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Stephen Fung

Sometimes, just sometimes, a film will surprise you when you have few expectations of it.

In the first place, the storyline did not seem promising. Kitty Zhang plays country lass Cai Feng who heads for the bright lights of Shanghai to realise her dream of becoming a hip-hop dancer.

The plot might be conventional but the treatment was anything but. You realise that something different is going on with the first musical number that takes place amid the fields.

The film was produced and based on a story by funnyman Stephen Chow and it bears his fingerprints all over.

Actor-turned-director Stephen Fung seems to have channelled Chow’s mo lei tau (nonsense) sensibility with sight gags such as Zhang’s becoming fuzz on her upper lip.

At the same time, the humour is not mean-spirited and even a fellow villager with a mysterious gender gets to make a point about diversity and acceptance.

The film is also lifted by Zhang’s buoyant performance. Looking like another Chow ingenue, Cecilia Cheung, she gives a star-making turn as the enthusiastic girl with the indomitable spirit.

Cai Feng subsequently falls for a playboy entrepreneur played by Singaporean Leon Williams, who filled in for Edison Chen after the sex scandal broke. The film’s romantic detour is less than convincing though, and worse, it veers away from the madcap antics.

Still, there is such a cheery vibe emanating from the film and Zhang’s performance that even a somewhat pat finale fails to dampen the mood.

(ST)