Movie
Hong Kong Comedy Craze
Behind the laughter lies one of Hong Kong cinema's liveliest portraits of everyday life and popular culture.
A curated journey through Hong Kong comedy, from Michael Hui's sharp observations of everyday life to commercial ensemble comedies, genre parodies and Stephen Chow's unmistakable mo lei tau humor.
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Curator's Note
Hong Kong comedy could turn almost anything into material for laughter: work, money, family, gambling, martial arts, crime, romance and even the film industry itself. From Michael Hui's sharp social satire to the star-driven commercial comedies of the 1980s and Stephen Chow's transformation of Cantonese wordplay and popular culture into mo lei tau absurdity, comedy became one of the clearest expressions of Hong Kong's urban identity.
The Birth of Hong Kong Citizen Comedy
Michael Hui turned work, money and everyday frustrations into a distinctly Hong Kong form of working-class comedy. · CHAPTER 01 (5 Movies)
An early Michael Hui breakthrough that uses gambling and ordinary urban lives to establish a distinctly local comedy voice.
Michael Hui stars as Wen, a convict who's always out to make a quick dollar through gambling. Being behind bars doesn't stop him from making something off of his gambling skills. Samuel Hui co-stars as Chieh,a novice gambler who gets into trouble one day when he tries to steal casino chips from a crooked card dealer Dean Shek). Whilst in jail, Chie
The Hui brothers continue their sharp observation of ordinary Hong Kong life through absurd situations and social satire.
A defining Michael Hui comedy whose workplace satire captures the frustrations and ingenuity of 1970s Hong Kong.
A biting comedy about employment, show business and the pressures faced by ordinary workers in modern Hong Kong.
A mature Hui Brothers comedy combining workplace hierarchy, urban frustration and the resourcefulness of ordinary people.
Cinema City and the Commercial Comedy Boom
Star ensembles, genre mixing and festive entertainment defined the great commercial comedy boom of 1980s and early 1990s Hong Kong. · CHAPTER 02 (7 Movies)
A Cinema City landmark that combines action, crime, comedy and star power into blockbuster entertainment.
The police track down a notorious burglar in order to apprehend him. However, he is given a chance to make up for his ways by working with the police on a case involving stolen diamonds.
The sequel expands the blockbuster formula with bigger spectacle, faster comedy and the same crowd-pleasing energy.
A breezy blend of school comedy, youth culture and supernatural fun that launched one of Hong Kong's signature 1980s franchises.
The sequel continues the franchise's lively mix of school life, young ensemble comedy and supernatural charm.
A star-driven festive comedy that captures the warmth and bustling commercial energy of 1980s Hong Kong cinema.
A quintessential Lunar New Year ensemble comedy built around family chaos, star chemistry and rapid-fire gags.
A festive costume comedy mixing romance, mistaken identities and ensemble chaos with classic Hong Kong New Year energy.
Chow Tung is a licentious man who was arranged to get married along with his ugly sister Gut to partners not of their choice. Chow, being a filial son, agrees to go along with his mother's plans. The plot thickens when Chow meets the beautiful Snow White and decides to marry her of which Matriarch Chow agrees whole-heartedly.
Wong Jing and the Age of Pop Entertainment
Gambling films, parody and relentless genre mixing gave Hong Kong comedy its fastest and most unapologetically commercial rhythm. · CHAPTER 03 (6 Movies)
A hugely influential blend of gambling mythology, star charisma and commercial comedy that sparked a major Hong Kong film trend.
Ko Chun, a renowned gambler, loses his memory in an accident and starts behaving like a child. Little Knife, an amateur gambler, offers him shelter and realizes that he has a penchant for gambling.
A gambling-film parody that became Stephen Chow's breakthrough and a major turning point for mo lei tau comedy.
A crossover of gambling mythology and Stephen Chow's comic persona, capturing the peak of Hong Kong's gambling-film craze.
A frantic commercial comedy driven by elaborate pranks, mistaken identities and the anything-goes rhythm of early 1990s Hong Kong.
Jin Yong's wuxia world is gleefully dismantled and rebuilt as a fast-moving mix of palace intrigue and mo lei tau comedy.
The sequel pushes Wai Siu-bo's chaotic adventures into an even denser mixture of wuxia parody, romance and political farce.
Stephen Chow and the Mo Lei Tau Era
Wordplay, streetwise humor and absurd imagination became a comic language uniquely associated with Hong Kong cinema. · CHAPTER 04 (10 Movies)
A police-undercover story transformed into school comedy, defining the rhythm of Stephen Chow's early golden period.
Chow Sing Sing is about to be kicked out of the Royal Hong Kong Police's elite Special Duties Unit. But a senior officer decides to give him one last chance: Star must go undercover as a student at the Edinburgh High School in Hong Kong to recover the senior officer's missing revolver.
A traditional martial arts hero tale reshaped into a comic story of humiliation, resilience and unlikely redemption.
Courtroom comedy, verbal wit and social satire collide in one of Stephen Chow's defining period comedies.
A classical scholar-romance tale reinvented as an exuberant feast of wordplay, pop references and absurd performance.
A spy-film parody that mixes deadpan absurdity, heroic fantasy and Stephen Chow's increasingly distinctive authorial voice.
A period courtroom comedy powered by verbal combat, institutional satire and wildly exaggerated performance.
Journey to the West becomes a time-traveling fantasy comedy whose mixture of absurdity and romance grew into a major pop-cultural phenomenon.
When the Goddess of Happiness tosses the Longevity Monk and his disciples out of heaven (because the Monkey King tried to attain immortality), the Monkey King is reincarnated as the Joker. He now spends his time chasing two jealous women. When one of them is dying, the Joker goes back in time in an attempt to save her.
Beneath its absurd comedy lies a bittersweet story of love, sacrifice and destiny that gave Stephen Chow's humor unusual emotional depth.
This sequel to "Pandora's Box" continues director Jeffrey Lau's adaptation of the Buddhism saga "Journey to the West". Stranded five centuries in the past, Joker Monkey King must battle a variety of monsters, seductive women and super-powered villains to save the dying Pak Jing-Jing.
Food culture, commercial mythology and an underdog comeback are transformed into a comedy that marks Stephen Chow's growing authorial control.
A deeply personal comedy about an aspiring actor's dignity, love and persistence, arriving near the end of Hong Kong cinema's golden era.
Absurdity, Parody and Genre Play
When wuxia heroes, gangsters, hitmen and urban relationships all became comic material, Hong Kong comedy revealed its wildest genre imagination. · CHAPTER 05 (5 Movies)
Jeffrey Lau wildly collages old Cantonese cinema, wuxia nostalgia and modern urban comedy into a quintessential 1990s Hong Kong farce.
A poet named Butterfly and her friend Kuen visit a stranger's mansion to return some possessions that were unintentionally taken. At the house, they stumbled upon an illegal weapons trade that ultimately went bad. To evade the police from interrogations, the two innocent witnesses wiped away their fingerprints and left a note that stated that the c
An all-star cast turns Jin Yong's wuxia mythology into anarchic parody, capturing the uninhibited entertainment spirit of Hong Kong's golden age.
Period adventure, spy parody, wuxia and domestic comedy collide in one of Stephen Chow's most inventive genre mashups.
A hitman and a struggling filmmaker become partners in a sharp black comedy about the difficulties facing Hong Kong's film industry.
Marriage and infidelity are staged with the rituals of a gangster movie, showing how post-golden-age Hong Kong comedy continued to play with genre conventions.