Writer: Syahida Kamarudin

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Watch this if you liked: “Hail the Judge”, “On His Majesty’s Secret Service”

There are a lot of questions playing in one's mind while watching "Treasure Inn". How did Corey Yuen end up making a movie with Wong Jing and resulted in this? Why is the feeling of dejà vu in your heart every time the characters make a boob joke? Why Liu Yang is even considered an actress? And most of all, why would Nick Cheung - who has crawled his way through everything from licking Stephen Chow's shoes in Wong Jing's "Tricky Master" (1999), to being a dog in "Every Dog Has Its Date" (2001) to finally an award-winning performance in "Beast Stalker" (2008) where he is finally taken seriously, but ends up in a Wong Jing movie again with prosthetic teeth and playing second fiddle to Nicholas Tse.

The good thing about "Treasure Inn" is that it still has that Wong Jing's comedy of the 90s feel to it - two small fries trying to make a name (1996's "Forbidden City Cop") and get framed for it in which they run to investigate it for themselves (1994's "Hail The Judge"). It is still a crowd-pleaser and has Wong Jing style stamped all over it.

The problem? It is not a serious movie and yet the comedy is not really there. When audiences are ready to laugh all the way, it was cut short with David Tong or Nicholas Tse's character that suddenly got all philosophical. When it tries to be crass and nonsensical, suddenly the element of romance takes over. When the audience tries to take the action seriously, suddenly it tries to be funny. There are a lot of long awkward pauses where one actor stops talking and everybody is standing still not knowing what to do.

Acting-wise, Nicholas Tse may be a good actor, but the guy does not have the same poker face that is funny and serious simultaneously - achievable by actors in the likes of Tony Leung (Chi Wai, not Kar Fai), Takeshi Kaneshiro and Stephen Chow. The action scene is a jumble of confusion that plays a lot with CGI effects which Stephen Chow has done in "Kungfu Hustle".

Wong Jing used to be called a King of Crappy Movies, but at least they are original - crass, crude yet loveable and filled with laugh-out-loud moments. Now they are mild, pretentious, only inviting timid laughter and nothing else.

Cinema Online, 05 July 2011