The Haunted Copshop

Meng gui cha guan

Hong Kong

1987

87 Min

Color

Cantonese

Currently 3.2/5 Stars.
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CAST Jacky Cheung, Fat Chung, Chan Ga-Chai, Fung Woo, Billy Lau, Ricky Hui

Much-hated police chief Shun (Woo Fung) receives a visit one day from an ex-officer, who is now a monk. He has come to worn his former boss that the station (which used to be a bar and the site where a group of Japanese soldiers committed suicide at the end of World War II) will soon be overrun by the undead during the upcoming Festival of Hungry Ghosts, unless precautions are taken, a threat Shun doesn’t take seriously. Later that evening, bumbling cops Macky Kim (Jacky Cheung Hok-yau) and Chiu Man (Ricky Hui Koon-ying) have fun tormenting thief Sneaky Ming (Billy Lau Nam-kwong), whom they get to confess in a novel fashion. Locked away in his cell for the night, Ming finds himself invited out to a ritzy bar and a round of mahjong.
What he doesn’t realize is that his three opponents are spirits and he has inadvertently wagered his life. Vampirized by their leader, General Issey (a bloodsucker of the Western variety, sporting the requisite Bela Lugosi-style cape), Ming tries to make Macky and Chiu believe that he is no longer of this earth but the two remain unconvinced — until Ming gets hit with a ray of sunshine and promptly disintegrates into a pile of ashes. This, however, is just a taste of what the partners and their new female boss have in store for them, as Issey is such a powerful foe, even Taoist master ghost fighter Chung Fat-pak (Chung Fat) cannot contain him. —anonymous

Director

Jeffrey Lau

Jeff Lau is one of the most successful directors in Hong Kong. He is best known for writing, directing and producing Hong Kong style comedy.

He had studied graphic design in the U.K., then returned to Hong Kong and worked in advertising. He co-founded the film companies Century Films and Wu Zhou Century Films with director Dennis Yu in 1980, and the duo produced various classics during the New Wave Cinema era.

With the support of actor-producer Alan Tang, Lau got his directorial debut with The Haunted Cop Shop, which showcased his distinctive style in supernatural comedies. The genre, along with its vampire and horror counterparts, soon became prominent in Hong Kong Cinema.

The renowned producer Wu Szu-yuan recognized Lau’s talents and invited him to develop All For The Winner with Corey Yuen in 1990. The film became one of the top-grossing films in Hong Kong Cinema and sent its leading man Stephen Chow on his way to stardom.

In 1992, under his pseudonym… read more