Zhongkui: Snow Girl and the Dark Crystal (2015)

I wanted to but couldn't!

Great Film overall

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...

Nothing is what it seems in this cleverly done movie. In this epic adventure, the thin line separating good from evil is often blurred and crossed, leaving the audience wondering about who the true hero really is. The only constant is immortal love. A must watch for those who love this genre, you won't be disappointed!

The Three Acts: Initial Tableau: Every 1000 years at July 15, a period of travel among Hell, Heaven, and Earth ensues, where travel is done by reincarnation. Devastation results as demons reincarnate near the village of Hu on Earth. The powers that be in Heaven dispatch a volunteer, Zhang Dao Xian, to help out the humans caught in the crossfire. Zhong Kui steals the 'Dark Crystal' from an active ceremony in Hell itself, and is spirited away by Zhang, one of the gods. The Snow Demon volunteers to the Demon King to fetch back the crystal. Her sister, Little Snow, is being held captive by the King, so her compliance is assured.Delineation of Conflicts: Snow Demon wants the crystal for her King. Heaven wants to keep it, so as to restore all the souls taken by demons. Zhong Kui is assigned to protect the Dark Crystal as it lies hidden within Hu. When a traveling troupe of entertainers arrives from the west, Zhong finds that Little Snow came with it. Can Zhong help free Little Snow from Hell, or will she seduce him away from his primary duty to Heaven? Will he successfully defend the Dark Crystal and the captured souls within it?Resolution: There are some major reversals during the final segment as resolution approaches. Those were quite well done.

It's no understatement that half of Zhong Kui is made of video game CG animation, which is not a bad thing visual-wise. This is probably one of the better looking animations from Chinese films, it is much more detailed and graphically pleasant from other recent works, though not every scene is gold. With aesthetically pleasing production value of costume and setting, the movie changes an average myth story into an eye candy.Story follows Zhong Kui, a demon slayer with tragic past and his love interest the Snow Girl. As fate has it, they would meet in a struggle for a magical relic called Dark Crystal, so far the title is on point. The script stumbles a bit as the heavenly endeavor has too many plot devices masked as supreme powers and also much of the film is invested on Romeo and Juliet theme.This is usual in mythical flick, the character or item has overpowered attribute so there's little consistency. Fortunately, the two leads perform well, especially Li Bing Bing as Snow Girl. If a comparison should be made, she's dressed and presented much like Disney's Cinderella. Her pale visage and good acting will delight the audiences, moreover the film utilizes the beauty in majestic set pieces throughout.Pacing is rather slow, the film serves also as drama between the two, this can be exhausting as the predictable romantic plot takes a bulk of the movie. It employs a couple of decent twists at latter half only to end up on an anticlimactic conclusion. Nevertheless, each scene is presented with elaborate colorful vistas and dashing outfits.Furthermore, half of it is well crafted CGI animation, everyone who have played any video games will see the resemblances. This is much better than previous Chinese animation, the details of face and clever way it paints the environment outweighs some occasions where the effect seems plastic or slow. There are times that the graphic might look jarring and outdated, but for most important part it is quite presentable.Zhong Kui doesn't stray far from typical myth of heaven and hell or forbidden love cliché, although it has stylish production and gorgeous set pieces to paint an ordinary tale with more fascinating colors.

A Visually exciting mesh of live actors/actresses perfectly blended with State of the art CGI to produce a story and characters that bring passion and action to the viewer. A banquet for the eyes. Li Bing Bing, a veteran actress performs superbly and will be every young man's heart throb. Also, there is the new multifaceted and talented actress/singer Jike Junyi. In only her second film, already she delivers enticingly believable characters who add the "thrill" to going to a movie. Jike Junyi's performance, while brief, delivers magical surprises at exactly the right moment to wow and astonish the viewer. A most entertaining film that I will watch again.