Hong Kong romantic comedy in which Ekin Cheng receives a robot girlfriend in the shape of Chrissie Chau…
Offering up what could easily be seen as a dubious line in male fantasy fulfilment, Hong Kong director Kam Ka-wai makes his debut with iGirl, starring Ekin Cheng and Chrissie Chau (who last appeared together in Lawrence Cheng’s 2014 rom-com Break Up 100) playing a man who falls for his beautiful and obedient robot girlfriend. Given the film’s premise, it shouldn’t come as much of a surprise to learn that it was produced by Wong Jing, and while it never goes down the sleazy route that might have been expected, it’s certainly a chaotic and scattershot offering in his usual style.
The film opens with Ekin Cheng’s super, super nice guy and veterinarian Evan getting dumped by his harridan of a girlfriend Janice (Jeana Ho, Lost in Hong Kong) one evening at a nightclub. Getting drunk with his friends Johnny (Dominic Ho, The Gigolo) and Irwin (Lam Chi-hung, The Mermaid), he wakes up the next day to find a crate in his apartment containing a strange blue package which, after being soaked in the bath transforms into ‘iGirl’ 001 (Chrissie Chau), who he apparently ordered while under the influence. Since he really is a true gent, instead of activating her ‘intimate mode’, Evan starts teaching her about life and human emotion, inevitably growing closer to her in the process. When Johnny and Irwin find out they also order their own iGirls, something which enrages their unpleasant ex-girlfriends, who set out to destroy the robots through methods best described as odd.
iGirl really is pretty senseless stuff, smashing together comedy, romance and science fiction into something which is both predictable and bizarrely off the wall. Although its basic gimmick of gorgeous and subservient robot girlfriends being played off against nasty, materialistic and violent real women is a sexist and borderline misogynistic one that’s a throwback to Hong Kong cinema in the 1980s and 1990s, the film is curiously tame, with precious little in the way of Wong Jing-style leering or raunchy gags. Instead, director Kam Ka-wai seems at times to genuinely believe the film has something to say, despite there being no substance to the script, which is peppered with plot holes and shows a general refusal to engage with any of the social, moral or technological issues it comes close to flirting with or to offer commentary on the battle between the sexes. Whether or not this is a problem depends largely on the viewer, as for fans of old school Hong Kong nonsense the film does have its funny moments, and the overall lack of coherence is quite entertaining.
Thankfully, the film has a saving grace in the form of lead pair Ekin Cheng and Chrissie Chau, who are both on charismatic form, enough so to give the paper-thin material a much-needed boost. Their age difference aside, Ekin Cheng pushing 50 and Chau being nearly 20 years his junior, they make a likeable and good-looking couple, enjoying a breezy chemistry which makes them easy to watch and root for, even if the film is never particularly romantic. With the rest of the cast being made up of stereotypes and comic relief, Kam Ka-wai would have been better off focusing more of the running time on Evan and 001, and while the film wins points for its brevity, it could have easily been fashioned into something more engaging. If nothing else, this would also have grounded the film somewhat and given it some semblance of normalcy, at least before it launches into its ridiculous final act.
Still, iGirl is a perfectly acceptable piece of Hong Kong genre cinema, amiable and fun in its own unambitious and sexist way. Though entirely forgettable, fans of Ekin Cheng and Chrissie Chau won’t feel short changed, and, for what it’s worth, the film is a pleasant enough way to kill an hour and a half.