{ "id": "epspthty45", "slug": "vulgaria", "title": "Vulgaria (低俗喜剧)", "updated": "2026-11-01", "topic_path": [ { "id": "culture", "label": "Arts and culture", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture" }, { "id": "culture.performance", "label": "Screen and stage", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen", "label": "Film and television", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films", "label": "Films and standalone screen works", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works", "label": "Individual films by title and year", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.comedy-romance", "label": "Comedy and romantic films (individual works)", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.comedy-romance" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.comedy-romance.comedies-of-2011-to-2012", "label": "Comedies of 2011 to 2012", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.comedy-romance.comedies-of-2011-to-2012" }, { "id": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.comedy-romance.comedies-of-2011-to-2012.yr-2012", "label": "Released in 2012", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/topics/culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.comedy-romance.comedies-of-2011-to-2012.yr-2012" } ], "geo": [ { "id": "geo.chn.t2001.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.comedy-romance", "label": "China · 2001 to 2020: Comedy and romantic films (individual works)", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.chn.t2001.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.comedy-romance", "path": [ { "id": "geo.chn", "label": "China", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.chn" }, { "id": "geo.chn.t2001", "label": "China · 2001 to 2020", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.chn.t2001" }, { "id": "geo.chn.t2001.culture", "label": "Arts and culture", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.chn.t2001.culture" }, { "id": "geo.chn.t2001.culture.performance", "label": "Screen and stage", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.chn.t2001.culture.performance" }, { "id": "geo.chn.t2001.culture.performance.screen", "label": "Film and television", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.chn.t2001.culture.performance.screen" }, { "id": "geo.chn.t2001.culture.performance.screen.films", "label": "Films and standalone screen works", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.chn.t2001.culture.performance.screen.films" }, { "id": "geo.chn.t2001.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works", "label": "Individual films by title and year", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.chn.t2001.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works" }, { "id": "geo.chn.t2001.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.comedy-romance", "label": "Comedy and romantic films (individual works)", "api_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/api/v1/geo/geo.chn.t2001.culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.comedy-romance" } ] } ], "excerpt": "Vulgaria, also known as 低俗喜劇, is a 2012 Hong Kong black comedy by Pang Ho-cheung that satirizes the film industry through a producer's deal with a triad boss.", "snippet": "Vulgaria, also known as 低俗喜劇, is a 2012 Hong Kong black comedy by Pang Ho-cheung that satirizes the film industry through a producer's deal with a triad boss.", "node": "culture.performance.screen.films.films.individual-works.comedy-romance.comedies-of-2011-to-2012.yr-2012", "markdown": "# Vulgaria (低俗喜剧)\n\n**Vulgaria** (低俗喜劇) is a 2012 Hong Kong black comedy directed, written, and produced by Pang Ho-cheung (彭浩翔) that satirizes the film industry itself: a struggling producer must secure funding from a mainland triad boss with bizarre sexual tastes in order to remake a 1970s softcore porn film. Shot in [Cantonese](https://www.edgepedia.org/cantonese) in only 12 days and rated Category III (adults only) in Hong Kong for its pervasive profanity and sexual content, it became the second-highest-grossing Hong Kong film of 2012 and won Ronald Cheng the Golden Horse Award for Best Supporting Actor.