A Chinese Odyssey Part 1 and Part 2 (1995)
A Chinese Odyssey Part 1: Pandora’s Box (1995) 6/10
Director Jeffrey Lau’s epic, ambitious 2 part retelling of the classic Journey of the West tale features one of Stephen Chow’s best performances and is a heady mix of humor, utter nonsense, romance and even pathos. The first part, Pandora’s Box is effectively the set-up while Part 2 Cinderella is the payoff. The opening sequence is hilarious and Stephen Chow keeps up the frenetic and crazy pace through the film with his trademark witticism and nonsensical brand of humor, full of non sequiturs mixed with physical gags. The weakness of the film is that the movie plods alot in the middle which feels like a long extended setup for Part 2 where the real payoff is. Here, Chow is aided by his usual sidekick Ng Man Tat and they effortlessly play off each other’s energy. A romantic plot is supposed to develop between Stephen Chow and Karen Mok but it feels rushed and superficial because it is only really established towards the end with very little time to develop the relationship. The strength of this film only really starts to show in the last 30-40 minutes of the film when Chow’s character gets the Pandora’s Box and does some time travelling hijink. The scene is easily the highlight of the entire film and the ending provides a tantalising teaser for Part 2. If you only watch Part 1, you will probably feel unsatisfied because Part 1 does not really have as much laughs or content compared to Part 2. More importantly, Law Kar Ying, who singlehandedly steals the first scene as the ultra nagging Tripitaka, does not have any further scenes in Part 1 and all his best scenes are in Part 2.
A Chinese Odyssey Part 2: Cinderella (1995) 8/10
Which of course brings me to Part 2, which is undoubtedly the stronger movie of the two. Part 2 is my personal favorite Stephen Chow movie of all time and i believe that it should be a must watch for all HK film affectionados. 3 reasons can be given for this and they are: better script, Law Kar Ying and Athena Chu. Whereas you get the distinct feeling that Part 1 has alot of padding to justify its running time, Part 2 is more tightly crafted and way funnier, with a memorable homage/parody of Wong Kar Wai’s Chungking Express (Trust me that scene is 100x funnier if you get the WKW reference). Second, Law Kar Ying, whose annoyingly talky Tripitaka is one of my personal favourite characters of the movie. He gets much more screen time in Part 2 and his song routine midfilm is simply da bomb. Plus, this time Stephen Chow manages to actually develop believable chemistry with the ethereally beautiful Athena Chu and craft a poignant, almost depressingly affecting love story. It is only towards the end that you realise what had started out as slapstick comedy has morphed into compelling romance tinged with pathos. Granted, the ending is quite a downer but it counts and Stephen Chow’s best movie, and a highlight of Athena Chu’s chequered movie career. Plus, Stephen Chow actually has substantial screen time as Sun Wukong, unlike in Part 1 where Sun Wukong only appears in the opening scene. As a HK movie classic and a must watch for Stephen Chow fans, A Chinese Odyssey should be watched together as one complete film. One caveat though: if you do not understand cantonese/ mandarin and watch it using only the subtitles, you will probably miss alot of the laughs which do not translate well into subtitles. Plus, some of the scenes are references and parodies of other elements of HK pop culture circa 1995 (eg, Athena Chu plays the dual characters Zixia and Qingxia, the latter a reference to HK actress Lin Ching Hsia, as well as several WKW references), and you may miss some of the truly funny parts of the movie if you don’t get them.
