Yau lung hei fung

Technically a pretty bad film but if feel good romance is your cup of tea, you'll love it. You know that feeling when your heart is so full that it gets a little hard to breathe, yea this film made me feel like that. Yes, it's extremely cliche, the plot at times is just plain bad, and you basically can see the ending from a mile away. For one, (I understand that it's a personal opinion but) I don't see the need for all the side love stories. It only serves as a distraction that isn't well elaborated on anyway. But even so, for a feel good rom com, it just works. Do I wish that the plot was better? Of course. But the superb acting more than makes up for its own shortcomings.

You know Valentine's Day is just around the corner when the screens begin to fill with movies designed specifically to commemorate the day. You got to salute the filmmakers of Look For A Star for keeping faith with a formula that doesn't seem to tire, and I guess it has legs to travel especially when you have the charismatic and still youthful looking Andy Lau (he doesn't look like he's pushing 50) romancing Shu Qi in a rather fantasy like premise, and still keep it rather appealing because love is in the air.

The obscenely rich man falling for the poor girl isn't anything new to begin with, just one of the many combinations to have your lead protagonists background set for an opposites attract. Like what Hollywood had with Pretty Woman, and what Bollywood recently had in Ghajini starring Aamir Khan. In fact, the love story here does have parallels with the latter, since the rich man, through a series of assumptions, managed to hide his identity from his lady love, one of the reasons being it makes perfect sense to test if that somebody falls for you because of who you are, and not the size of your bank account.

So Andy Lau plays Sam Ching, a billionaire developer with his sights firmly set with projects in Macau, one of which happens to be the MGM Grand. While wondering the casino tables, he chances upon Shu Qi's Milan, a sassy (what else?) cabaret dancer cum part-time dealer at the baccarat table, who catches his eye because she seems to dispense good advice to gamblers to avoid borrowing or even gambling, which means lesser profits for the company of course. For her, it's the assumption that he's one of the many poor souls who chain themselves to the gambling table, and helps out the complete stranger by sending him to the pier in order to leave Macau.

Directed by Andew Lau, better know for many a crime thriller flick and who last helmed a romance flick Sausalito some 9 years ago, this story would have sagged a bit if not for its intelligent fusing of 2 more sets of lovers. Cindy Tang and James Yuen's story had attempted to be an ensemble off love stories of sorts, and having 3 here is more than a handful to handle, which was pulled off quite effortlessly by Andrew Lau. It's a romantic movie with the central one being that of Sam and Milan, and the other two stemmed from Sam's trusted assistants, company secretary Jo (Denise Ho) and personal chauffeur Tim (Lam Ka Wah).

While Sam Ching the character may pass off as rather hard to read initially, when together with Tim and Jo the trio share the same problem in their love life, which generalizes that the busy and the well to do, have some vastly different concerns when thinking of getting hitched. In fact, this would have alienated the average joe folks in the audience I felt, if not for all their heartfelt performances. Denise Ho brought out some vivid alpha-female tendencies while being pursued by a lowly maintenance guy Lin Jiu (Zhang Hanyu), in an arc which I thought was the most touching of the lot, while Tim's dalliances with a divorced woman (Shannon Fok) whom he met on a blind date set up by Sam, happened to be the most clichéd and given the shortest screen time.

It's an examination into how love can transcend status only if you allow it to, without giving two hoots about what others want to think and read into things, and the set romantic pieces being smartly engineered to well the heart and the eyes with tears at the appropriate moments. Such opportunities get exploited when Sam's status gets revealed, which turns the movie into a more interesting direction. However, the only jarring bit, which you can experience from the audience's very audible quizzing, was why the need to introduce the dominating mom and ex-wives complication, which doesn't exactly get addressed properly, throwing up more questions about the character of Sam, and at certain moments do confirm his rather chauvinistic ways.

Macau itself is a beautiful backdrop for a romantic film, and having been there, I'd dare say this film captured the nice looking side of it, especially with the plenty of postcard perfect pictures of having the brightly lit casinos like the MGM Grand, Venetian, Wynn's and the unmistakably prominent Lisboa peppering the landscape. The Macau Tourism Board should be pleased with his effort. And also pleasing to Hong Kong cinephiles would be the long- time-no-see appearances of Maria Cordero, David Chiang, Rebecca Pan and George Lam taking on supporting roles here.

It's one of those feel good romantic movie that doesn't do no wrong, and clocking in at almost two hours, I felt that the last act involving the game show, was something that came out of fantasy, which on one hand would seem rather implausible, but on the other necessary in order to swiftly wrap up all the loose threads in one fell swoop. As it turned out it's rather enjoyable, and should make for a perfect date movie with that special someone of yours. Just remember to bring along some tissues too.

