“All U Need is Love” Teaser Poster
Director: Vincent Kok
Cast: Louis Koo, Tony Leung, Eric Tsang, Francis Ng, Gordon Lam, Philip Keung, Julian Cheung, Louis Cheung, Fiona Sit, Alex Fong, Cecilia So, Cheung Tat-ming, Michael Hui, Chin Kar-lok, Jackie Chan, Yuen Qiu
Running Time: 102 min.
By Paul Bramhall
If there are 2 movies that show the differences between Mainland China and Hong Kong cinema, then it has to be Chinese Doctors and All U Need is Love. Both came out in 2021, and both put the COVID-19 pandemic front and centre, but that’s where the similarities end. While one is a stirring straight faced story of medical heroics on the front line, the other is a light-hearted comedy involving an ensemble of characters quarantined in a luxury hotel. While one may look to pluck on the heart strings, the other is more concerned with jokes about cleavage and being gay. What both productions were likely banking on was that the pandemic would be in its final stages, or perhaps even over, by the time of their release. The expectation being that audiences could kick back, knowing that whatever’s onscreen is no longer the reality that awaits them beyond the cinema doors. As the expression goes – best laid plans.
Essentially a charity production created to raise funds for out-of-work members of the Hong Kong filmmaking community, All U Need is Love features what may well be every Hong Kong actor who’s currently active onscreen in some capacity, all of whom agreed to appear for free. Much like 1992’s The Twin Dragons was created to raise funds for the Hong Kong Director’s Guild, and featured cameos from a who’s who of HK cinema at the time, so All U Need is Love provides a similar star spotting experience for fans of the territories output old and new. In the directors’ chair is Vincent Kok, his first time helming a movie since 2018’s Keep Calm and Be a Superstar, and a frequent supporting actor himself since the late 80’s (although here he stays behind the camera).
Kicking off with an exhilarating action sequence set in Kai Tak Cruise Terminal, an arriving passenger played by Alex Fong (Kung Fu Cyborg: Metallic Attraction, Legendary Assassin) is eyed suspiciously by numerous masked men decked out in black suits. When they fail to seize him after going through immigration, a high energy chase breaks out encompassing 80’s style stunts, and a seemingly re-generating number of men in suits. Eventually Fong is captured and finds himself in the back of a medical van – his captors explain he may have been in contact with a COVID-19 case, and he has to self-isolate for 2 weeks. This opening sequence is as good as All U Need is Love gets, as the remaining 90 minutes settles into a series of loosely connected comedic vignettes that frequently struggle to find a worthy punchline. Only brief moments of mild amusement serve to do their part in maintaining a sense of misguided hope things may get better.
There’s a feeling of guilt associated to being too hard on a production created to make money for those in the already struggling HK film industry, now exasperated even more by the pandemic, however there’s a distinct feeling that with just a little more care All U Need is Love could have at least been passable fun. The concept revolves around the ensemble cast being caught in a snap lockdown, which sees them facing the next 14 days quarantined in the Grande Hotel. Amongst the guests there’s a pair of rival gangsters, played by Julian Cheung and Louis Cheung, a pair of elderly men looking to have some fun away from their wives, played by HK legends Tony Leung Ka-Fai and Eric Tsang (clearly reprising their characters from 2003’s Men Suddenly in Black), and a bride and groom to-be played by Luk Wing-Kuen and Cecilia So.
There are various other characters thrown into the mix – the hotel owner, played by the iconic Michael Hui (who’s clearly having fun), spends the entire time attempting to escape with disastrous results. The hotel manager, played by Carlos Chan, finds himself becoming closer to a recently fired co-worker and single mother whose daughter (who I admittedly spent 90% of the runtime thinking was a son) wants to find the “perfect father” for a school assignment, in a vague sub-plot that feels decidedly nonprogressive. As a director Kok has worked on ensemble pieces more than once with the likes of All’s Well Ends Well 2009 and Hello Babies, and has even staged them in a hotel setting before thanks to 2013’s Hotel Deluxe, so he clearly knows the ropes, perhaps indicating that the challenge here was time.
The COVID-19 jokes wear thin quickly, with classic HK gangster tropes like the arms deal revealed to be for handheld temperature checkers, and a sequence involving Julian Cheung and Louis Cheung strutting down a corridor avoiding multiple hotel staff trying to take their temperature. Perhaps such sequences will become funnier once we’re fully out of the pandemic, but it’s debatable. Most surprising is the appearance of Jackie Chan, who’s long fallen out of favour on Hong Kong shores, and hasn’t been seen in a local production since 2012’s CZ12, almost 10 years ago! Chan plays a member of the Pandemic Task Force, and foils one of Michael Hui’s escape attempts by fighting it out with Ken Lo set to the Police Story theme. Sounds like it could be worth checking out just to see the pair exchange blows? Don’t get your hopes up, it consists of a single punch and is over in less than 10 seconds, which is basically Chan’s total screen time.
The succeeding discussion that takes place though, that has Mui complaining to Chan that the glass Lo (or more specifically his stunt double) ends up smashing through is Venetian Blown and ridiculously expensive hits the right comedic note. It’s the kind of scene that I wish All U Need is Love had more of. Hat’s off to Kok though for managing to bring Chan onboard, as he’s clearly a fan, having directed Chan himself in 1999’s Gorgeous, and put the Police Story theme to good use in Keep Calm and Be a Superstar. It’s just a shame that Sammo Hung and Yuen Biao are both missing in action, as it’s unlikely we’ll be seeing Chan in another Hong Kong production anytime soon.
For those looking for glimpses of Hong Kong’s brighter days, a door knocking activity in the hotel manages to raise a smile, as one of the guests is played by a cameoing Yuen Qiu decked out in her landlady threads from Kung Fu Hustle. Michael Ning also shows up to riff on his character from Port of Call, a visual gag that I’m still not sure really worked considering how horrific the acts committed by his character are in the 2015 thriller. The biggest problem with All U Need is Love though is its indiscriminate approach to placing scenes of juvenile humour (I really don’t need to see Julian Cheung and Louis Cheung singing and dancing to ‘Baby Shark’ ever again) next to scenes practically overflowing with sentimentality. Sure tonal shifts are a mainstay of HK action cinema’s golden age, but here they don’t work, with jokes that are too frequently not that funny, and emotional scenarios with characters we hardly know being completely unearned.
In-between the comedy and sentimentality there are sometimes bizarre scenes which are completely standalone, and don’t appear to be connected to anything else, almost as if whichever direction they were intended to go was abandoned, but the decision was made to keep what had been filmed in there anyway. Louis Koo plays some kind of Pandemic Special Agent keeping suspected close contacts in a giant glass bubble (who include Gordon Lam) in a handful of scenes which I’m still scratching my head over. Of course none of this matters in the end, as all the plot threads come together for a predictable happy ending, including the punchline of Miu’s constant escape attempts of course ending up in him contracting COVID-19 (another one of those scenes that would probably be funnier if the pandemic wasn’t ongoing).
In the end I’m glad I purchased All U Need is Love because I’m all for supporting HK film and those who work in it, and as a way to raise funds slapping together a quick movie with a whole bunch of familiar HK faces undeniably makes a lot of business sense. Was it too much to ask for the movie to actually be good? Perhaps the answer is that it doesn’t matter. To go back to my earlier comment, there’s a feeling of guilt attached to panning what’s ultimately for a good cause, but at the same time, it also can’t be denied that All U Need is Love is guilty of being a poor attempt at entertainment.
Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 3/10
