Spooky and Kooky
Despite the name of the creature, it’s a surprise that there was never a Chinese remake of Gremlins. There is a Cantonese saying (“mō gwái tok sai”) which translates to demon carrying the world. This means to have phenomenal talent. I would have liked to have seen an `80s Chinese remake of Demons that was either modern or historical. In terms of film stock and music, there’s an atmosphere that you get from an `80s film that you couldn’t get now…so my wish will go unfulfilled. My wish may seem peculiar but there were `80s attempts to remake Mr. Vampire in English. Besides the cancelled remake starring Yuen Wah in 1988 (Demon Hunters), there was a U.S. 1989 film called The Jitters.
Many years later, there was an attempt to do a Hong Kong take on Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Titled The Twins Effect, it was choreographed by Donnie Yen and featured a protracted cameo by Jackie Chan. Because the two stars were female pop singers, I’m reminded of a Cantonese saying: a vampire’s tea bag. This describes a tampon. Hong Kong stuntman Lam Hak-Ming worked as an assistant director on Mr. Vampire Saga Four (1988) and Mr. Vampire 1992. Lam Hak-Ming’s name is reminiscent of a Cantonese term which goes hāk mihn sàhn. This translates to black-faced god, and it describes a man with an angry face. This term is usually attributed to another director whose hereditary name is Lam i.e. Ringo Lam Ling-Tung.
Back in the late eighties, it was popular in Hollywood to do body swap comedies but this trend never really caught on in Hong Kong despite there being Cantonese sayings which fit the bill i.e. old man spirit describes a precocious child whereas loose string monkey describes a child who is no longer under the control of their guardian or superior in general. “The brain does not fit the body” describes an immature adult. “Young boy in dad’s world” means that a grown-up child should make their own decisions. This latter term can also be meant facetiously when a parent wants to teach responsibility to their child. Given the number of remakes and rip-offs that have abounded in Hong Kong, a riff on Chucky would have fit in rather nicely given that there is a Chinese ceremony which can be done for either someone returning from prison or a new born baby. The special someone is carried over or steps over a basin with burning spells written on strips of yellow paper since it is meant to be a purification ceremony.
There is a Cantonese term which translates to ghost drawing charm. Instead of describing a ghostwriter, it describes someone who has illegible handwriting. Speaking of hands, a Ouija board is called a hand fairy. Sammo Hung starred in a movie where his hand was possessed. Titled Encounters of the Spooky Kind, it brings to mind other Cantonese sayings. Monkey spirit means a naughty person. Fox spirit means a seductress, especially a promiscuous woman. Inducing a ghost to eat bean curd can mean luring someone into a trap or it can be a way to express disbelief. Then there are two sayings about bad luck: encountering an evil spirit and the poorer one is, the more ghosts one sees.
I wish that Sammo Hung had worked with Tom Savini for both Encounters of the Spooky Kind (1980) and The Dead and the Deadly (1982). In 1982, Tom Savini met Jackie Chan in Hong Kong while Tom was working on a Hong Kong movie called Till Death Do We Scare. Sammo had already been pushing for a horror element in Kung Fu movies as far back as The Victim (the vampire scene) and even The Magnificent Butcher (the Mausoleum scene). The Dead and the Deadly brings to mind some Cantonese sayings: dead ghost replacement (a scapegoat), escorting someone through the gate of the spirit world (killing someone) and enemy ghost (either a stalker or the ghost of a person who was unjustly killed).
The Iron-Fisted Monk is an earlier Kung Fu movie by Sammo Hung which brings to mind a Cantonese term: a murmuring fee. This can be either a fee given to a monk or one given to a nightclub hostess in order to have sex with her. In Sammo’s movie, a monk is rather self-conscious about going inside a brothel. In Hong Kong culture, a gossip can be called a Taoist mirror. In Encounters of the Spooky Kind, there is a scene involving Sammo’s character being attacked by a woman who appears in a mirror. It’s fairly noteworthy that it was only after Sammo’s movie that Sam Raimi got Bruce Campbell to pretend that his hand was possessed in Evil Dead 2. In Hong Kong, a crazy person is thought of as acting like they’re possessed by a spirit. The Hong Kong version of the phrase “Speak of the devil” is: “By day don’t talk about people, by night don’t talk about ghosts.”
Fittingly, their version of “God knows” is ghost knows. Back to Sammo Hung, it took him a long time to do a supernatural Kung Fu movie because he didn’t want to be seen as cashing in on Lau Kar-Leung’s success in 1975 with The Spiritual Boxer. This movie was the first time that Lau had worked with someone from Sammo’s stunt team: Wilson Tong. Lau borrowed him to the point that Wilson had stopped working for Sammo. At a Hong Kong funeral, you’re supposed to offer money to the deceased to spend in the afterlife but no-one did that at Bruce Lee’s funeral. Sammo worked as a security guard for the event along with other Hong Kong stuntmen. Wilson, who appeared in Bruce’s Enter the Dragon, did not. In Cantonese culture, a coffin can either be called long life planks or four piece half. During his heyday, Sammo liked to play idiots, so it’s apt that an idiot can be admonished in Cantonese by saying: “You don’t know where to buy wood for a coffin.”