Tagline: Andy Lau easily keeps this afloat…

Review by Neo: It's been a while since director Andrew Lau venture into something decent. His misguided Hollywood adventure in The Flock was largely disappointing and needless to say, anything since the success of Infernal Affairs has been far-fetched and largely ignored. Sometimes it really makes you wonder if all credits gained in directing Infernal Affairs are actually attributed to his co-director Alan Mak. So it is timely that Andrew Lau is starting to return to some form and even if it is decently just above average, it is better than nothing. Look for A Star is surely thin on plot line and in many ways seems to be relying on the charisma of its stars, think Andy Lau and the somewhat radiating presence of Shu Qi. So to actually call the film a success would simply be an overstatement, but the good news is that it is far from being a failure.

The film is basically a story about a rich guy meeting the poor girl who works at a Macau casino as well as late nights dancing in a small night club. Sure, it is formulaic, and those looking for originality should really look elsewhere. As mentioned before, the story is driven by the screen presence of its stars and it does help when you combine this with some fine supporting players in the likes of Denise Ho (as the work dedicated high management Office Lady) matching up with the poor jobless Mainlander (played by Zhang Han Yu). By now, I am guessing that you guys are probably starting to get the trend; Hong Kong is a social class conscience society and director Lau is simply trying to reinforce the message of mixing chemistry between higher and working class people.

Andy Lau as usual have great screen charisma and there is no doubting that the film is relying more on his star power to drive the movie along and also filling cinema seats at the same time. Lau plays his role to a certain degree of likability and exactly the sort of undemanding acting in most romantic comedies. In saying that Lau passes the grade and his chemistry with Shu Qi is much appreciated by the viewing audience. Likewise, Shu Qi has been gracing the screen for more than a good decade and she basically plays the same role as she did in Jackie Chan's Gorgeous, a few years back. Here, she is once again likable enough for the audience to watch and her sheer sexiness is once again on display. Neo actually have a love and hate relationship with Shu Qi as sometimes she can really be annoying and in other times, she can be the best thing in a film. Luckily Shu Qi does well here and there is no further comment to be made. Adding on, Denise Ho does well in her role and sometimes you simply wonder who she does not attempt to act more often than just singing concentrated. Then again, the role is undemanding, but Ho does not disappoint either. The same can be said of the mainlander actor Zhang Han Yu, like the rest of the cast are all likable enough to make this a pretty smooth ride.

All in all, Look for A Star does not try to do too much, it is exactly the kind of film that every paying viewers would expect. Luckily, the film does not need to be something special, maybe it is the lunar New Year period or maybe it is simply just the idea of Andy Lau working around with his dozens of product placement, or even revoking Neo's memories of visiting Macau Casinos not too long ago. The thing is, the film meets its expectation and at the end of the day, if the audience is satisfied, it will probably means more bums on seats. So is Look for a Star any good? To be perfectly honest, the story is decent and Andy Lau and Shu Qi are good enough to make Look For A Star just as per expectations… (Neo 2009)

I rate it 6.25/10

• www.thehkneo.com

Look for a star is a romance movie with a stellar star-studded cast. Andy Lau, Shu Qi etc. As such, one would expect this movie to be a relatively outstanding one. But apparently the predictable story-line is not captivating enough. As the movie progresses on towards the mid part, my friend who was sitting beside me even fell asleep periodically. Fortunately, the movie starts to pick up after that.

The main characters in the movie, Andy Lau and Shu Qi both acted well. However, I find the character: Lin Jiu played by rising star Zhang Hanyu to be the best as it was the most touching one because his circumstances and constraints are something that most people can relate to. I actually feel for him.

Though at times the movie can be a little boring, there were some scenes that are actually quite touching that will pull your heart strings and give you a warm feeling.

This movie is not really recommended for young children as they might not be able to understand the emotions being acted out and the complexities of some scenes. But still, this is a relatively good movie to catch for it motivates me to pursue my love interest and happiness. You will feel the same way too.

I give it a 6/10.

I had the chance here in 2021 to sit down to watch the 2009 Hong Kong romantic comedy "Look for a Star" (aka "Yau lung hei fung"). I didn't even know about this movie's existence prior to getting the chance to actually sit down to watch it. And with it being a Hong Kong movie that I hadn't already seen, of course I took that chance.

And when I saw that the movie had Andy Lau and Shu Qi in the lead roles, I must admit that my interest in the movie was definitely cranked up, because they tend to deliver good performances and make enjoyable movies.

While the storyline in "Look for a Star" was pretty generic and archetypical for a romantic comedy, then the movie worked out quite well. Sure, the storyline here was as corny and sappy as these movies tend to be, but there was just something about the storyline that made it all the more enjoyable.

I will say that Andy Lau and Shu Qi really had great on-screen chemistry and they delivered very believable performances in the movie, so they were quite a good match for a movie such as this.

"Look for a Star" proved to be a rather enjoyable and wholehearted romantic comedy, with more emphasis on the romance I should say. And I think that was definitely one of the reasons why this 2009 movie worked out so well.

My rating of "Look for a Star" lands on a well-deserved seven out of ten stars. If you enjoy romantic comedies, then you should definitely sit down to watch "Look for a Star" if you have the chance, even if you might not be overly keen on Asian movies.