The endearing, deadpan performance of 86-year-old Tsai Chin (The Joy Luck Club) as Grandma Wong makes this darkly comic and goofy film an entertaining visit to the Big Screen.
Set in New York’s Chinatown recently widowed 80 year old Grandma Wong – whose husband left her penniless after a life of hard work, goes to a fortune teller who foretells that her reward is coming with a lucky day on October 28th.
Grandma’s upper middleclass son (Eddie Yu) has been trying to persuade her to move from her grim little apartment to his rather elegant home where she would lose her independence – and save him a double rent.
Armed with the information from Lei Lei (Wai Ching Ho) she empties her savings account and takes a bus trip to a casino where she has astonishing luck, doubling her stakes with each bet and winning thousands – until her last bet.
On the bus ride home, the man sitting next to her dies. She finds he has a bag full of money, which she appropriates. It turns out that the money was being carried by a gangland accountant. This leads to two goons called Pock-Mark (Woody Fu) and Little Handsome (Michael Tow), members of the Red Dragons gang turning up in her apartment.
Determined to keep the money she goes to Zhongliang, a rival gang, and hires a very large, discounted -after-bargaining, bodyguard called Big Pong (Hsiao-Yuad Ha), whose ambition is to run a healthcare app with his sister.. The diminutive old lady and the giant minder make an oddball couple.
This leads to gang warfare in which quite a lot of gangsters get shot.
This is the first feature film from director Susie Sealy, who wrote the screen play with Angela Cheng. The standout musical score is by Andrew Orkins.
A sweet, amusing film with absurd twists and an effortlessly funny performance from Tsai Chin. And a reminder to never underestimate the determination and independence of elderly women!
87 minutes.
English, Cantonese and Mandarin languages.
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Watch the trailer…
