Super Energetic Man (Review)

Super Energetic Man

aka 戇豆豆追女仔
Super Energetic Man
1998HKMDB Link
Written by Johnny Lee Gwing-Gaai
Directed by Dung Do Cheung Mei

I’m off-brand Popeye the Sailor Man!

A bootleg Hong Kong version of Popeye? Yep, Super Energetic Man transplants Popeye to Hong Kong cinema, brings a good portion of cartoon violence, and then goes completely nuts! Super Energetic Man plays like it’s trying to be a Stephen Chow comedy: It’s got copious copyright “borrowing”, cartoonish violence, scenes that make little sense to fill out the mo lei tau, and Lee Kin-Yan. As a Popeye film, it barely qualifies, with much of the plot running off in random directions, sometimes not even involving any of the main characters. But it just qualifies enough on the rare occasions On Do-Do whips out a can of spinach, shoots it up in the air (the spinach being played by green confetti), munches it down dramatically, inflates his arms, and does superhuman deeds.

Super Energetic Man

Oh no!


The fake Popeye is named On Do-Do (Edmond Leung Hon-Man), and he’s a humble newbie lifeguard who mysteriously often dresses in a sailor suit. His first appearance is disrupting the complicated seduction plans of Captain Lorento (Elvis Tsui Kam-Kong), who throws rats at women who are in rafts, then “saves” them from fake sharks. This overly-complicated plan fails when On Do-Do tosses a skewer into the “shark”, and earning the unwanted gratitude of hot babe Maltese, who will spend most of the film chasing after him and declaring him her boyfriend. But On Do-Do’s heart belongs to another…

On Do-Do and Princess Lychee (Gigi Lai Chi) are in love, they met on the internet. In 1997. “But ours is internet love, I can’t retreat from it,” says On Do-Do. Also they’ve never sent photos to each other, so when they do meet, it is a mystery what each one looks like. But once they do meet, sparks fly, at least until the many many times someone comes in to disrupt their union. Princess Lychee is a real princess, from Kuwite, and because of her great beauty, many men have turned heel in obsession with stealing her away to make her their bride. Hence, her Uncle Pat spends the beginning of the film battling some random soldier who professes her love and tries to kidnap her (Lychee protests that she’s never even met him!) and later Captain Lorento and Mad Dragon also try to steal her away. With all these creepy dudes stalking after her, On Do-Do becomes the best guy in the country simply because he’s the only one who let’s her choose who she wants to date. Also he helps save her from the creeps who take her agency, which often makes up for the various lovers’ quarrels.

Super Energetic Man

So say we all!


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Girls Unbutton

Girls Unbutton

aka 不扣鈕的女孩 aka Bu kou niu de nu hai

1994
Written by Lam Chiu-Wing
Directed by Taylor Wong Tai-Loi


Girls Unbutton is a story about a woman’s search for love. Along the way she gets naked a lot, as do her friends, so it’s all good! A lot of people now compare it to Sex and the City, but Girls Unbutton came out years before that series. It’s spiritual predecessors are those European erotic journey films where they are narrated by the young lady who has a string of lovers until she finds the one that is best. There was a whole host of these in the 70s, though the genre seemed to peter out in the 80s. Many also featured internal dialogue in the form of diaries (as some were based on actual books!), and the diary aspect is carried over for Girls Unbutton. But not entirely, Jenny has two friends with ideas of their own about love and men, thus giving us external dialogue and conflict and nudity.

Despite the fact it appears to be nothing more than sleazy Category III that hastily straightened up the room before mom barged in, Girls Unbutton actually has seeds of an idea of a better film. It almost does a good job looking into the ins and out of relationships, of a woman’s search for love. But Jenny is thrust into various ridiculous scenarios that quickly take the winds out of the sails for a serious and good movie. Girls Unbutton is its own worst enemy. But also its greatest strength. Just the very fact the producers tried to do something makes it a cut above a lot of the slop. And Girls Unbutton is entertaining.

This is a Loletta Lee vehicle, so the plot revolves around her as our heroine Jenny. Jenny has a busy love life, but each relationship is not right for her. Will she ever find true love? Is there a Mr. Right? Will she and her friends be wearing any clothes in the next scene? We shall find out! This was the last film directed by Taylor Wong Tai-Loi, the talented director and fan of old school Cantonese flicks, which he showed his love with in Buddha’s Palm (1982) and Kung Fu Vs. Acrobatic (1990).

Jenny (Loletta Lee Lai-Chun) – Jenny is a modern girl searching for love in a land of duds and duddier duds. What’s a girl to do when everyone sucks or dies quickly?? Lounge around naked and write in your diary. Heck yeah! Loletta Lee was also in Summer Lover
Kate (Mikie Ng Miu-Yee) – Jenny’s friend who wants her to be a strong woman in love, which basically means being a horrible person. Mikie Ng Miu-Yee was awesomely sexual and dangerous in the vastly underrated Rock on Fire, but soon vanished to obscurity. She is sometimes credited as Wu Mia Oyi.
Jenny’s Friend Number Two (Hung Yuk-Laan) – Friend Number Two is such a good friend, she doesn’t even have a name. You don’t need one in the world of friends! Friend Number Two is just as friendly as Friend Number One, Kate. And just as naked!
Lung Mao (Elvis Tsui Kam-Kong) – Triad Boss who has a relationship with Jenny. Dies in battle.
Pong Kwong-Yim (David Siu Chung-Hang) – Politician who becomes the next failed relationship in Jenny’s life, though he doesn’t want to leave her life.
Ho (Leung Si-Ho) – The guy who is right for Jenny, for reasons not really stated, but he just is. You can tell by looking at him!
Ho’s Sister (Fan Oi-Git) – She never gets a name, and has a passion for losing her clothes accidentally. And she parades around he brother in a string bikini that covers less than dental floss!


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