The Bride Napping

Dir: Yan Jun
Scr: King Hu
Orig Story: Shi Nai'an
Prod Co: Shaws Brothers
Co-starring: Ting Ning, Chiao Chuang, Diana Chang Chung-wen, Zhu Mu, Feng Yi
1962 / Colour / D Beta / Mandarin / Chi & Eng / subtitles / 123min

Betty Loh Ti's penchant for comedy was finally put to good use, playing the matchmaking maid Chunlan in an episode extracted from The Water Margin. Liu Yueying (Ting Ling) meets and falls in love with the down-on-luck scholar Bian Ji (Chiao Chuang) at a fête but their union is threatened by a bully with designs on her virtue. When push comes to shove, it's all up to the maid to save the day… A lavish production featuring a stellar cast (the diva trio of Loh, Ting and Diana Chang Chung-wen) and crew (King Hu as screenwriter-cum-lyricist; composer Yao Min and the singing voice of Tsin Ting), this all-singing period drama was probably conceived as a rehearsal run for The Love Eterne and the string of huangmei diao films that followed.

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