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CJ7  Hot
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Written by Bob Ham   
Tuesday, 29 July 2008


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CJ7

Grade

Content Grade: B-
Sound Grade: B+
Extras Grade: B-
Picture Grade: A-

Specs

Studio/Label: Sony Pictures
Studio/Label Website: http://SonyPictures.com
Aspect Ratio: 2.40:1
Sound Options and Formats: Dolby Digital 5.1
Disc Length: 88 Minutes

Review

No one could ever call Stephen Chow a subtle director. Over the course of his lengthy career as a writer-director-star of a series of increasingly over the top martial arts action/comedy hybrids, Chow fills the screen with loud braying, outlandish fight scenes and hyperkinetic action that defies every law of physics. That may sum up a lot of modern Hong Kong action films, but Chow infuses them with Three Stooges-like slapstick and bits of Westernized melodrama that often run at odds with the sequences that proceeded it.

 This penchant for sentimentality has never fit better with one of his films than it does with this very obvious nod to the work of another Steven, in this case, a certain Mr. Spielberg and his blockbuster film about a boy and his alien. The alien in Chow's world is a sort of extraterrestrial dog with the power to fix things that are broken. The young boy, named Dicky, comes into possession of the newly rechristened CJ7 thanks to his down-on-his-luck father, who finds the creature in its pupal form while foraging in a dump looking for "new" gym shoes for his son.

It is from this point that the film works to both pay tribute to and mock the thematic conventions of E.T. and the many copycat films that were made in the wake of its success. One particularly sharp sequence shows CJ7 solving all of Dicky's problems in school – poor grades, bullies, etc. – only to have the entire series of scenes turn out to be a dream sequence.

The rest of the film, though, sticks to the formula, using the alien creature's existence as a spark to change the relationships between the boy and his father, the boy and his friends, etc. It doesn't hurt the film at all, but considering the uneven tone of the finished product, it might have made better cinematic sense to either turn it into a complete parody or a even more treacly tribute.

 


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Picture and Sound

A crisp, lively picture that brings out a lot of subtleties with reds, greens, and blacks. The sound is mixed a tad on the hot side, threatening to overwhelm during some of the more overly orchestral moments of the soundtrack.

Extras

Feature-length audio commentary from director Stephen Chow, actors Chi Gung Lam and Shing-Cheung Lee, and writers Lam Fung and Kan-Cheung Tsang

The Story of 'CJ7'

CJ7: Mission Control game

'CJ7' T.V. Special

Anatomy of a Scene

How to Bully a Bully

How to Make a Lollipop

'CJ7' Profiles
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