Name: Painted Skin: the Resurrection (2012) IMDb: link to IMDb
Genres: Fantasy, mystery, romance. Country of Origin: China. Directed by: Wuershan.
Cast: Zhou Xun as Xiaowei (fox demon), Chen Kun as Huo Xin (warrior), Zhao Wei as Princess Jing, Mi Yang as Quer (bird demon), Morgan Benoit as the Wolf Boy of Tian Lang Kingdom, Shaofeng Feng as Pang Lang (the Monster Slayer), Kris Phillips as the Witch Doctor of Tian Lang.
The Three Acts:
The initial tableaux: Sequel to Painted Skin (2008). Five hundred years have passed since the fox demon Xiaowei was imprisoned in the original film. The bird demon Quer helped Xiaowei escape, and travels with her. Xiaowei has a habit of eating the hearts of human men whom she had seduced. She does this to regenerate the pleasing side of her visible form.
Xiaowei rather disliked the time in the frost prison, and looks for a change to her life. She encounters Princess Jing and Huo Xin, the warrior who was entrusted to guard Jing. However, Jing's face was disfigured on Huo Xin's watch. He blames himself for this; Jing had a golden mask made to cover it.
Delineation of conflicts: Xiawei comes to like Jing and Xin. She sees a process to become mortal, but it involves bringing harm to Jing and Xin. Jing would like her own beauty restored, but the cost might be steep indeed. The Tian Lang state would like to make inroads in Jing's kingdom; Jing and company would rather that not happen. Tian Lang's true motives are darker.
Resolution: One might guess how the film's climax comes to pass, but difficult choices are involved. Are the principal characters up to it?
One line summary: Poor effects, poor script, so-so actors.
Statistics:
a. Cinematography: 2/10 The visuals are largely spoiled by effects. The green screen composites were many, and looked fake. The models used are not all that well done, and looked to be perhaps 1970s quality. The credits in the opening sequence looked bad. Clearly a lot of money was dumped on this project, but the effect was not worth it.
Makeup and wardrobe were poor, obvious, badly done.
b. Sound: 4/10 The background music seemed overly florid. The spoken dialogue was irrelevant to me, since I do not understand spoken Mandarin Chinese, and will not any time soon. The subtitles seemed adequate, and not glaringly incorrect. The +4 is for the lovely music over the closing credits.
c. Acting: 0/10 I've seen American directors get better results from unknown actors. Having to watch the dreary performances of the actors who played the fox, the princess, the warrior, the bird, and the Tian Lang folk was drudgery.
d. Screenplay: 1/10 Did I identify with any of the characters? No. Did I empathise with any of the characters? No. Did I like any of the characters? No. Were the Tian Lang opposition members (the bad guys) interesting? No. Was there any comic relief? No. Did I enjoy 30 minutes of plot being stretched over 131 minutes with this uninteresting group? No.
Final rating: 1/10, though not that good. I am usually a fan of Asian film, and this property received much critical praise. For the reasons given above, I think it deserves little if any.
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