Yin-Yang Master I

I feel like 6/10 may even be too generous. Still, it is visually pleasing.... but it was hard for me to look past the largely incoherent storyline. Such a shame because it had so much potential. To enjoy this movie you have to lower your expectations in advance.... and try not to think too much about the insane amount of plot holes.

I was inspired to watch this because "Yin Yang Master" (also 2021) was entertaining. This one was different. It was a feast for the yes in terms of CGI, very realistically rendered. But the plot was convoluted, and the reasoning for the plot seemed so very arbitrary that I simply didn't care.

This movie was a mashup of old chinese kung-fu movies of medieval times, TLR, End Game, Dr. Strange, E. T. (at least the glowing fingers), and probably others. Like ye olde chinese medieval movies, the characters take themselves way too seriously, and every sentence is uttered as if a gem of wisdom to be savoured. Tiresome.

The fight scenes in the beginning was as ballet as can be. At the end, however, it got more realistic. Thanks or that saving grace.

The scenery was awesome, as was the music. Set design, etc., all great. The story? Meh.

The language and cultural differences are still a huge barrier for people from English or other foreign language speaking countries to truly understand this movie. The fighting scenes and the special effects are simply not the focus of the movie. The theme of this film is love. For people who can truly resonate with this movie, it's really hard not to cry.

Audience from Asian countries definitely can better resonate with the love story between the Princess and Zhongxing (Qingming's master). Some people say the love in this movie is too philosophical or even cliche. One reason is they simply cannot appreciate Oriental style of love. Another reason is because the English script is too bad. Honestly, both the English dubbing and the scripts are bad. For English audience, I don't know if it will be better to listen to the Chinese audio and read the English script.

There are just so many things lost in the translation. The music is first class!!! I am a Chinese, so I can almost fully understand what this movie is talking about. The first time I watched it, I simply cannot stop crying mutiple times.

This is a film that is over two hours long. Most of it is people emoting with their faces without doing anything, moving slowly, talking slowly. The rest is a bit of Wire-fu and CGI and a lot of knowledge lost in translation. That doesn't make it a bad film, because the production values and acting were good, while the story is a combination of murder mystery, detective story, love drama and monster flick. Yeah, it goes all over the place. It's just slow.

Moreover, a lot of other reviewers took the story to be about the love between the master and the empress, but to me it felt like it was more between Qing Ming and Bo Ya. Certainly they had the more romantically long face emoting moments. And that ending!

Anyway, there is a lot of stuff lost in translation for a Westerner. Even if we don't need to understand the mechanics of the magic, or the spirit servants, or the giant snake, we can get the overall idea for the story. But as many other people said, what you see translated in the English subtitles is also not enough to understand what the people are talking about, certainly not the finer metaphorical and cultural aspects of the dialogue.

Bottom line: I watched this on the TV app, which doesn't have a speed setting. Netflix! Make the speed setting available everywhere!! Did I mention the film feels really slow?

A highly anticipated movie for me, I was counting down the days and hours to watch this but I'm left a little disappointed. The trick could be to keep your expectations low and maybe the movie will turn out better for you.

I love Mark Chao and Deng Lun to death (the 2 male leads). After watching "Eternal Love -10 Mile of Peach Blossom" and "Ashes of love" I was thrilled these guys were teaming up. Solid acting from the both of them in this movie. Mark with his facial expressions on point as usual, and Deng Lun giving everything he's got, there was a scene even his pores were acting.

But the story was a little convoluted. For most of the first half I was asking 'who was who' and 'what was what'? Then all of a sudden there was an awesome monster fighting scene that came out of nowhere. I was captivated but still confused. They distracted me with a half naked Deng Lun that I momentarily caved into the storlines' ambiguity. Then some of the missing pieces were filled in via some flashbacks and we were back on track again to understanding what the hell was happening and why it was happening.

I binged watched a lot of Mark Chao's and Deng Lun's dramas but I won't be in a hurry to watch this movie again.

Overall, I would recommend this movie if you're looking for a captivating action fantasy with a good (albeit delayed) storyline.