Mulan 2020
The wife wanted to watch this. I didn’t.
As a disclaimer, I’ve only caught bits and pieces of the cartoon over the years but I kinda know what it’s about. I, however, did read The Ballad of Mulan so the claim of this being a more realistic movie that sticks to the that version of the story is pure nonsense IMHO. No, seriously, it’s nonsense. It’s a Disney movie. No one expects that shit. Just don’t bullshit people.
The original story of Mulan is anti-war and pro-Confucian style filial piety. There’s nothing in here than resembles any of it’s themes.
You know why I don’t watch big budget movies from China? Because they’re mostly big budget Hollywood movie ripoffs without any thought given to interpreting them through the lens of the local culture(I’m talking about culture, not the settings/backdrop), something that Hong Kong movies did so well in the 80s and early 90s, which is why they also rip off Hong Kong movies but the results are even worse unless Wu Jing is at the helm.
What they normally end up becoming is something that visually resembles a Hollywood blockbuster set in some CGI version of China with the storylines and characters not making any sense because they’re just mindlessly ripped off from existing Hollywood movie templates.
THIS movie somehow managed to look like a ripoff of a big budget China movie trying really hard to pander to the China market whereas China movies are made the way they are because the local audience likes big budget Hollywood movies, which makes even less sense than that Nicholas Cage movie set in China where he played a character called “The White Ghost”. At least that was a lot more entertaining and I still believe his line in the movie where he proudly announces,“I AM THE WHITE GHOST!” was an elaborate prank played on him by the crew. I actually highly recommend the latter if you want to watch a “so bad it’s good” kind of movie.
So what’s good about this movie?
The fight choreography. But they’re just pretty little dances without any depth , something that you can see executed far better in any of the big budget crap Zhang Yimou has made. Zhang Yimou(House of Flying Daggers, Hero), however, may be overrated but he isn’t a shitty director. He can make a really good movie(To Live, Not One Less, Red Sorghum) when he wants to. At his worst, he makes The Great Wall. Yes, that piece of crap starring Matt Damon.
Donnie Yen. Donnie Yen opens half a can of whoopass for 2secs on the battlefield because he’s Donnie Yen(you’ll know what I’m talking about when you see it) and then they CUT AWAY. Good job, people, good job.
Gong Li is still hot. She’s also a damn fine actress of Meryl Streep calibre but her talent is wasted here.
The silly usage of the word “chi”.
This seriously made me lol. “Chi” can mean 1 of 2 things. It’s either part of some old ying yang nonsense, or some kind of superpower found in wuxia novels and movies where characters use it to fly, make the ground explode or “throw their voices over 1000 miles”. Powerful shit.
When you use “chi” in a traditional Chinese context, there’s both ying and yang “chi”. Yang is good shit like sunshine, rainbows and masculinity. “Yin” is the bad shit like darkness and femininity. You need both to balance each other out because we can’t just have nice things. Once a man gets married, his wife drains his yang “chi”. You can see how this isn’t just a Chinese concept lol. Obviously, the New Age bullshit being sold nowadays redefines this, but it is what it is.
The cinematography and set design is pretty good, almost good enough to detract from the shitty editing.
The dialogue was worse than the English dubbed versions of some old Italian schlock horror movies. That made me lol too but it just gets off putting after a while. I tried to translate some of it into Mandarin in my head but it still made no sense so I gave up.
So, I don’t know. This will probably be a hit in China because the China market will lap up anything that looks pretty and colorful with a big budget. Kids will probably enjoy it. I didn’t.
2/10