Twinkle, Twinkle, Lucky Stars (1985)

To me, this movie is perfection.

So much average

Pretty Good

It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.

This broadly humorous sequel to the cult hit MY LUCKY STARS is another film cast from the same mould: small scale comedy and laughs combine with hard-hitting action, the result is a roller-coaster of a film, slow in some spots and rip-roaring in others. The thing that really made me enjoy this film was the fun atmosphere, even more improved since the last instalment: the leads now seem really natural together (as they should, having starred in two ensemble films previously) and the comedy comes brisk and naturally. Plenty of the humour surrounds the boys' attempts to score with a pretty young woman, creating fires and fights in an attempt to grope and see her naked as many times as possible. Yes, it all sounds pretty low brow, but that's the point, and there's an innocence about the humour which makes it impossible to dislike.Just about every cast member acquits themselves admirably in this production. The comedy stars shine through and the action heroes are quite wonderful. Comedy and action is mixed together in a successful, always moving, non-boring sequence. There are two main martial arts sequences, whilst the rest of the film involves incredible stunts (jumping from buildings and moving cars particularly), motorbike chases, shoot-outs, and just plain old-fashioned escapism (Jackie shooting the door off his car is a favourite moment). The warehouse attack, about halfway through, is a major tour-de-force for stars Jackie Chan, Yuen Biao, and a young Andy Lau. Each faces a weapon-wielding toughie in a warehouse setting; the resultant fights are fast and furious in the truest sense of the words.The film is really a who's who of Asian talent: along with bit-parts from popular players like Kara Hui, Jason Pai Piao, Phillip Ko, and villain Dick Wei, we have fresh-faced soon-to-be-famous bits from Michelle Yeoh and Andy Lau amongst the more established turns of the three leads. Rosamund Kwan lends fiery support but the fun is in the villainous trio, comprising Fat Chung with hilarious eyebrows; imposing Japanese villain Yasuaki Kurata, and best of all the Australian martial arts master, Richard Norton. In one of his first roles, Norton is great as the shell-suit clad baddie, particularly when shooting people with a machine gun whilst hang-gliding through the air! He also gets some great dialogue, such as in the final fight scene: "Painful?". Norton's tongue-in-cheek turn makes for the best villain of the series and every scene with him is a winner.Sammo Hung only really comes to light in the film's finale, a chase-cum-shoot-out-cum-mass-fight in a theatre and a restaurant. There's a great gag in which a girl pretends to be blind, then some blistering action from Hung and Chan. Hung is particularly good, wielding wooden tennis rackets and beating bad guys like the pro he is. Obviously these kind of films are an acquired taste, a mix of old-fashioned slapstick, sniggering schoolboy humour, and the kind of martial arts flavoured mayhem they can only make in Hong Kong. It's reall rather good.

Review: This movie was awful. There's loads of unnecessary comedy, which is really not funny but the action is fast, when it is taken seriously. I thought that the movie was going to be based around Jackie Chan and his crime squad but most of the scenes are with these 5 characters who seemed more like the Marx Brothers than action heroes. Anyway, the serious side of the movie is about a police informant who sends an important letter to his friend, which contains information about an illegal drug operation. When the informant gets brutally murdered by the druglords hit men, the cops put the informants friend in protect custody by making her stay with the 5 Lucky Stars, who I personally thought was a bunch of misfits who were completely useless. When the druglords find out about the mysterious letter that will damage there operation, they go on the hunt for the woman that the police are protecting but Muscles (Jackie Chan), and his elite squad, manage to stop them in there tracks by using there Kung Fu skills to take down the bad guys. The movie wouldn't have been that bad if that was the main story, because the epic battles with the bad guys, actually wasn't that bad but we're stuck with this badly written comedy scenes which became hard to watch after a while. I should have known what to expect, once I saw that Sammo Hung was in the directing chair because he's known for his comedic movies, which I really don't find that funny but I thought that I would give this movie a go because I'm close to finishing my Jackie Chan season. His acting wasn't bad in this film and the epic fight at the end was worth the wait but the rest of the movie was a waste of time. Disappointing!Round-Up: This movie was directed by Sammo Hung, 63, who brought you the great Prodigal Son, Winners & Sinners, Project A, Wheels on Meals, Dragons Forever, Moon Warriors, the Evil Cult and Mr. Nice Guy. Personally, I'm not a fan of his movies because I don't really find his comedy that funny but he can fight and he does put together some epic action scenes. His haircut was really strange in this film, along with his weird costumes and he did seem to be making a fool out of himself in most of the scenes. With that aside, the elite police squad made this film slightly watchable but I still found the core of the movie quite poor. I recommend this movie to people who are into their action/martial arts/comedies starring Jackie Chan, Sammo Hung, Biao Yuen, Michelle Yeoh, Richard Ng and Andy Lau. 2/10

The script is totally incoherent (something about a letter that could expose a criminal organization... don't even bother to think about it), and most of the comedy is lame, but the action is fast and exhilarating. Jackie has a small part and barely any dialogue in this one; I also would have liked to see more of the gifted Yuen Biao, who has a way of making even the most amazing stunts seem effortless. Sammo Hung gets the lion's share of the fighting, and at the end he is pitted against Richard Norton, one of the most worthy villains of Jackie Chan movies. I give "Twinkle" * for the comedy and *** for the action, so the average is **.

"Xia ri fu xing" was the first movie by Sammo Hung, and I loved it. The stunts and the action is great and the story isn't stupid. The decrees are fun. Sammo Hung, Jackie Chan and the rest of the actors played super. You don't see very much blood, but they hit and kick and hit and kick...This movie shows, that you can film super stunts, without special-effects, like in "The Matrix".