Hua gui you xian gong si

This is a ghost comedy from Hong Kong that features groups of men and women taking lessons from Taoist masters in order to learn how to vanquish of bunch of poltergeists inhabiting a high-rise where they work.

The movie begins with several haunts by the demons of unsuspecting guests in the building. Then, the haunting takes you to a mansion where a couple of the film's protagonists get caught in a creepy but funny ghost chase. It's pretty fun stuff and the ghosts were freaky-looking, but when it comes times to the ghost-busting lessons scenes, the horror plot downgraded to boring comedy & romance scenes involving the men and women students. This consumes much of the middle of the movie, and the ghost action does not resume until much later in the movie.

While the ghost special effects weren't bad and it serves up quite a few scary scenes, the movie's goofy-romance subplot really distracts the audience from the main horror plot (something a lot of Hong Kong films notoriously contains). The acting was very average and you will get quite a few chuckles here and there. But overall, it's not one of the best Hong Kong ghost comedies out there.

Grade C-