| Pedicab Driver (1989) |
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| Director: | Sammo Hung |
| Writers: | Barry Wong |
| Starring: | Sammo Hung, Max Mok, Nina Li, Billy Chow, and Lau Kar Leung |
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The Plot: Pedicab Driver is a story with several plots all sorta happening at once. Fat Tung (Sammo Hung) and Malted Candy (Max Mok) play two great friends who are both pedicab drivers. Malted Candy is more light hearted and good natured, while Fat Tung has a bit more grit to his persona. Regardless, the duo are a pretty silly pair. Fat, after some pratfalls, falls in love with a young woman who is working as an apprentice for an ornery old baker. The baker also has eyes for the same lady, and what follows is a very strange love triangle. Candy, however, falls in love with a girl named Ping who he randomly meets while driving his pedicab. Ping seems sweet, innocent, and has a personality that perfectly fits with Candy. There’s one problem that stands in his way: she’s a prostitute who works for a brutal brothel owner. When Candy finally discovers this fact, he has issues with it, but decides that this girl is worth it. The only problem is that the owner of her brothel isn’t willing to let her go. |
| The Review |
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Without meaning any offense to the fans out there, Hong Kong melodrama can be a real pain to try and sit through. For my tastes, it is often very cliche and taken far over-the-top. While Pedicab Driver is guilty of implementing many of these poor traits, the reasoning behind the melodrama sits very well with me. There are some true human touches found in the story of Ping and Malted Candy (Max Mok). There are many cliches at work in this subplot focusing on a hooker with a heart of gold, but the small nuances of the characters are what makes this small arc work so well. The arguments between Ping and Malted Candy seem very realistic and the performances, when Max Mok isn’t going absolutely over-the-top, can be quite touching. The film dances between bluntly serious drama and goofy humor, but the resulting mix works well in a rather ludicrous way.
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| The Conclusion |
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