[1](https://asianwiki.com/Vulgaria) • [2](https://www.hkfact.com/movie/15532) • [3](https://news.sohu.com/20121124/n358558821.shtml)\n\n| Key fact | Detail |\n|---|---|\n| Original title | 低俗喜劇 (Cantonese: Dai juk hei kek); English title Vulgaria[4](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2266938/releaseinfo/) |\n| Director / writers | Directed, written, and produced by Pang Ho-cheung (彭浩翔); co-writers credited as Lam Chiu-wing (林超榮) and Luk Yee-sum (陸以心)[1](https://asianwiki.com/Vulgaria) • [5](https://focus.lib.ntu.edu.tw/?q=en%2Fnode%2F97) |\n| Release | World premiere March 27, 2012 at the 36th Hong Kong International Film Festival; Hong Kong theatrical release August 9, 2012[1](https://asianwiki.com/Vulgaria) |\n| Runtime / rating | 90 minutes (some sources list 92 or 93); Category III in Hong Kong; Cantonese[1](https://asianwiki.com/Vulgaria) • [2](https://www.hkfact.com/movie/15532) • [6](https://www.goldenhorse.org.tw/film/about/archive/detail/743) |\n| Production | Shot in 12 days; produced by Makingfilm (正在電影製作有限公司)[5](https://focus.lib.ntu.edu.tw/?q=en%2Fnode%2F97) • [2](https://www.hkfact.com/movie/15532) |\n| Major award | Ronald Cheng, Best Supporting Actor, 49th Golden Horse Awards (2012)[3](https://news.sohu.com/20121124/n358558821.shtml) |\n\n## Spoilers\n\n### Plot\n\nThe story is framed as a film producer, To Wai-cheung (杜惠彰), speaking at a university seminar about his career. Long in the industry without a hit, he is introduced through a friend to [Tyrannosaurus](https://www.edgepedia.org/tyrannosaurus) (暴龍), a mainland triad boss with a taste for exotic game meat and unusual sexual proclivities who wants to invest in movies. Desperate for money, To accepts the deal, and Tyrannosaurus demands a remake of the classic softcore erotica film *Gwai Yan Ngo Wo Yiu* (官人我又要), with the original cast.[7](https://www.yesasia.com/global/%E4%BD%8E%E4%BF%97%E5%96%9C%E5%8A%87-2012-blu-ray-%E9%A6%99%E6%B8%AF%E7%89%88/1031952160-0-0-0-zh_TW/info.html) • [8](https://eiga.com/movie/78981)\n\nThe problem is that the original's star, Susan Shaw (邵音音), now plays herself and is past 60, unable to appear nude as she once did. To's solution, and the escalating chaos on set, supply the comedy: the production assembles a former Category III actor with a phobia of \"human explosion\" from shooting 3D erotica, a young model with unusual oral talents, and even two mules, while the producer's family life frays under the pressure.[8](https://eiga.com/movie/78981) • [6](https://www.goldenhorse.org.tw/film/about/archive/detail/743)\n\n## Cast\n\nChapman To (杜汶澤) stars as the producer To Wai-cheung, and Ronald Cheng (鄭中基) plays Tyrannosaurus. Dada Chan (陳靜) plays the model, Fiona Sit (薛凱琪) plays Quin, and Crystal Tin (田蕊妮), To's real-life wife, appears as Tsang Lai-fan. Susan Shaw, Matt Chow, Hiro Hayama (葉山豪), Jim Chim (詹瑞文), and Lawrence Chou round out the credited cast, several of them playing themselves.[2](https://www.hkfact.com/movie/15532) • [9](https://app2.atmovies.com.tw/news/NF1206220528/)\n\n## Production and context\n\nPang Ho-cheung, born in Hong Kong in 1973, worked as a film critic while in secondary school, became a television screenwriter in 1994, and directed his first feature, *Maai hung paai yan* ([買兇拍人](https://www.edgepedia.org/you-shoot-i-shoot)), in 2001, thereafter working as an independent writer-producer-director whose credits include *[Isabella](https://www.edgepedia.org/isabella-2006-film)* and the *Love in a Puff* series.