Lord of the 金箍棒 - Return of the (Monkey) King

I guess it was suppose to turn out an epic, and the audience of the western world would probably think it so. I mean, it's a big budget hollywood production starred by arguably the two most reknowned martial artists of this generation. It's got breathtaking scenaries, exotic sets and stunning special effects. And of course, it also stars the angelic Liu Yi Fei.

But show it to chinese audience, and we will find it quite a comedy. The entire feel of the movie is like LOTR of the east, complete with Mount Doom lookalike 五行山.

There's a fellowship of misfits: drunken fake immortal aka Kay Sian; Monkey King's Hair turned Monk, Ang Mo teenager from USA (they die die must have an ang mo save the fricking day regardless the setting! Goodness!) and my angelic Liu Yi Fei (acting the part of a pouty Zhang Zi Yi).

There's a long journey fraught with assassins and ambushes.

There's a Rivendale-like haven before the final assault (aka 少林寺 but the constructed set is a sorry effort to those who have seen the real thing.)

There's a practically inassailable enemy stronghold (but piece of cake for any decent self-respecting heroes and heroines of an epic movie).

And the most funny thing is the constant slew of exotic, idiomic-sounding, philosophical-like rambling that sound like they were translated from Chinese. But read the chinese subtitles and you will find that the Chinese version is no less convoluted and definitely nothing I have heard before.

And they did not event bother to think of new names: Liu Yi Fei is 金燕子 (i.e., the Golden Sparrow) and Li Bing Bing is 白发魔女 (which the subtitle tells us is "the one raised by wolves", i.e., the true blue 练霓裳 from 梁羽生's 白发魔女。)

The final straw is when Ang Mo return to his own time and place, he discovers Liu Yi Fei is the girl running a memorabilia store next door and the name of the store is the Golden Sparrow. Parrot can only say: "Sai!"

Apart from the ok action scenes, I guess the only redeeming quality is (not Liu Yi Fei) but Li Bing Bing who is at her most beautiful ( I think) as 白发魔女。I've never considered her very beautiful but she looks absolutely stunning here.

In case you still haven't realise by now, I was talking about The Forbidden Kingdom.