Director – Teddy Chan, Screenplay – Kai-Chi Yuen, Hing-Ka Chan & Kin Chung Chan, Photography – Ardy Lam, Music – Chin-Yung Shing. Production Company – People’s Productions Limited/Golden Harvest.
Tony Ka Fai Leung (Tony), Rosamund Kwan (Chia Chia), Ellen Chan (Ellen), Bei-Dak Lai (Peter Li), Fung Woo (Lawrence Chia), Hon Leung Yip (Mr Yeh), Siu-Wai Mui (Michael), Siu-Wai Mui (Hui Mei), Tin-Long Lee (Mr Yeh’s Wife)
The architect Tony has a fall while on a building site. He starts to travels into the afterlife before a ghost girl Chia Chia appears and guides him back to where his body lies in hospital. Tony wakes up but because he has expelled some of his breath into Chia Chia’s body she is bound to him and he can see her. As he returns to work, her appearances cause mischief. At the same time, Tony tries to pursue Ellen, the co-worker upon which he has had a long time romantic crush. Chia Chia tries to aid him but ends up causing chaos.
The 1980s saw a series of wave of comedies on ghostly themes emerge from Hong Kong. The way was presaged by hits such as The Happy Ghost (1984), Mr Vampire (1985), A Chinese Ghost Story (1987) and The Haunted Cop Shop (1987), all of which led to assorted sequels and quite a number of copies. (See Hong Kong Cinema).
Most of these films have a strong slapstick comedy element. Pretty Ghost is one example where the slapstick is allowed to go into orbit. This become evident from the opening scenes in the rondeau that goes on at the office as Tony Leung Ka-fai attempts to get some flowers to give to Ellen Chan, the girl of his dreams. And especially so the scenes at the building site with Tony Leung Ka-fai encountering the ghosts, including a malevolent presence that never has any subsequent relevance to the film. This scene involves him being tossed around before he traps ghost girl Rosamund Kwan inside a photocopier and then wields a vacuum cleaner to suck the malevolent ghost up before placing the bag from the cleaner inside the microwave and blowing it (and the site office) up.
There is soon an immense silliness to what goes on on screen. Like the scenes with the boss (Hon Leng Yip) and the others spinning a tiny plate that he claims to be inhabited by a spirit around on his desk, or the boss taking Siu-Wai Mui, the secretary he is having an affair with, into a bathroom cubicle to make out while the invisible Rosamund Kwan has Tony Leung Ka-fai hanging in the air directly above their heads. Elsewhere we have underwater breathing competitions at a swimming pool, while Siu-Wai Mui and the boss’s wife (Tin-Long Lee) let their jealousies play out over a slapstick game of ping pong.
In later scenes, the ghost girl’s father (Fung Woo) manifests and gives the best friend (Bei-Dak Lai) possibly some of the worst romantic advice ever to woo Siu-Wai Mui – for him to play at being pathetic. (Apparently it works for we see the two get married in the final scene of the film). There are also slapstick just desserts for Siu-Wai Mui as the romantic rival for Ellen Chan’s affection where ghost girl Rosamund Kwan cuts out the bottom of the wine bottle he is drinking from and pours more in, causing him to become drunk. Not to mention a climax that involves Tony Leung Ka-fai being sympathetically affected by Rosamund Kwan as she watches a tv comedy and he starts bursting into laughter as Ellen Chan tries to tell a sad story, or of Bei-Dak Lai trying to run around the apartment catching ghosts in balloons.
Trailer here (no English subs)