God of Gamblers

Chow Yun-fat and Andy Lau send the gambling genre to the stratosphere in Wong Jing’s shockingly iconic comedy.

“I like cards.”

In cinema, genres and trends come and go. From the endless legacy sequels that will not stop coming out to the 3D films making comebacks every twenty or so years, most trends tend to have a relatively short lifespan. So if you’re sick of John Wick-a-likes we can surely assume then in a few years we’ll have seen the back of them. But one trend that last a lot longer than anyone could have ever guessed was Hong Kong’s comedy gambling films. Movies that centred on one ace gambler who effortlessly won every game he ever played, and James Bonded his way into many women’s hearts and pants.

This is a trend that, as recently as 2023’s One More Chance, was still kicking about in some form or another and it all started here: in 1989, with Wong Jing’s unfathomably popular comedy God of Gamblers. (Well, in actuality, it all was popularised here, but that’s for another time).

Ko Chun (Chow Yun-fat) is the film’s titular character, an immensely skilled gambler whose confidence and talent has made him a myth in gambling circles. He is asked by a fellow gambler to help him enact revenge on a Singaporean gamer Chan who had a hand in killing his father. After Ko humiliates Chan, he is attacked on a train, escapes, but falls victim to a trap

Little Knife (Andy Lau) is a small-time gambler with no luck, whose fortunes change when Ko lands in his back yard with amnesia. Knife decides to exploit Ko’s memory loss and talent for games, but it’s not long before Ko’s history (and memory) catches up with them. It’s a really silly film with quite a dumb premise, but it somehow all comes together better than expected.

This is largely down to its cast. Chow is a good enough performer that he sells the almost childlike amnesiac Ko well enough – at least, as good as one could expect in this sort of farce. It’s a shame that so much of the film has him acting like this, though, when it spends half an hour setting up and promising this suave, hyper charming individual. I’m reminded of how effortlessly cool he was in A Better Tomorrow until he got his knees shot out.

Andy Lau has a bit more to do, complexity-wise. He has to play a bit of scumbag, but one who’s still friendly enough for the audience to root for. As an actor, Lau straddles the line between sweetheart and serial killer constantly, even when he’s playing romantic leads, which can sometimes work against him. Here it serves him well, as he does have to balance both sides, enough so that when he gets betrayed or hurt, we end up feeling for him. His friendship and relationships are also a key part of what makes him work as a character.

It’s also quite a bit funnier than I might have expected. I personally have never been a big fan of Wong Jing’s work. Typically I find his style of comedy a bit grating and largely unfunny, relying too much on broad humour, and over the top performances, his nevertheless has his moments, and God of Gamblers is a great example of it. The story is interesting enough, and has plenty of moving pieces to stay interesting throughout. Ko’s cousin Yee (Jimmy Lung Fong) makes a great secondary villain, injecting a darkness into the film that would otherwise choke on its own silliness. It never reaches the heights of dumb that his later gambling films will get – more on those in the future, I have no doubt – but the level of jokes here is paving the way for Jackie Chan wearing a Chun Li outfit in City Hunter.

In the end, God of Gamblers is a fine film, beloved by many, and was popular enough to launch Hong Kong cinema into a wild new direction – with serious takes on the genre, parodies, and parodies of the parodies with God of Gamblers getting several spin-offs and sequels – two of which have the same title of God of Gamblers 2. So I look forward to rolling these dice and seeing which are actually hits, and which are busts.

Verdict: The golden standard for comedy gambling films, God of Gamblers is a fun ride. Enjoy it: it’s mostly downhill from here.

Overall entertainment: 7/10
Violence: 3/10
Sex: A bit of fumbling under some sheets/10
Gambling: 10/10 (1/10 for realism)
Indiana Jones knife scenes: Sort of one
Music: Boy does that theme sound like Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head

God of Gamblers (1989)
Also known as: 賭神
Cantonese

Director: Wong Jing
Writer: Wong Jing

CAST

Chow Yun-fat – Ko Chun
Andy Lau – Little Knife
Joey Wong – Jane
Sharla Cheung – Janet
Charles Heung – Dragon
Ng Man-tat – Brother Shing
Chan Lap-ban – Grandma
Jimmy Lung Fong – Ko Yee
Yeung Chak-lam – Nam