L'empire du roi-singe

Surprisingly and shockingly awful. There are a lot of significant events, but no story. Constant stickfights that all look the same, aren't very exciting, and all the good guys win far too easily so no tension is created, do not make a movie action packed. Constant scenes of giant whirlpools or people flying do not make a movie magical when the scenes are poorly done and completely unmotivated by character. Watching two people kiss and express their love for one another does not make a movie romantic unless the two characters have some chemistry and interaction. The problem isn't that this movie is cheesy and formulaic. The problem is that the cheesy formula is unbelievably poorly executed. The characters are never developed, the special effects (especially the tiger) are often second rate, the story is not only derivative of every fantasy movie ever but derivative of itself (two separate villages that have had their children kidnapped by bad people), at least don't repeat your own ideas in the same movie. Dialogue is awful and cardboard, and the acting is pretty much lousy. This is everything the typical, paint-by-numbers approach to movie making yields. This movie is so bad it's insulting to it's audience. Horrible. Save yourselves and don't go near this worthless mess of a mini-series.

This movie is a contemporary take on the classic Chinese novel "Journey to the West," which is a fictionalized account of the legends around the Buddhist monk Xuánzàng's pilgrimage to India during the Táng dynasty in order to obtain Buddhist religious texts called sutras.

The ministers have imprisoned the writer of the book, and are attempting to destroy it to reverse time back to traditional Chinese life, i.e. before any modernization. The modern world will be destroyed unless The Scholar From Above (Thomas Gibson) can enter the underworld and save it.

Don't make any mistake. Gibson would not have taken one step except for the fact that he was following the luscious Bai Ling, who anyone would follow to the gates of Hell.

He rescues Sun Wukong the Monkey King (Russell Wong - Romeo Must Die), and is joined by Zhu Bajie(Pigsy)(Eddie Marsan - 21 Grams, Vera Drake) and Sha Wujing (Friar Sand) (Kabir Bedi - Octopussy) to save the book and save the world. It is almost a Wizard of Oz adventure, as they all have personal issues to resolve in addition to the mission.

Of course, Kuan Yin (Bai Ling) appears any time he utters a prayer. Thankfully, for the many appearance of Bai Ling make this film worth watching. She is usually in another spectacular costume each time she appears.

Besides spectacular costumes, the sets were lavishly decorated. The special effects were magnificent, and the martial arts displays exciting.

It was overly long, but most great adventures are. Anyway. that is more time to watch Bai Ling.

Some other commentators have bemoaned the historical faults, others the romantic interest. To which I say this - first off, it was a made for TV movie. What is the first role of such a movie? To entertain. Perhaps the History Channel will do a more accurate documentary, if that's what people want. As for the romance, where would the movie "Titanic" have been without the love story? Similarly, this movie needs the romantic interest to move the very 21st Century "Scholar" into a position to want to get involved with people that are more the stuff of Myth, Legend, and to a great degree, Hope. Otherwise, why should he bother? "The Journey West" is a story I'd not heard of. Now, even with this fanciful introduction, I think I'll go look it up and read it. To bring me to do this, both the movie, and other comments here, have thus been successful. Microwave up the popcorn, sit back and enjoy the show. Just don't take it too seriously, just enjoy it for the entertainment that it is.

The Lost Empire is a excellent updating and play off a an ancient Chinese novel entitled "Journey to the West".

For viewers who have some knowledge of Chinese myths and stories this movie is a real treat. It brings back all the wonderful characters of one of the most beloved novels of childhood.

On the other hand if you don't have a clue who the Monkey King was, let alone the celestial Kingdom and the Jade Emperor, than you might not get the underlying story elements, but the movie should still be a great deal of fun simply as a great adventure story with wonderful special effects and some very amusing characters.

This movie can be enjoyed by young and old. Think of it as an Asian version of Wizard of Oz, Ben Hur and Indiana Jones all rolled into one.

Lost Empire, a VERY strange title for a retelling of the old Chinese classic adventure "Journey to the West", is a mixed bag of a film. David Hwang's screenplay is in many respects a sequel to the original story, as opposed to being a modern rendition of the original story. I regard this as a mistake as I believe Mr. Hwang lost more by giving up on the original characters than he gained by having a modern setting.

Good points: The lovely Ling Bai did a good job as the Bodhisattva of Compassion (Kwan Yin). Some scenes with Monkey and the "Scholar from Above" went well (mainly the scenes when Monkey rescues his subjects on Flower Fruit Island). Some interplay between "Sandy" and the "Scholar from Above" was funny. Some of the art design for the palace of the Jade Emperor was good (but NOT the throne room, yuk!).

Bad points: Too many explosions. A really ugly and totally wrong portrait of Confucius (I could go on for some time but I'll stick with this key point: Confucius was a materialist. He had no interest in religion and spirits. He was only interested in how a good state was run. The depiction of Confucius in this movie is totally at odds with EVERYTHING that Confucius stood for.) The last half-hour of the movie was anti-climactic, over-wrought, and uninteresting.

Deeper problems: Journey to the West is, at its core, at Buddhist story about the quest to attain enlightenment (along with the fun stuff about beating demons). This story (Lost Empire) takes place AFTER Monkey and Sandy have achieved their ultimate state. They are both "supposed" to be enlightened beings. The problem with this is that a) they don't act like enlightened beings, and b) there isn't much drama possible when you are enlightened. You can really tell the weakness in the writing when Kwan Yin has to tell Monkey's old teacher that "Monkey HAS been blessed by the Buddha". If you need a 3rd party (a goddess no less) to convince other people that you have become enlightened and have been blessed by the Buddha, well, its clear to me that the story is saying one thing, but doing another.

In fact, none of the characters behaves "in character". At least not like the characters that you enjoyed when reading "Journey to the West".

Deepest problem: the story (Lost Empire) is trying to both be and not be "Journey to the West" at the same time. Its trying to both be true to original ideas and be "modern" and up-to-date at the same time. Its trying to be a sequel that retells the original story. It is, in short, a total mess at a very deep level. -- Colin Glassey