[6](https://www.goldenhorse.org.tw/film/about/archive/detail/743)\n\nHe conceived *Vulgaria* against the backdrop of the mainland co-production boom, which he saw as squeezing genuinely Hong Kong-flavored films out of local cinemas. Using \"making a movie\" as the subject of a movie, he shot the film in 12 days on a low budget, mixing fictional plot with exaggerated situations that reviewers read as jabs at the real absurdities of Hong Kong film production and Hong Kong-mainland co-productions.[5](https://focus.lib.ntu.edu.tw/?q=en%2Fnode%2F97) The film opens with a warning that it is politically incorrect and full of discrimination and sexual content, telling the easily offended they may leave early.[5](https://focus.lib.ntu.edu.tw/?q=en%2Fnode%2F97)\n\n## Box office and reception\n\nThe film opened in Hong Kong on August 9, 2012 with a first-day take of HK$1.1 million, beating the big-budget thriller *The Silent War* (聽風者), and passed HK$20 million within two weeks.[10](https://ent.sina.com.cn/m/c/2012-09-06/14123733535.shtml) Its final Hong Kong gross of HK$30,069,986 made it the year's second-highest-grossing Hong Kong-produced film, behind only Pang's own *[Love in the Buff](https://www.edgepedia.org/love-in-the-buff)* (春嬌與志明) by one account, which reported *Vulgaria* as having overtaken that film as the year's top local earner at an earlier point in its run.[11](https://ent.sina.cn/film/chinese/2012-09-10/detail-icesifvx4341251.d.html) Its heavy use of [Cantonese profanity](https://www.edgepedia.org/cantonese-profanity) was the stated reason for the Category III rating, and the film's crude humor and local slang generated wide discussion in Hong Kong.[10](https://ent.sina.com.cn/m/c/2012-09-06/14123733535.shtml)\n\nCritics noted that its vulgarity lies less in toilet humor than in its portrait of the film industry's ugliness, and that the film walked a tightrope between eroticism and violence while letting audiences vent frustration; a Taiwanese library review argued that beneath the crudeness it carried something of Hong Kong cinema's core values.[5](https://focus.lib.ntu.edu.tw/?q=en%2Fnode%2F97) The critic Tony Rayns, writing about the Hong Kong Film Festival, called it a minor classic in the making.[9](https://app2.atmovies.com.tw/news/NF1206220528/)\n\n## Awards and festival run\n\nAfter its world premiere at the 36th Hong Kong International Film Festival, the film screened as the opening film of the New York Asian Film Festival, in competition at the Udine Far East Film Festival and the Taipei Film Festival, and at festivals in Paris, Stockholm, and New Delhi.[7](https://www.yesasia.com/global/%E4%BD%8E%E4%BF%97%E5%96%9C%E5%8A%87-2012-blu-ray-%E9%A6%99%E6%B8%AF%E7%89%88/1031952160-0-0-0-zh_TW/info.html) It won the Netpac Award at the 16th Bucheon International Fantastic Film Festival in South Korea and the Best Asian Film Silver Award at the 16th Fantasia festival in Montreal, and Chapman To was named Best Comedy Actor at a United States fantasy film festival.[7](https://www.yesasia.com/global/%E4%BD%8E%E4%BF%97%E5%96%9C%E5%8A%87-2012-blu-ray-%E9%A6%99%E6%B8%AF%E7%89%88/1031952160-0-0-0-zh_TW/info.html) • [12](https://www.ccidahk.gov.hk/en/publication/2012.pdf)\n\nAt the 49th Golden Horse Awards in November 2012, Ronald Cheng won Best Supporting Actor for his role as Tyrannosaurus, while Chapman To was nominated for Best Actor and Dada Chan for Best Supporting Actress.[3](https://news.sohu.com/20121124/n358558821.shtml) • [6](https://www.goldenhorse.org.tw/film/about/archive/detail/743)\n\n## Controversy\n\nIn February 2013 the Hong Kong Arts Development Council announced the winners of its first ADC Arts Criticism Awards.