Where's Officer Tuba? (1986)
Tuba is a fainthearted cop who prefers to play in the brass section of the police band to pounding the streets. One day, he finds himself caught up in an extortion case with trigger-happy detective Rambo Chow. When Rambo gets fatally wounded, he makes a half-hearted vow to avenge his death. Tuba is more than a little surprised when Rambo's spirit returns to make sure the timid cop makes good on his promise. Backed up by his hotshot partner Cheung, Tuba eventually summons the gumption to track down the baddies.
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It starts with the Hong Kong police chase down a criminal and a good chase it was. Sammo plays the tuba at an awards ceremony. The story really starts when David Chiang is killed and reappears as a ghost to Sammo. The problem is what was all that filler material at the beginning that had nothing to do with the story? The first half really went nowhere. The good stuff was the scenes with Chang Yi and Hwang Jang Lee. Those fights could have been twice as long. My copy is a DVD but the original material was a laser disk. This copy took me years to find. It is one of the hardest to find of Sammo Hung's movies. Overall just average for Sammo but any Sammo movie is above average.
Sammo Hung plays tuba-playing-policeman dubbed Officer Tuba, who joins forces with Police Detective Chow (David Chiang) to capture a band of blackmailers. Chow is gunned down in the process and, in his dying moment, makes Tuba promise that he will defeat the gangsters and avenge his death. Tuba forgets his promise after he is preoccupied with another police mission and with wooing his girlfriend-to-be Joanne (Joey Wang). As a result, Chow's ghost pays a visit.This is a somewhat conventional ghost-comedy from Hong Kong, with a plot that starts off riveting with all the police action, but then drifts off to some comedic, but laughable, moments. The dating scenes of Tuba and Joanne consume a lot of the movie, which tends to drag the plot and sway it away from the main police/ghost elements. However, the comedy, again, is pretty good and sent me and my brother reeling with laughter, especially in the scenes where Chow's ghost torments and play tricks on Tuba in getting him to fulfill his promise of avenging his death.A lot of cameos were crammed into the movie as well, with appearances by HK actors including Paul Chun, Stanley Fung, Lam Ching-Ying, Melvin Wong, John Sham and Dennis Chan. Sammo does not showcase his martial arts moves much, as his character is portrayed to be somewhat of a bumbling weakling. Much of the heroic action is due to Jacky Cheung, who plays Tuba's colleague.Action is limited, with the end fight being probably the highlight of all the scarce action scenes. However, with the decent humor and acting inserted, this is not a bad ghost comedy for some light entertainment.Grade B-
Sammo's character is not much of a fighter in this movie. He plays a cowardly police officer who plays the tuba for the police force's marching band. David Chiang plays the tough cop and needs someone who doesn't look or act like a cop to go undercover for him. Jacky Cheung plays Sammo's friend and recommends him for the job. It is a money exchange and David Chiang ends up dying at the hands of the villains. Sammo promises to avenge his death, but then decides against it since he is a weakling. So Chiang's ghost starts to haunt Sammo and forces him to take revenge.A lot of the comedy is good, but I found the comedy with Chiang's ghost very lame. The story is decent, and like most Sammo movies, there are a couple of moments that will have you laughing really hard.There is not too much action to speak of. Some cool stunts here and there, but you have to wait until the end for the 2 main fight scenes. Hwang Jang Lee shows up and gives Sammo a serious beat down. His kicks have never looked better. Unfortunately, the way he gets beat is not very satisfying. I don't want to give it away, but prepare to be disappointed.This is not a bad movie, but it could have been so much better.The Universe DVD has very good picture quality and the subtitles are written well enough.
sammo hung is a cowardly officer in the police band. playing the tuba gets him the name Tuba. the police sargent needs someone to go under-cover and deliver extortion money, so he picks tuba...i dont want to spoil the plot, but its a pretty good ghost/cop movie. loads of hilarious embarrassing moments. Sammo can do no wrong! 6.5/10