|
 h
boy. It's another
Hong Kong
movie where CGI isn't just the order of the day,
it's the order, the menu, and the restaurant! In
short, Jeffrey Lau's "A Chinese Tall
Story" is a combination muddled storytelling,
needlessly convoluted plotting, oftentimes
inspired set design, and so much CGI overkill that
you will swear you were playing one of those Final
Fantasy videogames and not watching a movie.
"Tall Story" has a lot in common with
Tsui Hark's 2001 film "The
Legend of Zu", another movie so devoid of
point that its pointlessness became the point. The
only thing missing from "Tall Story" is
Cecilia Cheung to dull the pain. Instead, we get
an "uglied" Charlene Choi.
"A Chinese Tall
Story" is supposedly based on the classic
"Journey to the West" story, and follows
monk Tripitaka (the ever effeminate Nicholas Tse)
as he runs afoul of a CGI tree demon that wishes
to eat his soul in order to attain immortality. Or
at least that's what the Tree Demon says, as he
shows up for a brief bit in the beginning, again a
few minutes later, and then doesn't bother to
appear again until almost an hour later. At the
initial battle between CGI Tree Demon and
Tripitaka's troika of apprentices, led by the
stout Sun Wukong (Wilson Chen), Tripitaka ends up
tied to Wukong's magical Golden Staff and tossed a
great distance out of harm's way. This leaves the
apprentices to be captured, a situation Tripitaka,
who doesn't actually know how to fight, is
determined to rectify.
But before Tripitaka can ride
to the rescue, he must first shake off the
unshakeable lust of ugly-as-sin Meiyan (Charlene
Choi), whose people located the tied-to-a-Golden
Staff Tripitaka. Hijinks ensue as Tripitaka and
Meiyan uses the Golden Staff, which can turn into
just about anything, including a giant mecha with
mini-guns (think "Matrix:
Revolutions"), to time travel, visit the
cosmos, the Heavens, and all that other good
stuff. Along the way, a space princess (the lovely
Bingbing Fan) hiding in a floating cocoon of sorts
show up, along with her giant fleet of spaceships
and an army of laser rifle carrying Ultraman-like
soldiers. Yes, it's that kind of movie.
If "A Chinese Tall
Story" was determined to out-CGI, out-weird,
and generally out-everything the other big-budget,
CGI-laden Chinese movie of 2005, namely Chen
Kaige's "The
Promise", then it succeeded.
Quality-wise? Not so much. The two films share two
things: star Nicholas Tse and lots of CGI. I mean,
more CGI than in "Avenging
Fist". Even more than in all three "Matrix"
movies combined. We're talking a lot
of CGI here, the quality of which ranges from
cheesy, to silly, to cheesy and silly, to "Oh
my God are they serious?" Which is a shame,
because when Lau elects to maximize the physical
set designs, the film looks gorgeous. And unlike
other green screen heavy films like "Sin
City", there's no attempt with "Tall
Story" to make the effects seamless. Or at
least, if they tried, they never came close to
succeeding.
The first hour and change of
"A Chinese Tall Story" is all goofy
hijinks and jokes, as Tripitaka and Meiyan
eventually find themselves in the company of
super-powered villagers determined to teach
Tripitaka the ways of fighting so that he may,
finally, make that whole rescue-his-disciples
thing happen already. No, really, the film tends
to forget its many storylines in lieu of the here
and now. Sun Wukong and the other two captured
disciples show up in the beginning, and then
disappear completely until over an hour later.
Same for the Tree Demon and the Space Princess. To
see a traditional, coherent narrative in
"Tall Story" is to ask for the
impossible.
To no one's surprise, "A
Chinese Tall Story" eventually finds itself
indulging in its inevitable Public Bathroom
Abortion scene (see "Sex
is Zero" for the reference). This is
when, almost always towards the end of the movie,
the filmmakers decide they've had enough of comedy
and now wants to move into heavy Melodrama so that
they can "affect" the audience. In
"Tall Story", we get Meiyan, now
beautified, being tied to a rock with barbed wires
and covered in blood. Tripitaka also gets his legs
broken during a bloody fight. No, really. Western
audiences will be shock by the sudden tonal shift,
but Eastern audiences will be wondering why it
took the Public Bathroom Abortion scene so long to
show up.
In the end, "A Chinese
Tall Story" is innocuous enough that, if
approached in the right frame of mind, its
trespasses and excesses are easy to excuse. The
film's humor is of the hit and miss variety, and
no doubt native Chinese speakers will get more out
of the film's verbal gags than the rest of us.
Shave 20 minutes off, including the pointless
Public Bathroom Abortion scene tagged on at the
end, and there's a recommendation here somewhere.
Nevertheless, I'm hardpressed to say with any
conviction if sitting through an hour and 40
minutes of "A Chinese Tall Story" is
worth a couple of chuckles here and there. |
