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Acting
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Directing
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Story
Starring: Zhang Ziyi, Leehom Wang, Ryan Zheng
Director: Dennie Gordon
Running Time: 113 mins
My Lucky Star is a Chinese film about a woman who, upon winning the holiday of a lifetime to Singapore, finds herself whisked away by the handsome spy from her dreams, only to find that she must now really fight to save the world.
Imagine giving an 11 year old girl $8 million to make a film about anything she wanted. You’ve got My Lucky Star. This is a completely ridiculous and idiotic romantic comedy action spy film, with relatively average performances and not great comedy. However, it’s just so fluffy and harmless, and has that childlike sense of fun that I ultimately really enjoyed it.
Of course, I can recognise that this isn’t a good film, but if I didn’t have as much fun with the madness of it all as I did, my rating would be way lower. Sometimes, it’s nice to watch a film with no brains, and just enjoy a completely ridiculous story that’s neither particularly funny nor particularly exciting, but is so light-hearted that it’s impossible not to love.
That’s why it just feels like it’s all made by an eleven year old. I’m not saying that it’s a poorly-made movie, far from it, considering that Dennie Gordon’s direction is actually pretty good at showing off the glitz of some of East Asia’s most glamorous destinations, and also manages to spoof the spy genre pretty well, it’s just the fact that everything is so stupid that makes this seem almost like a kids’ movie.
I could compare it to something like Carry On, given that there are some silly double entendres thrown in here and there, but that would be overestimating the comedic intelligence of this film. In reality, I don’t think that I was meant to be laughing at absolutely everything that happened, even Zhang Ziyi’s mad performance as Sophie, a woman who appeared to be a legitimate idiot.
The odd thing is that Zhang Ziyi, a fantastic actress famed for great dramatic performances, isn’t all that great here. She doesn’t have the best script to work with, admittedly, but she really comes across more as stupid than a fun-loving person on screen, which wasn’t exactly what the film makers were going for.
In the end, I can only describe my view of My Lucky Star as a guilty pleasure. I know it’s awful, and completely stupid, but it was just so light-hearted and crazy that I couldn’t help but have a blast, and that’s why it gets a 6.2 overall.
