English title: Three Kingdoms: Resurrection of the Dragon
Rating: NC-16 (Some Battle Scenes)
Running time: 106 minutes
Opens: 3 April 2008, Now Showing
Some info:
1) Wiki Article
2) IMDB Profile
3) Official Site (English)
There has been some talk about this show before it premiered. Things like how Maggie Q doesn’t suit the role of such a Chinese role etc. However after seeing the movie, I think it’s generally quite ok and nicely done.
The summary of the show can be found in the Wiki Article. Do note however that the movie is not entirely accurate since 赵云 didn’t die in a battle as portrayed in the movie. Yeah, the wiki article mentions the differences as well so yeah.
The movie indeed puts enough focus on the main character, and some of his more notable achievements etc. Some of the fights are really nice, especially seeing the use of the 枪 (not the gun/pistol hoh!!). Quite swee to see the action scenes. On the downside, I somehow got a little bored towards the later half of the show. Not sure if me being tired (for some unknown reason) yesterday has anything to do with it. Well, at least the positive traits of 赵云 are kept intact bah, though I don’t know if they left out other important things cos I don’t know my 3 Kingdoms well enough anyway. Hahaha.
For the really bad side of the show, there are a few areas which really require work on:
1) Firstly, 赵子龙 in the English subtitles is spelt as Zao Zilong, but for the most of it Zilong is used. Omg right? I have absolutely no idea how that managed to pass the QC. Sad case. Oh and 阿斗 is subbed as Adu. Best liao lor. Really is 差一点 (playing on 阿杜’s song title) then correct le.
2) The voices are obviously dubbed. Ok, at least they match the cast’s lip movements. And some of the voices are the usual ones u hear on HK drama serials and stuff. Sigh, they need to get a bigger voice actor/actress base. Learn from Japan!!! =P
3) Next would be the timing of the subtitles in the movie. There are so many cases where the subtitles don’t exactly match the time the audio is being said. It’s either too early (usually the case) or a tad too late. Or even worse, it has extra lines of subtitles that were never mentioned by anyone in the movie, whether before or after the text appeared. On top of that, the subtitles can have VARYING font sizes in order to accommodate all the words being said in a string. While I understand it’s not exactly very meaningful to split up the sentences (especially those said nicely in Chinese pattern), I would think letting people be able to read the subtitles is more essential. After all, what’s the use of the subtitles if people have to really stare the subtitles to be able to read it?
On a side note, the official site’s “about the film” section, also has a typo in the very first word after the heading, Synopsis. Gosh, what a bad typo, since it belongs to Mr 赵. Not surprising, since in the movie itself, it’s also mistyped. Gosh, how could they do that to the main lead of the show, much less a heroic figure. Sighx, they really need to improve on their proof reading (or maybe translation as well). Maybe there are other minor errors but I didn’t really go read the (sparse) contents of the website. Lol.
My take: 6/10. Overall, it’s quite a nice watch though there are blemishes (mainly the post-filming production) here and there that made the movie looked a little bad. =D I wonder how the upcoming 赤壁 will fare.
p.s. Vaness Wu (who makes a cameo [sorta] appearance) looks weird in that kind of 造型. Lol, I nearly wanted to laugh when I finally recognised him upon 2nd close-up during the movie. Oh, his fans please don’t bash me too much ya? =P
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