Money No Enough: A 25th year anniversary retrospective

有些人为了要赚钱 they don’t mind go and die.

Still from Money No Enough. Credit: J Team Productions/Asian Film Archive.

I recently watched the 4K remastered version of the groundbreaking local comedic film Money No Enough (1998) starring Jack Neo, Mark Lee and Henry Thia with my cousin. We often spoke about this film, especially with Mark Lee’s character of Ong, a general contractor in the film, and his impeccable delivery of Hokkien and Singlish, acting as the quintessential Singapore ‘Ah Beng’.

Reflections of watching Money No Enough, 25 years after release

I was in Secondary school when the film was first released — I watched it perhaps two to three times in its entirety at that time so my memories of the show were pretty vague prior to my recent rewatching.

Now that I have been in the workforce for some time, I can relate to Keong’s (played by Jack Neo) job search process after he left his well-paying job. I think the job search process is always tough, regardless of age or qualifications. The film’s interpretation of an ‘Ah gua’, (referring to Keong’s boss and the company’s new hire who appear to be effeminate) is a caricature of the transvestite and feels almost parodic. It probably would not sit well with the LGBTQ community of today.

Looking at the film again, I realised that the actress who played Keong’s wife kinda overacted in her role and it did not seem that natural as a wife and mother. There were references to sponsors of the film, such as Carven watches and Carlsberg beer but these were quite subtly done. For example, it made sense to see the Carlsberg beer bottles and posters at the coffeeshop. This is in direct contrast to Jack Neo’s often blatant placing of sponsors’ products in his more recent films, such as the Ah Boys to Men series.

Homage and references

Since Money No Enough was the first film of its kind in Singapore, reflecting the different strata of classes and society in the country, it had to take references from films elsewhere. My cousin pointed out quite accurately that the characters of Neo, Lee and Thia were a direct parallel to the trio of characters played by the Hui brothers from Hong Kong, with their films such as the Private Eyes (1976) and Chicken and Duck Talk (1988) being massively popular. The eldest ‘brother’ would…