Mr. Vampire II hit theatres in 1986, but Ricky Lau’s version of the movie this time was completly different than the first. Ricky bringsthis movie to modern day Hong Kong and introduces Yuen Biao to the series probably because Chin Siu Ho isn’t in this one.
Lam Ching Ying of course is back in his role of the Toast Priest (No one does it better),and Moon Lee is also back to bring a bit of glamour to the movie. It starts when a family of vampires which includes a father,mother and son are revived by a archeologist played by (Chung Fa). But the boy is seperated from his parents and finds himself living with a young girl and her family (Shes keeping the vampire a secret). The other 2 vampires are still on the loose so A taost Priest and a news photographer decide to join forces and stop the vampires before anyone is hurt.
There is a brilliant and funny scene which happens when yuen biaos character tries to bring down the vampires by himself in a locked room and see’s two bottles called – wait for it…. (Retarder) which when it is dropped or sniffed it slows everything down,including peoples movement. It is played out with the actors actually talking and moving in slow motion for the shot,so the camera itself doesnt slow it down. Good acting.
Another scene which sticks out is when the two adult vampires are stuck in the back of a lorry which lam ching ying is driving. When there suddenly stopped and searched by the police, the vampires try to escape so they set fire to the truck causing them to jump out the top of the lorry and hope along the cars stuck in traffic. great scene.
In the finale we see lam and biao take on the vampies, being thrown through windows and glass tables but we dont really see the likes of yuen biao struct his stuff and show us what he can really do. Sammo hung was back in to produce the movie and also chroeograph the fight scenes, but overall its a decent movie but nowhere near the standard of the original.
[Rating:7/10]