\n\n## Later release\n\nJapan received a theatrical release on August 24, 2013, as a special invitation screening at the 8th Osaka Asian Film Festival and later in a Pang Ho-cheung retrospective.[8](https://eiga.com/movie/78981) The film has since been cited in discussions of Hong Kong cinema's local identity and of the enthusiastic post-screening audience events (謝票) that marked its 2012 run.[13](https://telegra.ph/%E9%A6%99%E6%B8%AF%E7%94%B5%E5%BD%B1%E5%AF%92%E5%86%AC%E6%9C%9F%E4%BC%97%E4%BA%BA%E8%B0%88%E6%88%8F%E9%99%A2%E5%B7%B2%E6%AD%BB%E8%B0%A2%E7%A5%A8%E6%97%A0%E7%94%A8%E4%B8%9C%E5%8D%97%E4%BA%9A%E5%B8%82%E5%9C%BA%E6%98%AF%E6%95%91%E6%98%9F%E5%90%97---%E7%AB%AF%E4%BC%A0%E5%AA%92---%E6%9C%80%E6%96%B0-04-25)\n\n## References\n\n1. [Vulgaria, AsianWiki](https://asianwiki.com/Vulgaria)\n2. [低俗喜剧, HKFACT](https://www.hkfact.com/movie/15532)\n3. [第49届台湾电影金马奖揭晓, 搜狐新闻](https://news.sohu.com/20121124/n358558821.shtml)\n4. [Vulgaria (2012) Release info, IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2266938/releaseinfo/)\n5. [低俗喜劇－崎嶇難行電影夢, 台大圖書館影音Focus](https://focus.lib.ntu.edu.tw/?q=en%2Fnode%2F97)\n6. [低俗喜劇, 台北金馬影展](https://www.goldenhorse.org.tw/film/about/archive/detail/743)\n7. [低俗喜劇 (2012) Blu-ray (香港版), YesAsia](https://www.yesasia.com/global/%E4%BD%8E%E4%BF%97%E5%96%9C%E5%8A%87-2012-blu-ray-%E9%A6%99%E6%B8%AF%E7%89%88/1031952160-0-0-0-zh_TW/info.html)\n8. [低俗喜劇 作品情報, 映画.com](https://eiga.com/movie/78981)\n9. [台北電影節神秘場《低俗喜劇》, 開眼電影網](https://app2.atmovies.com.tw/news/NF1206220528/)\n10. [《低俗喜剧》进军台湾, 新浪娱乐](https://ent.sina.com.cn/m/c/2012-09-06/14123733535.shtml)\n11. [《一路向西》将上映, 新浪](https://ent.sina.cn/film/chinese/2012-09-10/detail-icesifvx4341251.d.html)\n12. [2012年香港電影獲得的獎項, 香港電影資料館刊物](https://www.ccidahk.gov.hk/en/publication/2012.pdf)\n13. [香港电影\"寒冬期\"众人谈, 端传媒](https://telegra.ph/%E9%A6%99%E6%B8%AF%E7%94%B5%E5%BD%B1%E5%AF%92%E5%86%AC%E6%9C%9F%E4%BC%97%E4%BA%BA%E8%B0%88%E6%88%8F%E9%99%A2%E5%B7%B2%E6%AD%BB%E8%B0%A2%E7%A5%A8%E6%97%A0%E7%94%A8%E4%B8%9C%E5%8D%97%E4%BA%9A%E5%B8%82%E5%9C%BA%E6%98%AF%E6%95%91%E6%98%9F%E5%90%97---%E7%AB%AF%E4%BC%A0%E5%AA%92---%E6%9C%80%E6%96%B0-04-25)\n\n---\n*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Comedy and romantic films (individual works) › Comedies of 2011 to 2012 › Released in 2012*\n\n*Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*\n\n*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*\n\nLicense: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license\n", "same_as": [], "url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/vulgaria", "markdown_url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/vulgaria.md", "license": { "name": "Edgepedia Community License 1.0", "url": "https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license", "summary": "Free with credit, commercial use included. AI training is open to everyone. For other uses, organizations over USD 100M in revenue or 100M monthly users license separately.", "spdx": "LicenseRef-Edgepedia-Community-1.0" }, "credit": "\"Vulgaria (低俗喜剧)\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), https://www.edgepedia.org/vulgaria. Edgepedia Community License 1.0.", "credit_md": "\"[Vulgaria (低俗喜剧)](https://www.edgepedia.org/vulgaria)\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), [https://www.edgepedia.org/vulgaria](https://www.edgepedia.org/vulgaria). [Edgepedia Community License 1.0](https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license).", "credit_html": "\"Vulgaria (低俗喜剧)\", Edgepedia (EdgeChat), https://www.edgepedia.org/vulgaria. Edgepedia Community License 1.0.", "speakable": "Vulgaria, also known as 低俗喜劇, is a 2012 Hong Kong black comedy by Pang Ho-cheung that satirizes the film industry through a producer's deal with a triad boss." }