Buddy Cops

刑警兄弟

Hong Kong/China, 2016, colour, 2.35:1, 100 mins.

Director: Qi Jiaji 戚家基 [Peter Tsi].

Rating: 5/10.

Unoriginal odd-couple cop comedy gets by on its lead performances and technical smoothness.

STORY

Hong Kong, the present day. After accidentally messing up a police stakeout, and then running up huge bills in a subsequent car chase, maverick detective Chen Jianfei (Huang Zongze) is transferred to the so-called Central Invisible Unit 中隐身部, a department for police employees that no other department wants. Along with him go his superiors, Choushui Sir (Lin Shengbin), a professional arse-kisser, and his chief Wen Changkai (Zeng Zhiwei), who is close to retirement and just wants to protect his pension. In the unit, which is loyally run by Madam Zhu (Yu An’an), Chen Jianfei finds himself working alongside Li Zhongni (Jin Gang), who drove the car he requisitioned for the disastrous car chase. The two are like chalk and cheese: Chen Jianfei is a loose-cannon, womanising cop with onetime underworld connections, while Li Zhongni is a precious mummy’s boy who goes by the book. The pair find themselves thrown even closer together when Li Zhongni’s mother (Jin Yanling) gets engaged to Chen Jianfei’s father after meeting on holiday; as a result, Chen Jianfei and Li Zhongni are forced to share the same flat with them. Meanwhile, Chen Jianfei investigates the killing of old friend Liu Jing (Chen Xiaochun) on the orders of triad businessman Kong Xiangxing (Lin Jiadong), who poses as an anti-drugs philanthropist. Chen Jianfei uses his current girlfriend – the insatiable Bessie (Fang Haowen) – to gain access to Kong Xiangxing’s warehouse to find evidence of drugs trafficking. Meanwhile, Li Zhongni finds himself targeted by a geeky young Japanese woman, Little Princess (Xu Zishan), who happens to work for the Narcotics Department.

REVIEW

Shot in spring 2012 but only released four years later, Buddy Cops 刑警兄弟 is a totally unoriginal, odd-couple cop comedy that gets by on its lead chemistry and smooth production values. The first directorial outing of Qi Jiaji 戚家基 [Peter Tsi], a Hong Kong producer-writer and sometime arts administrator, it gets plenty of comic mileage out of pairing two TVB contract actors (Hong Kong singer Huang Zongze 黄宗泽 and Taiwan bozo comedian Jin Gang 金剛) as a studly detective and a campy mummy’s boy who team up to take on a local drugs lord, played by Lin Jiadong 林家栋 [Gordon Lam] with shades and nail varnish. What it doesn’t do, alas, is halt Hong Kong cinema’s backslide into the 1980s and beyond. Apart from its greater technical finesse, this could have been made 30 years ago – and even has a warehouse finale, with an Amazon enforcer, to prove it.

Given the back-of-a-coaster plot, and the inability of Qi and co-writer Guo Jianle 郭建乐 to develop it, most of the running time is taken up with situation comedy that pairs one actor with another or in groups: Huang’s boyish cop and Jin Gang’s girly one sharing sleeping quarters, their conjoined families sharing a dinner table with food that may be poisoned, and so on. Without being laugh-out-loud funny, the dialogue has a cosy comic familiarity, especially in the mouths of veterans like Zeng Zhiwei 曾志伟 [Eric Tsang, also producer], Jin Yanling 金燕玲 [Elaine Jin] and Feng Cuifan 风淬帆 [Stanley Fung]. As well as Lin as the villain, stalwarts like Chen Xiaochun 陈小春 [Jordan Chan], Yu An’an 余安安 [Candice Yu] and Lu Haipeng 卢海鹏 pop up in supporting roles, and younger actresses Xu Zishan 徐子珊 and Fang Haowen 方皓玟 hold their own as a possibly-psycho girlfriend and a goofy Japanese nerd, with Xu (the clothes-shedding assassin in 14 Blades 锦衣卫, 2010) nicely catching the comic tone as the detective’s insatiable lover. It’s all very cosy, very familiar – but very depressing, as if the territory has been in creative stasis for the past half-century.

Clean, bright photography by Wu Wenzheng 伍文拯 and seamless editing by Li Dongquan 李栋全 [Wenders Li] ensure a smooth ride. The film’s original Chinese title, 神兽巴打 (roughly, “Beastie Bros”), can still be seen in the background of the animated main titles.

Qi’s second outing (co-directed with Taiwan’s Ke Mengrong 柯孟融) has still not been released three years after shooting in summer 2013 – the boxing romance A Choo 我的情敌是⌈超人⌋, from a script by Taiwan writer-director Ke Jingteng 柯景腾 [Giddens Ko 九把刀] – presumably because its male lead, Taiwan’s Ke Zhendong 柯震东, is still blacklisted by China following his arrest in Beijing for drug use in Aug 2014. [It was finally released in Hong Kong and Taiwan, but not the Mainland, in Jul 2020, under the new Chinese title 打喷嚏.]

CREDITS

Presented by Shaw Movie City Hong Kong (HK), Television Broadcasts (HK), Sil-Metropole Organisation (HK), Huace Pictures (CN), Rock Partner Film (HK). Produced by Concept Legend (HK).

Script: Qi Jiaji [Peter Tsi], Guo Jianle. Original story: Zeng Zhiwei [Eric Tsang], Qi Jiaji [Peter Tsi], Guo Jianle, Yan Xiyun. Photography: Wu Wenzheng. Editing: Li Dongquan [Wenders Li], Mo Wenhao. Original music: Deng Zhiwei, Zhuang Dongxin. Music: Tige Hui, Ye Shujun. Art direction: He Jianxiong [Cyrus Ho]. Costume design: Ouyang Xia [Connie Auyeung]. Sound: Chen Weixiong. Action: Qian Jiale [Chin Ka-lok], Huang Weihui.

Cast: Huang Zongze (Chen Jianfei/PK Bird), Jin Gang [Li Xinqiao/King Kong Lee] (Li Zhongni/Johnny/Primary School Chicken), Xu Zishan (Little Princess), Fang Haowen (Bessie Lu), Feng Cuifan [Stanley Fung] (Chen Feili/Philip, Chen Jianfei’s father), Jin Yanling [Elaine Jin] (Jiao, Li Xinqiao’s mother), Zeng Zhiwei [Eric Tsang] (Wen Changkai/Man Sir), Lin Shengbin (Choushui Sir), Lin Jiadong [Gordon Lam] (Kong Xiangxing/Hung), Chen Xiaochun [Jordan Chan] (Liu Jing), Yu An’an [Candice Yu] (Madam Zhu), Lu Haipeng (Lu Hai), Tang Yingying [Angela Tong] (Mary), Lin Wei (crime-squad head), Zheng Lisha (Golden Wolf, Kong Xiangxing’s female enforcer), Lin Yingtong (waitress), Zhu Ximin (TV show actress).

Release: Hong Kong, 21 Apr 2016; China, 22 Apr 2016.