Kung Fu Monster (2018)

Monstrously bad

Kung Fu Monster is an uneven comedy that fails with the comedy more often than not. It also fails to live up to its title with very little monster or kung fu.

The beginning of the film is all over the place narrative wise, making it very hard to keep up with who is who, especially when some of the faces will never be seen again. To top it off, it's not told chronologically so you just have to go with it until later on when flashbacks explain what happened and to whom, although those events aren't in order either. They leave it to the viewer to figure out what happened. Basically, a group of bandits and rebels gather together to steal the reward for the capture of the Imperial Secret Policeman Si Hai (Louis Koo) who released a furry monster with big eyes that looks a lot like a gremlin from a secret jail because he couldn't train it to be a killer as the evil Eunuch Yehe wanted. He also sprang Bing Bing, the beautiful incarcerated daughter of an executed man. Basically, in for a penny, in for a pound. He's ultimately caught and encased in a coffin to be sent back to the eunuch. Meanwhile, the group of miscreants plan to steal what they think is silver in the coffin by staging a trap at an abandoned inn. All but Bing Bing are furious when it turns out there's no silver, only the wanted policeman. Not a problem, there's a bounty on his head and they are prepared to turn him in. When the furby shows up, I mean monster, now they can collect 30,000 more for it. This being a movie short on logic, of course they change their minds and decide to help, especially when there isn't another choice as the eunuch closes in on them.

There's almost no kung fu, there's a little magic fu, but not much fighting at all. Near the end of the movie there's finally a little monster kung fu, but that's a generous interpretation. So, if you are looking for some good fights, this isn't the movie. They even rip-off the Hulk's funniest scene with Loki from The Avengers movie.

The only thing that actually made me laugh was an officer named Detective White-browed Fei whose white brows were removable. Even when being used as a practice dummy for the gang's knives he was insisting on martial arts decorum. How funny you think the movie is depends on how well you like slapstick and apparently I have a very low tolerance for it. I also have a low tolerance for lots of random events happening just to have something moving the story along.

I found the movie to be too frenetic, jumping from mood to mood. One minute a monster is recklessly charging through the inn, the next there's a romantic dance scene, then death is on the line. There wasn't remotely enough time to develop any of the characters. Most of the actors did the best with what they could for their thinly drawn characters. Zhou Dong Yu gave the most complex performance even though her character was initially very annoying. Louis Koo looked as if he was thinking, "What has happened to my career?" The CGI monster was not the greatest even though it was supposed to be adorable given that it cooed whenever it was onscreen. A "cute" monster doesn’t draw me in unless they give me a reason for it to. It would have also been nice if they'd explained the presence of monsters in the late Ming Dynasty. World building matters.

Kung fu and monsters are two movie genres I enjoy, but this movie was the dumbest and most chaotic movie I've seen in a while. Honestly, the outtakes were better than the movie. Kung Fu Monster should have been fun, but I found myself sympathizing with Louis Koo---someone get me out of here!

3/7/23

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