Writer: Casey Chong

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Watch this if you liked: “Ah Beng The Movie: Three Wishes”.

Back in 2010 and 2012, popular My FM deejay Jack Lim has scored a double jackpot with "Woohoo!" and "Ah Beng The Movie: Three Wishes" - two hugely successful Malaysian-Chinese movies that turned his iconic Ah Beng character into a household name amongst the Malaysian-Chinese community in the local cinema industry.

In "Ah Beng: Mission Impossible", security guard Ah Beng (Jack Lim) is asked by his superior to cancel his Chinese New Year holiday for a 'simple' mission that promises him a lucrative RM1 million reward.

Naturally, Ah Beng accepts the mission and brings along his best friend, Ah Hien (Jeff Chin) to Korea to meet an old couple (Remon Lim and Albert Nico). To secure the RM1 million reward, Ah Beng is required to impersonate a professional bodyguard Mark Ma (which is coincidentally looks identical like Ah Beng himself) and gets close to Mark's sexy young sister, Maggie (Yumi Wong) for the RM500 million worth of fortune.

The premise does sound promising, but the screenwriters fail to make full use of its potential. For instance, they could have played around with the "mistaken identity" angle related to Ah Beng and Mark Ma because of their identical resemblance. Instead they opted to jumble up the plot together in a series of comic vignettes rather than blended the whole story together into a cohesive whole.
Despite the disjointed plot, there are some worthwhile hilarious moments throughout the movie. Among them is the parody scene that pokes fun on John Woo's movie (the infamous white pigeon and the slow-motion shootout with two pistols) and another laugh-out-loud moment where one of the characters able to guess correctly what the kidnapper would say on the phone whenever there's a ransom involved.
Director Silver does a fairly acceptable job here, but there's a glaring problem the way he handles subplot that sometimes steers off the main course of the movie. The most obvious one is the unnecessary long-winded finale involving the conflicted relationship between Ah Beng and Ham Yu Lian (Chen Keat Yoke). No doubt that particular ending drags the overall momentum of the movie.

Cast-wise, Jack Lim is reasonably funny as the simple-minded Ah Beng. But this reviewer particularly enjoyed Jeff Chin's performance better. As Ah Hien, he's especially amusing to watch for whenever he feels annoyed on certain situations and tends to give sarcastic remark. The rest of the supporting actors are equally satisfying, while newcomer Yumi Wong, a Pahang-born model making her feature acting debut, gives a so-so performance as Maggie.

As a Chinese New Year movie blockbuster, "Ah Beng: Mission Impossible" is worthy for a few good laughs here and there as long as you keep your expectation low. But then again it's a safe bet that most die-fans of the My FM deejays will enjoy this comedy nonetheless.


Cinema Online, 20 January 2014