The third installment of the Crazy series, considered a milestone in Chinese comedy, Crazy Necklace started shooting on November 16 in Beijing. The complete cast met with the media, including actors and singers from the Chinese mainland, Hong Kong and Taiwan, all promising a new wave of "craziness" for Chinese cinema screens.

The loony-tune black comedy Crazy Stone was a box office hit when it premiered in 2006, reaping 16 million yuan ($2.34 million) at the box office from its small 3 million yuan ($439,500) budget. The overwhelming success quickly drew attention and interest toward the film's young director Ning Hao and all films labeled since with the word crazy.

The second Crazy film directed by Ning, Crazy Racer, also known as Silver Medallist, was screened during Chinese New Year this year and racked up a massive 100 million yuan plus ($14.65 million) at the box office, a figure usually only ever achieved by Zhang Yimou or Feng Xiaogang's blockbusters.

The legend of Crazy will continue with Ning's Crazy Necklace, which tells the story of how average man Liu Yide gets involved in a series of incidents and accidents after picking up a necklace at a murder scene. With the same Crazy theme of people being played by the hand of fate, Crazy Necklace has a different narrative structure from the previous two films that followed multiple story strands.

"We try to analyze different possible results of one single story line in this film," explained producer Wang Kejian, screenwriter and director of On the Jinggang Mountain, "but it is still going to be an exciting black comedy, filled with unexpected plots and jokes."

Similar to Ning, who was relatively unknown before shooting Crazy Stone, Crazy Necklace's director and screenwriter Lang Chen only has one film, Two Days and Two Nights, under his belt. However, his talents have been applauded by the film's artistic adviser, renowned director Huang Jianzhong.

"Reading Lang's script reminds me of when I was shooting my first film Xiao Hua (also considered as one of his best) in 1976, full of fresh ideas," commented Huang during the press conference. He said that a positive sign for China's film industry is that each generation of filmmakers continues to be innovative.

Huang said that he is confident with the film's market potential, saying it would appeal to those born in the 1990s and 1950s. Lang added that he will bring 90 minutes of nonstop laughter for all comedy-loving audiences.

Crazy Necklace has an extensive cast including mainland singers Zhou Xiao'ou and Jing Gangshan as two leading actors. Famous 67-year-old Hong Kong actor Wu Ma will play a key role as a fortune teller. As one of the most familiar faces in the history of Hong Kong cinema, Wu said his character only has three to four scenes in the film but has a "confidential" importance to the plot.

The film is scheduled to complete shooting within 30 days, the premiere date remains undecided.

(Global Times November 19, 2009)