From Beijing with Love (1994)

Since melatonin causes nightmares more intense than the usual, the potential of Xanax as sleeping pill is overrated, and I prefer to keep my Stilnox supplies for situations when I know that's critical to fall asleep before 4 AM, I moved back to another version of "sleeping pill": old Hong Kong movies. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. It depends on how bad the movie is, or its translation, because I didn't see enough yet to catch on a bit of Cantonese. "From Beijing with Love" is a so & so example, but enough of more "so" to deserve a blog entry - especially since I don't have anything more "fresh" to talk about.

The intro sequence copies the typical themes in Bond movies, having though an ending that's more out of norm, which already tells you that what we have here is a parody. A low budget one, but you can appreciate that it's acknowledging it and makes fun of this too. The completely stupid intrigue is intentionally so, and only serves as support for the comic part: the head of a dinosaur is stolen by a mysterious villain dressed in an impenetrable armor and equipped with a golden gun, which again references the 007 series. We quickly find out that under the bad guy's mask is actually the army general who's supposed to figure out the robbery, and to show that he's doing something for this he reinstates in function a retired agent. A guy who currently struggles as a pork meat seller complaining that the vegetarian trend is bad for business, and who seems to resemble more a sort of inspector Clouseau, but who obviously finally solves the case, gets the girl, and delivers us a predictable happy end. But the movie's not in the story, it's in the absolutely hilarious scenes that offers along the way, starting with the gadgets prepared for the secret agents (e.g., a torchlight functioning exclusively with solar energy), up to how you can escape an execution platoon that's so zealous to not allow getting away not even to a blind man who got there based on his own written declaration...

If you're old enough to have be nostalgic for the slapstick comedies during the '80s-'90s, made by Zucker/Abrahams or Mel Brooks: Airplane, Spaceballs, The Naked Gun, Hot Shots or Top Secret, then there are big chances to also enjoy the Chinese James Bond. I've never liked the genre much, but it really depends on how well the comic part is integrated with the parody (e.g., Top Secret is probably a different class than Hot Shots). Even though the Far East 007 seems cheaper than anything made in China, if you can get over "the typical silliness", which you can find in most HK movies before 2000, then it's probably enjoyable enough to not put you to sleep.

Rating: 3 out of 5