Alternate Titles: A Hope, Cheunggong 7 Hou, Chang Jiang XII, Alien, Yangtze River VII, Wai Xing Ren, Long River 7, Cheung Gong 7 Hou
Review Summary
A devilishly entertaining curveball thrown at unsuspecting family audiences, “CJ7” is “E.T.” as reimagined by the premier clown of Chinese cinema, Stephen Chow. Whether American viewers will respond with the enthusiasm of their Chinese counterparts remains to be seen. What is clear, however, is that Mr. Chow’s notion of family is decidedly more Addams than Brady. A simple fairy tale — albeit with a perverseness that no Disney executive would permit — “CJ7” finds Mr. Chow in a Chaplinesque mood as Ti, an impoverished widower caring for his young son, Dicky (the 9-year-old actress Xu Jiao in her debut). By day Ti works long hours on a construction site to pay for Dicky’s elite private school; at night they return to a sweltering, cockroach-infested shack with unreliable electricity. Both suffer constant bullying: Ti’s overbearing boss (Lam Tze Chung) berates him for having ideas above his station, while Dicky’s fastidious teacher (Lee Sheung Ching) and snotty schoolmates treat him like a leper. Scouring the local dump one evening to supplement his son’s wardrobe, Ti discovers a strange green ball that, when placed in Dicky’s curious hands, transforms into a saucer-eyed creature resembling an ineptly groomed cockapoo. Filmed in the seaport town of Ningbo in Zhejiang Province, “CJ7” (the title is a reference to the Chinese space program) has an airy widescreen look that counters the privations of Ti and Dicky’s surroundings.

Director: Stephen Chow
Cast: Stephen Chow, Tin Kai-man, Chan Kwok Kwan, Yuen Qiu
Rating: PG (Adult Situations/Profanity/Scatological Humor/Smoking)

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