any comedies of recent titles. All movies in the last stage of his career were of serious roles such as “Double Tap”, “The Kid”, “Inner Sense” etc. The versatility of Leslie made him such an invaluable asset in the industry. Leslie as Sou was so perfect. Never did I think that he could be so sissy! He portrayed his character well as he performed Sou in every little tiny detail. The way he spoke, his body language(especially his hands), and the way he thought. Sou once said that he didn’t want to get married because it was arduous to bear a child! The attitude of Sou was shown at the start of the movie. When Sou went into the kitchen, he saw a towel misplaced. After putting it back, he clapped his hand in satisfaction! This scene shows that Sou was just as fussy and particular like a woman (although some women may not be as fussy as this).

Teresa Mo as Leung Mo Seung:
Teresa gave a commendable performance as MS. MS was born when her mother was 70 years old, so she is obviously younger than her cousins(Sou’s parents). She performed MS’ character as a tomboy which is directly opposite to Sou. She looked so cool when she drove her bike into Sheung’s house and went up the ladder looking for Sou. The best scene was when she was in the lift with Sou. She touched a lady’s bottom but the lady slapped Sou and left as he was the only guy there. MS was grinning and Sou was shocked. Then came an opera-guy into the lift. This time, Sou did the trick and thought that MS may get slapped. Truly, the guy slapped MS and also Sou and scolded them! It was a tough lift ride for them though.

Stephen Chow as Sheung Fun:
He is again the main spotlight of the movie and Chow did deliver the goods. He is so natural in performing comedy acts and he truly deserves the title of being “King of Comedy”. All silly jokes and tricks can be seen whenever Fun is present. I guess Chow must have contributed some ideas to the scriptwriter and thus kept all the hilarious stuff rolling. The best scene with Chow was when he was down with brain damage. As mentioned earlier, Fun played all kind of ploy on Mun’s mistress & Yuk. He blew the noodles that contained a lot of pepper onto Mun’s mistress’ face and gave her a punch in the eye! Yuk fared no better as Fun always got the better of her. Both of them tried to take revenge by stuffing him inside the washing machine! After that he was hung to dry in the garden.

Maggie Cheung as Ho Lee Yuk:
How often do you see Maggie Cheung in comedies nowadays? I can say it’s none as Maggie preferred to take on more serious roles instead. Roles in “Hero”, “In The Mood For Love”, etc., were played perfectly by Maggie and she is even acknowledged on the international stage. However, Maggie’s performance in AWEW is also notable. The character of Yuk is quite complicated as I think she had some psychological problems. Initially, she was obsessed with Hollywood movies. She had imitated Madonna, Julia Roberts in “Pretty Woman” and Demi Moore in “Ghost”. You can see that her attitude changed along with the characters. And when Yuk tried to take revenge on Fun, you can see how desperate she was and that almost made her crazy. Her role is not that funny but is somewhat between insane and normal. During the 80th birthday function, she looked very normal, didn’t she? What can be said of Maggie’s acting skill? Numero Uno!!!

EPILOGUE:
The overall flow of the story is fine and well done except for some irrelevant points (in my point of view). If a distinction must be made between comedies of the past and present, I will definitely give my vote to the former! Say whatever you like, I think comedies nowadays have lost their touch. Sad!

A recommendation to all of you who want some laughs and joys in order to relieve stress! Don’t worry, be happy.