All Night Long
Director: Peter Mak
Rating: 6.0
Year: 1989
The first hour of this loopy Hong Kong comedy from 1989 is like watching
the four main female characters spin around in a washing machine. It is nutty,
chaotic and lots of fun. In the final third though it loses its energy and
it seems like they missed an opportunity to make this into a classic. It
is the sort of HK comedy that has women running around in a panic a lot of
the time and men constantly talking about raping them. That is how HK comedy
often rolled back then. It takes some getting used to and for the most part
that style of comedy in HK has vanished - eaten up by changing times and
changing attitudes. It was a comedy world unto itself unlike any other in
the world.
This one stars four women - all reasonably popular back then. Carol "Dodo"
Cheng was the biggest star of the four and would continue to be one through
the 1990s. Elizabeth Lee was the sexy one and was in some films I really
like (Gunmen, Widow Warriors, The Sword Stained with Royal Blood). Elsie
Chan showed up mainly in comedies and Crystal Kwok was just starting out
but would be in The Master with Jet Li. They all have great energy here and
loud screams. And their combined personalities make for frantic going. It
all takes place in one crazy night.
Dodo is a single teacher bored with her life and after eating a lousy meal
in her apartment decides to go out into the Hong Kong night for a walk. Considered
one of the safest cities in the world. Not on this night. She goes into an
underground walkway and is accosted by a group of men who want to rape her.
She runs for her life and jumps into the car of a man who is just driving
away. Saved. Well not really. He has been shot in a bank robbery and forces
her to take him into a convenience store (12-8) to make a phone call. Inside
is Crystal as the clerk and Elsie as a customer. He dies. A bag falls down
full of tons of money. Elizabeth Lee walks in and wants in.
The girls are jumping for joy. Girls Just Want to Have Money. But there is
blood every where. And a dead body. Lucky Manfred Wong gets to do a dead
man impersonation for much of the film. The local cops (Wu Ma) show up for
their nightly coffee. It becomes a slapstick game of hide the body and clean
the blood. He has enough blood to supply a blood bank and it is leaking out.
Eventually of course the dead man's partners show up led by Stanley Fung.
When they do it is like letting the air out of a balloon. Too bad. The girls
were so much fun. Multiple threats of rape isn't that funny. Directed by
Peter Mak who later directed The Wicked City.
