The Mermaid (Review)
The Mermaid
aka 美人魚 aka Mei Ren Yu
2016
Written by Stephen Chow Sing-Chi, Kelvin Lee Si-Zhen, Ho Miu-Kei, Lu Zheng-Yu, Andrew Fung Chih-Chiang, Ivy Kong Yuk-Yee, Chan Hing-Kar, and Tsang Kan-Cheung
Directed by Stephen Chow Sing-Chi
It isn’t really a secret that I’ve been less than enthused with the movie industry coming out of China in the past decade. As more and more Hong Kong stars and directors get lured away by big budget Mainland firms to pump out soulless imitations of Hollywood blockbusters, my interest in what they do great grows less and less. A few directors are working against the trends, but the only one with the clout to basically do whatever he wants is Steve Chow. Though Chow took extended time off in front of the camera to work more on the production side, his return to directing has been a welcome development. First he came back with Journey to the West: Conquering the Demons, and soon after with The Mermaid, where Chow returns to his roots with a love story buried beneath a bunch of other movies. The Mermaid went on to slay at the box office, becoming the highest grossing film in China (not any more, lol!)
The Mermaid feels like a first draft of a love story that everything else was stapled around. Some of the side scenes are amazingly awesome, while others fall short and seem weird. Overall there just isn’t enough in the rest of the film to seem like a filling meal. Chow obviously saw the Dolphin Cove documentary as we even get actual footage of the dolphins being slaughtered multiple times throughout the film, and the imagery is used again when the humans attack the mermaid hideout. The US military’s sonar that kills sea life is also mentioned, though here it is sonar developed by a company that causes fish to explode and damages the mermaids, leading to their hiding out in a cove. Tossing this stuff into a comedy is a brave move, and while not pleasant to see, helps put actual stakes on the table both within the film and in real life. Some people might think twice about where the food they eat comes from.
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Categories: Movie Reviews Tags: China, Chiu Chi-Ling, Deng Chao, Hong Kong, Jelly Lin Yun, Kitty Zhang Yuqi, Stephen Chow Sing-Chi, Tin Kai-Man, Tsui Hark
The Thousand Faces of Dunjia (Review)
The Thousand Faces of Dunjia
aka 奇門遁甲 aka Qi Men Dun Jia
2017
Written by Tsui Hark
Directed by Yuen Woo-ping
The Thousand Faces of Dunjia isn’t just another martial arts film, it is a wuxia fantasy with science fiction elements, including alien invaders in search of weapons of ultimate power. It’s directed by Yuen Woo Ping,a remake of his 1982 The Miracle Fighters, except it is completely different, more of a remake in concept only. The script is by Tsui Hark, and it stars some great actors like Zhou Dongyu and Da Peng. The film should have worked, which makes the fact that it didn’t even more disappointing.
Ultimately The Thousand Faces of Dunjia falls into the same trap that has ensnared so many other Chinese films, it becomes as soulless as the big budget blockbusters it tries to live up to. In a weird example, the best scene in the entire movie is a mid-credits scene where they basically roast on some of the more ridiculous concepts that happened earlier. It’s the kind of heart and good-natured ribbing the rest of the film should have been filled with. There were some humorous scenes, but mostly slapstick style humor, nothing that is basically on the same level.
Despite the group of heroes being made up of a solid core of actors, the villains are largely CGI creatures. They mind control a few martial arts masters into their bidding, but it is largely just CG villains arguing with each other and vaguely working against the heroes. Basically the entire villain side of the film completely fails, and that sort of sucks. Of the CGI monsters, the initial fish monster is the most fun, largely because they designed it to look like a crazy stop motion creation running around. When the larger villains show up, one is made of a bunch of red tendrils while the other is like a gargoyle. One of the heroes also turns into a CGI character, a blue phoenix that is vaguely symbolic.
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Categories: Movie Reviews Tags: Aarif Lee Chi-Ting, China, Da Peng, Ni Ni, Tsui Hark, Wu Bai, Xing Yu, Yuen Woo Ping, Zhou Dong-Yu
Cat-it-tude Links!
