Mad Mission (1982)

Aces Go Places is—not that the credits will ever tell you—a remake of the Dick Emery film Get Charlie Tully. The storyline is identical, but the characters are distinctly Chinese.

King Kong (Sam Hui) is a Simon Templar-like thief, known for pulling off a major jewel heist in Hong Kong. The Royal Hong Kong Police are stumped and decide to enlist overseas help from a shortlist which includes Inspector Clouseau—but realizing that actor Peter Sellers is now dead (an interesting use of in-jokes mixing reality with the film world), they turn to their next choice, American-based Albert Au (Karl Maka), the 'Bald Detective' (the literal translation of the series Kojak in Cantonese). Sylvia Chang plays a police superintendent who Au falls for.

Apart from some changes to the story, and action sequences which arguably inspired Jackie Chan, Sammo Hung and other film stars, it is Get Charlie Tully from there. Without revealing too much, the clues are identical; even certain gags.

It doesn't mean to say this is a poor version of Get Charlie Tully. It has been cleverly changed to Chinese tastes, and the movie is still funny 18 years on. Arguably, the Hong Kong writers have created something even funnier than the Emery movie through a careful use of puns and metaphors. The pace and timing remain an odd, if hilarious, mixture of British and Chinese.

It was, after all, successful enough for four more sequels through the 1980s, although after this outing, the Emery connection ended and Maka and company went for more - for want of a better term - originality.