Like in The Magnificent Butcher, one of the key fight scenes in Encounters of the Spooky Kind takes place near a coffin. The nickname for Hong Kong’s Independent Commission Against Corruption is coffin shop. “To not cry until one sees the coffin” means to know no fear or to be in denial about something until it becomes apparent. A dead man’s lantern describes a situation where someone embellishes a figure whether it be exaggerating an income or inflating a statistic. It speaks to the spiritual mindset of Hong Kong society that a very rich person can be called a wealth god. Pretending to be rich is described as posing as a big head ghost. When you consider that the criminal underworld in Hong Kong is called rivers and lakes, it’s telling that “River ghost is promoted to city god” characterises someone who has undeservedly risen up in the world.
In 1990, Wong Jing remade Ghost but changed the tonal emphasis completely. He removed the drama, boosted up the comedy and added more action yet left in only a smidgeon of romance. The 1991-released remake, titled Money Maker, not only reflects the money-making madness of his gambling movies but it epitomizes the genre given that he created a movie which revolves around using Taoist magic to win at gambling. Unlike Ghost, there isn’t a horror element despite Wong Jing having proven to be successful in that regard over the decades. What would have been smarter would be to simultaneously remake Ghost and Ghost Dad (also 1990), but Jing always aims at the biggest of big bucks. Since money is often thought of as the difference between life and death, it’s common for someone in Hong Kong to say: “If you have money, you can make a ghost push a millstone.”
There is a 1980 Kung Fu comedy called Two on the Road which, while not being a horror movie or a supernatural one, brings to mind a Cantonese term: ghost horse. This means to be funny like a clown. In the movie, Phillip Ko’s style of Kung Fu is one which involves him acting like a horse. To masquerade as a ghost and as a horse means to concoct a plan which involves telling different lies to different people. Leung Kar-Yan’s character is a conman, which brings to mind two terms: ghost language (lies) and big cannon ghost (someone who is either a liar or a braggard). A person who is a complete failure in life can be described as someone who can’t be a good trickster even if they were a ghost. While the movie was not made by Sammo Hung, it’s reminiscent of a 1979 movie that he directed. Titled Knockabout, it’s also a Kung Fu comedy about conmen where the villain was originally played by Philip Ko before he was replaced by Lau Kar-Wing: the brother of the aforementioned Lau Kar-Leung and the man who directed the aformentioned Till Death Do We Scare.
Two decades ago when psychological horror thrillers from Japan became all the rage, there was a missed opportunity for Hong Kong film-makers to follow suit since there are Cantonese sayings which show potential. Wandering ghosts describes daydreamers. “Did you see a ghost?” can be used to express skepticism about a story that someone has told. This could easily be the basis for a Hong Kong ghost story about a lawyer or journalist. “Fearing a ghost at the bow and a robber at the stern” means being too cowardly to make a firm decision. This would be perfect for a ghost story about a judge or a juror. A fire ghost refers to a fireman. A ghost head son is a mole in an organization e.g. Infernal Affairs (surprisingly not a horror movie version of Internal Affairs). Someone who is in a rush can be described as acting as if they have seen a ghost. The two-faced nature of cops on and off duty is reminiscent of a saying which goes: “On meeting a human, one speaks human language, on meeting a ghost, one speaks ghost language.”
Even Hong Kong’s biggest movie star, Stephen Chow, had dropped the ball completely when it came to the world of supernatural comedy. At the height of his powers in 1993, he had the opportunity to do an X-rated comedy. When he finally got the chance to do a Category III Hong Kong movie, the result (Flirting Scholar) was anything but horror comedy. While Michael J. Fox came to terms with it on The Frighteners (1996) and Bruce Campbell had the knack for it for Army of Darkness (1992), Stephen didn’t really get to grips with horror comedy until Out of the Dark (1995). His style of comedy is affectionately known in Hong Kong as nonsense style. As such, it’s poetic that the Chinese over there often describe nonsense as ghost talk.
While the bible is a novel that’s used to instil fear into people about morality, superstitious folklore does the same thing for Hong Kong folk. Curses can scare them straight. One particular saying, beware of your last two years, reminds me of how Bruce Lee spent the last two years of his life in Hong Kong. The saying means may you pay for what have done. Another saying, the god of longevity hangs himself, also reminds me of Bruce. I’m not saying that he literally hung himself but he was definitely tempting fate. The most hurtful of spiritual sayings is “you’re the last of the line” since it’s a way of telling someone that they won’t have descendants. In third person, it can be a commandment where you tell someone (namely a hitman) to break up the ancestral hall. While Saint Peter is the gatekeeper for Heaven, the Chinese regard King Yama to be their gatekeeper since he was the god of death. That’s why they have a saying which goes: “Report to King Yan-Lo when you arrive.”
Other Cantonese terms to think about: A place that’s completely deserted is described as not even having the shadow of a ghost. “Having seen a ghost, one fears the dark” describes how a bad experience makes one cautious about going through a similar experience e.g. once bitten, twice shy. A horrible singer or music can be described as ghost sound, ghost spirit. “God is tied to him, ghost is tied to him” describes someone who oscillates between being in a good mood or a bad mood. “Urge life symbol” refers to a written Taoist spell which is supposed to hasten a person’s death. It’s slang for a person who is always pressing others to do something. “To position the door gods wrongly” means to snub someone since usually the door gods are positioned so that they face each other.
