The Grateful Monkey

The Grateful Monkey

Dir: Wong Yiu
Scr: Lau Sang
Cast: Tang Bik-wan, Yu Kai, Cheng Bik-ying, Kwan Hoi-shan, Cheung Yuen-chau, Chu Yuen-lung (alias Sammo Hung)
1963 / B&W / D Beta / Cantonese / 91min

 

Master Yu Zhanyuan's clan is mobilised to monkey around for this funhouse ride of a film. The Grateful Monkey, a genre blender typical of 1960s Cantonese cinema, is a costume sing-song palatial drama with a supernatural dimension. The boys and girls wear Disneyland-like cute animal outfits to play primates that are pulled into dirty palatial politics, their amazing acrobatics employed to manifest not only animal qualities but also super-human capacities. Opera star Tang Bik-wan may get top billing for the film, but it is the monkeying kids who steal the show.


Date Time Venue
30/1/2016 (Sat) 7:30pm Cinema, Hong Kong Film Archive
12/2/2016 (Fri) 7:30pm Cinema, Hong Kong Film Archive

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