PaPa Loves You

Straight-up Hong Kong comedy isn't really Yau's strong point. All the elements were here to turn this into fun little genre filler, but the somewhat aimless direction and poor balance of genre elements makes this is a needlessly confusing and ultimately uninteresting film. Maybe not too surprising, as it was made in one of Yau's lesser periods.

Ying is a single parent who struggles to raise his teen daughter Ellen. She doesn't respect her dad no matter what he tries. Things get worse for Ying when he swaps bodies with a famous gangster. He turns out to be way more popular with Ellen and her classmates, while Ying gets a couple of vengeful criminals on his tail.

With actors like Tony Leung, Charlene Choi and Eric Tsang around, it should've been possible to turn this into a funny comedy, but the jokes are lame, the actors underperform, the added crime and drama elements feel out of place and the styling is cheap and uninviting. This is one for Yau completists only, one of the lesser films in his oeuvre.