Chicken and Duck Talk

Chicken and Duck Talk
Traditional	雞同鴨講
Simplified	鸡同鸭讲
Directed by	Clifton Ko
Produced by	Ronny Yu Michael Hui (executive)
Written by	Jo Ma (story) James Yuen (story) Michael Hui (screenplay) Clifton Ko (screenplay)
Starring	Michael Hui Ricky Hui Sylvia Chang Lowell Lo Lawrence Ng
Music by	Richard Yuen
Cinematography	Derek Wan
Editing by	Wong Yee Shun
Distributed by	Hui's Film Production Co.
Release date(s)	July 14, 1988 (1988-07-14)
Country	Hong Kong
Language	Cantonese

Chicken and Duck Talk (Chinese: 雞同鴨講 (Gai tung aap gong (Chicken with Duck Talk)) is an award-winning 1988 film co-written by Michael Hui, who also starred. It was directed and co-written by Clifton Ko. The film deals with the conflict that ensues between the proprietor of a BBQ duck restaurant that is in trouble for health violations and the fast food chicken restaurant that opens across the street. The film was the highest-grossing Hong Kong film released in 1988. Hui's screenplay and performance won him several awards, including a special award given by the American Film Institute in 1989.

The film also includes a celebrity cameo by Sam Hui (Michael's younger brother), as the master of ceremonies at the grand opening of Danny's Chicken, and the screen debut of Gloria Yip in a brief appearance as Hui's son's school friend. Sam Hui (playing himself) speaks the title phrase to cut his speech short.

Plot

Hui Kei (Michael Hui) is the struggling proprietor of a BBQ duck restaurant. In the beginning of the film, he is visited by a health inspector, who found a cockroach in his soup and other unsanitary conditions, and threatens to sue the restaurant. Fortunately, Hui's staff stops him from leaving with the soup sample after a slipup from the inspector. While the restaurant is typically operated on ground floor, Hui lives upstairs and awaits a visit from his aristocratic mother-in-law (Pak Yan), who is convinced that her daughter, Ah Kuen (Sylvia Chang), has married a good-for-nothing husband who cares for no one.

Later, Hui faces new trouble when businessman Danny Poon (Lawrence Ng) opens what is to be the first of a chain of Danny's Chicken fast food fried chicken restaurants across the street from him. Not long after, Danny's Chicken becomes the talk across Hong Kong, attracting young customers and families and causing Hui's business to plummet. When Hui has a frank discussion meeting with his fellow staff, in regards to his business and its working conditions, one of his employees, Cuttlefish (Ricky Hui) gets fed up with Hui's abuse and guilt-tripping about his dead father and his struggling mother, and decides to work for Danny's Chicken. But Cuttlefish discovers while being trained over at Danny's Chicken that Poon's regimen was both strict and humiliating, where much of his job involves appearing in a chicken suit on the street, much to Hui's disgust. Hui's mother-in-law offers to invest in Hui's dwindling business, to which Hui vehemently rejects. After his son tells him that his best friend, Judy (Gloria Yip), likes its food and its atmosphere, Hui disguises himself as an Indian woman to infiltrate his rival's restaurant and tries Danny's Chicken. Hui is convinced that it is only the packaging that people like, but his disguise is quickly undone by Poon himself.

Hui transforms his new restaurant to match Danny's Chicken "packaging" atmosphere, from tabletops to nightclub singing, with little success. Hui also begins parading the street in a makeshift duck costume, leading to a physical fight with Cuttlefish in his chicken suit that nearly gets Hui and Cuttlefish arrested. Hui's business was attracting no customers at this point, and even his most regular of customers, a Buddhist nun who frequently orders vegetarian noodles with no lard, finds Danny's Chicken accommodating to her needs. After a series of rat infestations, Cuttlefish's reluctant return, notices of closure, and an attempted buyout from Danny's Chicken, Hui resorted to his mother-in-law's help to renovate his restaurant completely before she leaves. Business began to boom for Hui once again, while Danny's Chicken slowly dwindles to the point of a disastrous attempt to market BBQ ducks. In a final act of desperation, Poon resorts to arson to end the competition, nearly killing himself before Hui and his family and staff eventually rescues Poon. Several times throughout the film, Hui talks about getting AIDS through sharing food.

External links

• Chicken and Duck Talk at the Internet Movie Database