Ma Sze-Tsang

Though her marriage with rich businessman Chan Hak-lit is crumbling, Anna Poon refuses to accept her childhood sweetheart Wong Kei-shu's courtship. Anna's younger sister Mei-na has a crush on Shu and treats Lee Man coldly. When she sees Anna being with Shu, she taunts Anna with stealing who she likes. Anna is hurt and goes back to Chan's house. Chan holds a house party and invites business celebrities. Shu attends it and when tells Anna he loves her when they dance. Anna rejects him and tells him never to see her again. Chan goes to the racecourse. When Shu falls down from a horse, Anna faints. Chan asks Anna what her relationship with Shu is. He warns her not to have any wrongdoing and ruin his reputation. Shu is fine and asks Anna to meet for the last time. Anna cannot turn down him and goes to meets him. Lit miscomprehends the situation and files a divorce. He even forbids Anna to see their daughter. A distressed Anna becomes a victim of love in a conservative society.

Reporter Yu Mong-yuen is recovering from a leg injury in his fiancee Man-wah's apartment. Bored, he looks out the rear window and observes the life of the neighbouring building. Among the tenants are a sugar-daddy and his mistress, a middle-aged man wants to marry a young girl, but she is in love with his son. Finally, she hatches a plot and makes the man agree to her marrying his son ; a sly fortune-teller ; a lively gym, a rich widow quarrels with the trainer of a gymnasium because his dog has bitten her cat ; and an opera school, a woman signs, leaning on the balcony, and a man tries to strangle her. In fact they are rehearsing an opera…… One evening, Wah is on the night shift, and Yuen watches the opera troupe rehearse to the end. Under the influence of drugs, Yu mistakenly believes that a divorced man has murdered a taxi dancer. He alerts the police, but the whole thing is nothing more than a misunderstanding.

Reporter Yu Mong-yuen is recovering from a leg injury in his fiancee Man-wah's apartment. Bored, he looks out the rear window and observes the life of the neighbouring building. Among the tenants are a sugar-daddy and his mistress, a middle-aged man wants to marry a young girl, but she is in love with his son. Finally, she hatches a plot and makes the man agree to her marrying his son ; a sly fortune-teller ; a lively gym, a rich widow quarrels with the trainer of a gymnasium because his dog has bitten her cat ; and an opera school, a woman signs, leaning on the balcony, and a man tries to strangle her. In fact they are rehearsing an opera…… One evening, Wah is on the night shift, and Yuen watches the opera troupe rehearse to the end. Under the influence of drugs, Yu mistakenly believes that a divorced man has murdered a taxi dancer. He alerts the police, but the whole thing is nothing more than a misunderstanding.

An opera troupe has to dissolve in view of the poor economy. Comedian star Sang Kwai-lei loses his job and he has no alternative but to play the lion character in the opera troupe of his former junior apprentice Chan Hau and pawn his stage costume. He aims at earning enough money to support the final year's secondary school studies of his elder son Chi-kuen. Kuen however refuses to continue his studies, seeing that his father has to put aside his dignity to earn money and his mother is worried. Lei is enraged and uses the money to support his younger son Chi-wai's studies. Again, Lei loses his job and he resorts to giving street performances, his wife takes up sowing work in her spare time and she dies after a long illness. Kuen works to support himself through school, but Wai is less fortunate, he is forced to enrol in an opera troupe as an apprentice. Years later, the dying father joyfully embraces Chi-kuen's return from his studies.

Drama from Hong Kong directed by Lee Tit.

Drama from Hong Kong directed by Chu Kei.

This rare gem features the extraordinary stellar cast of two comedy giants on the same screen and the two Ma's (Ma Si-tsang and Sun Ma Si-tsang) performing together. Leung Sing-por as the wealth-feigning Au and Ma Si-tsang as penny pincher Ma already set the stage for laughter. Ma Si-tsang dons a hilarious moustache and adds panache to the character whenever he complacently twists his moustache, making his greediness almost lovable. The film features a zany plot 'twist' when the two Ma's, as father and son, try to attend a charity gala by having Sun Ma Si-tsang teach Ma Si-tsang to sing ‘Yu Hap-wan Expresses His Inner Feelings', one of the elder Ma's most popular repertoire. Ma Si-tsang gives a commanding seven-minute solo performance that captures the heart of the audience now and forever.

The rapier wit is not only for playful bantering between a couple but also for fighting justice. Famed attorney Sung Sai-kit (Ma Si-tsang) is best known for his sharp pen and silver tongue. His wife Madam Tong (Hung Sin Nui), sympathetic with a wronged widow, tries every trick up her sleeve to get her husband to help. Ma is funny and lovable who morphs from the henpecked husband to the brilliant and shrewd attorney at court, he displays perseverance behind his devil-may-care and nonchalant attitude, even Stephen Chow reincarnated his persona in the 1992 version.

The rapier wit is not only for playful bantering between a couple but also for fighting justice. Famed attorney Sung Sai-kit (Ma Si-tsang) is best known for his sharp pen and silver tongue. His wife Madam Tong (Hung Sin Nui), sympathetic with a wronged widow, tries every trick up her sleeve to get her husband to help. Ma is funny and lovable who morphs from the henpecked husband to the brilliant and shrewd attorney at court, he displays perseverance behind his devil-may-care and nonchalant attitude, even Stephen Chow reincarnated his persona in the 1992 version.

Ma Si-tsang is memorable in his comedic roles for being lively and down to earth, making a stark contrast with the tough and feisty Hung Sin Nui, and they strike gold as a team in screwball comedies. Ma is psychologist Doctor Tsui while Hung is Pearl, the feisty third daughter who is hard to get along with. The undaunted Tsui sees the virtues in Pearl and teases her to teach lessons on marital harmony. With multiple schemes, Tsui teases, coaxes and has Pearl taste her own medicine. The battle of wits and the sexes becomes a joy to watch with Ma's complacent and roguish portrayal as a refined witty scholar clashing with the energetic and bickering Hung.

The film is divided into seven episodes, each episode directed by a different director. The film was selected as one of the top hundred Chinese films by film historian Du Yunzhi (HKFA).

Hong Kong drama.

An adaptation of Heinrich Mann's novel Professor Unrat.