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Edmund Lee

3.5/5 stars
A year after he earned much acclaim for the character-driven crime drama Rob N Roll, which won best screenplay honours in the Hong Kong Film Critics Society awards earlier this month, director Albert Mak Kai-kwong is back for another crack at the Lunar New Year box office with this unusually warm-hearted boxing drama.
While the tragicomic tale of midlife crisis in Rob N Roll represented a welcome change of pace from the plain silly offerings typical of this time of the year, Hit N Fun tells a bittersweet and at times almost philosophical story that again feels like it is striving to separate itself from all those Lunar New Year comedies.
When high-flying advertising executive Elsa (Louise Wong Dan-nei) first meets washed-up actress Carrie (Gigi Leung Wing-kei) at an audition for a menopause product commercial, the two don’t exactly start off on the right foot.


But their paths converge when Elsa accidentally discovers that her painter boyfriend, Daniel (Peter Chan Charm-man), has been dating Surewin (Chrissie Chau Sau-na), a Muay Thai champion in Macau and one of the disciples of Carrie’s husband, the martial arts master Bruce (Louis Koo Tin-lok).
Helpless in the face of his boxing gym’s declining popularity, Bruce has also been smarting from a bitter break-up with his top protégé Arnold (German Cheung Man-kit), who has set up a profitable gym business on his own and, to add insult to injury, enlisted Surewin as his star instructor.
Bruce’s quiet life ends when he reluctantly resumes his role as a professional trainer – first for the amateur Elsa, who has foolishly challenged Surewin to a proper fight in three months despite having no chance of winning it, and then for Carrie, who has received an unlikely offer to star in an action film.
Its few moments of slapstick humour aside, this is a largely sombre tale in which characters learn to accept their lot. Hit N Fun seems intent on forcing its protagonists to rethink their purpose – Elsa with her certain defeat against Surewin, Carrie with her advancing age and Bruce with his old-fashioned ways.

“What’s the point of persevering?” is a question that is repeatedly posed in Mak’s film, which carries a faint echo of the spirit of Johnnie To Kei-fung’s unclassifiable 2004 gem Throw Down, another film that stars Koo and doubles as a parable of Hong Kong at a time of major social and economic upheaval.
Fans of last year’s Twilight of the Warriors: Walled In should delight at the references to it in Mak’s film and appearances by many of its actors, from Koo and Cheung to Tony Wu Tsz-tung, Philip Ng Wan-lung, Lau Wai-ming (also known as Jozev Kiu Ching-fu) and Wong Wan-ching, who plays Bruce and Carrie’s young daughter.
Hit N Fun isn’t the hot-blooded sports drama about overcoming the odds that viewers might have expected, but there’s no denying this is a product of its time – and a rather engaging one at that.
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Albert Mak is back with bittersweet tale of a high-flyer, a washed-up actress and a failing gym boss forced to rethink their purpose in life


Albert Mak is back with bittersweet tale of a high-flyer, a washed-up actress and a failing gym boss forced to rethink their purpose in life.


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Review | Hit N Fun movie review: Rob N Roll director returns with warm-hearted boxing drama

Albert Mak is back with bittersweet tale of a high-flyer, a washed-up actress and a failing gym boss forced to rethink their purpose in life