Above is a shirt I tried unsuccessfully to get my wife to buy. And below are a bunch of links I’ll successfully get you to click on, along with some random movie news that didn’t warrant their own updates.
**Fist of B-List meets Angelfist!
**Derek Yee Tung-Sing (爾冬陞) has begun work on his next director’s gig, a 3D film called The Sword Master (三少爺的劍), which is written by Tsui Hark! The Sword Master is about a retired master swordsman who returns to the martial world to try to settle a dispute with his longtime nemesis. It will star Lin Gengxin (林更新), Peter Ho (何卓榮) Jiang Yiyan (江一燕) and Jiang Mengjie (蔣夢婕). The lack of big name stars was apparently controversial, which caused Derek Yee to say “If a collaboration between Tsui Hark and I still need big stars to get you to waste your time and spend your money on a ticket, then we might as well pack up, go home, drink whiskey and shoot the breeze.”
**Pre-Code.com meets The Man From Monterey!
**The teaser trailer is out for High Heels (하이힐). The film stars Cha Seung-Won (차승원) as Detective Ji-Wook, who solves violent crimes and also desires to become a woman. The film will costar Esom (이솜) as mysterious woman Jang-Mi, and Oh Jung-Se (오정세) as Heo-Gon, who didn’t get a character description in English. High Heels is directed by Jang Jin (장진), who did the classic Guns and Talks and the more recent The Quiz Show Scandal .
**beyondasiaphilia finds That Demon Within!
**Have a nice list of the 100 best Mainland Chinese films to argue about!
**The Film Fiend is drafted into Frankenstein’s Army!
**Teleport City meets the 13 ghosts of Golgo-13!
**An Evening With Jim Henson and Frank Oz – July 1989 at the Puppeteers of America
**Jeremy Blitz feels that Black Torment!
**Newsreel archive British Pathé just released 85,000 films onto YouTube! Holy crap!
**Reminder that Kate Mulgrew was tricked into narrating a documentary where it’s alleged that the Earth doesn’t revolve around the sun.
**FilmiGeek declares OMG – Oh My God!
**A cool essay about African American women in the silent film industry
**At Monster Island Resort the TCM Classic Film Festival Hosts TCM Party!
**The Horror!? makes bets with Daredevils of the Red Circle!
**Hey, Ju-On (The Grudge) is getting another Japanese installment!
**Hey, The Grudge (Ju-On) is getting another American reboot!
**Will there be a Gamera reboot? Probably if the Godzilla remake doesn’t bomb.
Categories: Movie News Tags: Cha Seung-Won, China, Derek Yee Tung-Sing, Esom, Gamera, Japan, Kate Mulgrew, Korea, Oh Jung-Se, Remakes are stupid, Tsui Hark
Zu: The Warriors from the Magic Mountain
Zu: The Warriors from the Magic Mountain
aka 新蜀山劍俠 aka Xin shu shan jian ke
1983
Written by Shui Chung-Yuet and Sze-To Cheuk-Hon
Directed by Tsui Hark
My life having gone through the binge period of renting blurry Hong Kong VHS second generation dubs with hard to read subtitles from locally owned video stores in the 90s, Zu: The Warriors from the Magic Mountain is one of those films that unleashes giant waves of nostalgia. Despite the bad conditions it was being viewed under, the energy and effects magics caused it to rise above the masses. I’ve since seen it on first generation VHS, vcd, and DVD, each time being a fun experience as an idealistic young fighter is caught in the world of wuxia masters, who turn out to have just as many problems as the normal folk (only their problems are a million times more dangerous!) With Tsui Hark’s direction (and choreography work done by Corey Yuen Kwai, Yuen Biao, Fung Hak-On, and Mang Hoi), Zu is visually distinctive. The choreography and effects jumpstarted the look of modern Hong Kong film from the 1980s, while the color and humorous tone helped distinguish it from the Shaw Brothers films that it often shared rental store space with.
The effects look a bit dated now, flying people on obvious wires, old school makeup effects, and cartoon lasers zapping around. But a lot of the practical effects still look nice, and the pulsating monster seems more dangerous as a jiggling puppet than it would as just a bunch of lifeless CGI. The effects were pushed to show that Hong Kong could produce films on par with Star Wars and other early 80s effects-laden films from Hollywood. While I don’t think they quite match the talent, much is accomplished on what is obviously an insanely smaller budget (and Hong Kong effects would develop much further thanks to experience from producing films like this one!)
