White Snake (2019)

[Drunk Monk]

Wow. Just wow. 

Some of the most stunning animation I've seen in a while. This is a sumptuous take on Green Snake, on of my fav films, that was redone as The Sorcerer and the White Snake with Jet Li a few years back (see http://www.brotherhoodofdoom.com/doomFor...p?tid=2361) I need to revisit Green Snake because it's been years, but this new version may have stolen the crown. 

Everything about it worked for me, the vision, the yaoguai world, the storytelling, the snakes Blanca and Verte, the villains, the dopey human Xuan and even the dog Doudou. But most of all was the animation, which was brilliantly colorful and captured a magical world with a fresh style. Chinese animation has come a long way. Especially after seeing the animated A Chinese Ghost Story last night (http://www.brotherhoodofdoom.com/doomFor...3#pid41773) which was cutting edge in its day, this is a whole new level. It's so sophisticated and robust. I must see Abominable now, which I've been meaning to check out since last year. I would jump at the chance to see this in 3D IMAX. 

Loved it. 

No sword fights but lots of magical Kung Fu. DOOM recommended.

Hoopla.

---

and just for me 

[Drunk Monk]

Watched this again with Tara & Bri. They were impressed too. I was struck by how much I forgot. Stuff just doesn’t stick in my mind like it used to. But that kept things fresh. Still, a bit worrisome as it was only like a year ago when I first saw this and I thought I was paying attention.

This is on Hoopla btw. 

I need to backtrack and watch all the lightchaser animes

[Drunk Monk]

It’s troubling that this is the third time I’ve watched this film and I remembered so little of it. It’s still great - so visual and fantastic - but I was astonished that I didn’t remember the three-headed crane lion. You’d think that would’ve stood out. It was almost like watching it for the first time. That’s how I keep it fresh. To quote Garcia ‘major memory lapses help.’

Now I see how it sets up the threequel. The end credit scene is the intro scene of thr threequel. And Green Snake is more like a tangent, the sequel to Nezha that Light Chaser just inserted in between part 1 & 3 and could be completely ignored except that it’s so good. Now 3 feels like an obligation, something planed that they went back for, but they kinda phoned it in. No wonder it didn’t get picked up by any North American distributor. It’s so weak by comparison. Hopefully Light Chaser hasn’t lost their way because they’ve been on a roll. 

In 2025 they plan to release Strange Tales from a Chinese Studio, which is based on a classic collection of twilight zonish tales from the 17th century. There are like 500 stories and I’ve read a few translations but less than 100 or so. Not sure if this is part of the New Gods universe either. We shall see. I’ll have to hunt down Chang’An, which came out prior to the White Snake threequel.