Despite the effects, much of the film is character driven. Dik Ming Kei’s endless idealism, Ding Yan’s tough exterior hiding a lonesome and good man, Yat Jan being a royal screw up, and the Ice Queen being the total opposite of her name when it comes to Ding Yan. It’s Moon Lee’s first major role, she would go on to be a major player in the Girls with Guns films of the late 80s/early 90s. Brigitte Lin began her domination as a martial arts queen that would ripen with Swordsman II and The Bride with White Hair.
The energy of Zu: The Warriors from the Magic Mountain is infectious, it covers so much that we’re sprinting from concept to concept. Despite that, the basic story is simple to follow. They even stop to remind everyone that it is just good vs. evil!
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Flying Swords of Dragon Gate 3D – Posters and Stills
Feast your eyes on some posters and stills for Flying Swords of Dragon Gate 3D released ahead of the American Film Market. Tsui Hark directs this return to Inn-based wuxia swordplay films, starring Jet Li, Zhou Xun, Chen Kun, Kwai Lun-Mei, Mavis Fan Hiu-Huen, Fan Siu-Wong, and Li Yuchun
Categories: Movie News Tags: Chen Kun, Fan Siu-Wong, Jet Li, Kwai Lun-Mei, Li Yuchun, Mavis Fan Hiu-Huen, Tsui Hark, Zhou Xun
Detective Dee and the Mystery of the Phantom Flame (Review)
Detective Dee and the Mystery of the Phantom Flame
aka Di Renjie
2010
Directed by Tsui Hark
What they say: This is Tsui Hark’s best film in years, it’s one of the best films of 2010, Tsui Hark, Tsui Hark, Tsui Hark!
What you really need to know: Andy Lau gets into a kung fu fight with CGI deer.
Do you like yo-yos? Yo-yos go up and down, and so does Detective Dee. Some sequences in Detective Dee and the Mystery of the Phantom Flame are awesome, but other parts of the film are embarrassing and make you wonder why people were lavishing praise upon it.
If you’ve read any book on Hong Kong cinema that came out in the 90’s (which is when most of the books started appearing in the US), then you remember every single one had chapters on Tsui Hark. Tsui Hark was one of the Hong Kong New Wave directors that shook the industry to the core, and helped modernize Hong Kong film. Many of his earlier films are classics, though he had a few misfires. But even as the industry changed, Tsui Hark has seemed incapable of making film that is watchable since the mid-90’s. Those Jean-Claude Van Damme films were terrible, the Zu Warriors redux was boredom, and Seven Swords is a film so long that no one has ever gotten to the end of it. Despite all the technological achievements, Tsui Hark just wasn’t making good films anymore, and no amount of technology can change that. While Detective Dee isn’t a great film, it is at least the most watchable Tsui film since Black Mask, and something you should eventually get around to watching. You know, when it’s raining outside or something.
With Tsui Hark in the director’s chair, we are at least assured the film will look good, and it does. The cinematography is top notch. Elaborate CGI effects are needed to create ancient Chinese cities, palaces, giant Buddha statues, and underground meeting places – some are more believable than others, but you always know you are looking at a bunch of 1’s and 0’s in picture form. We do give props to action director Sammo Hung, as the actions sequences are the best parts of the film.
The stylized elements Tsui loves sometimes help the film, and sometimes hurt. As the opening scrawl is stylized to appear and disappear in wisps of smoke (which is nice), but a problem is the crawl is Star Warsian in length. In fact, the long text openings of Reefer Madness and Alone in the Dark are brought to mind. We are forced to read like half a sentence at a time, and have to wait for each piece one by one. It is what I like to call “annoying”.
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Categories: Movie Reviews, Ugly Tags: Andy Lau Tak-Wah, Carina Lau Ka-Ling, CGI trainwreck, Deng Chao, Hong Kong, Li Bing-Bing, Richard Ng Yiu-Hon, Sammo Hung, Tony Leung Ka-Fai, Tsui Hark
