Yu Shaoqun gets Ning’s endearing klutziness down, but he lacks the handsomeness of Leslie Cheung, which certainly added some attraction to the original film's star-crossed romance. Unfortunately, the character of Ning Choi-San suffers. All things considered, Liu is a fine choice for the role. She also handles Siu Sin's emotional scenes well. But Liu possesses the proper ethereal qualities to play Siu Sin, and looks great in the character's trademark robes. Liu Yifei lacks Joey Wong’s seductiveness, making her Siu Sin less enigmatic and alluring than Wong’s take on the character. Also, Yin Chek Ha is called upon to be the butt of many jokes, and Koo is an ace at this sort of self-effacing comedy. Granted, it gives Louis Koo and Liu Yifei more opportunities to share screen time, and Koo as a tortured romantic lead is something that female audiences would likely support. However, given audience familiarity with the original film, the new love triangle seems an odd fit. Hong Kong Cinema was once celebrated for being deliriously, gorgeously fake, and Yip wisely retains that manufactured quality in his remake.
The visual effects are improved, but Yip lets the roughness of the production shine through, eschewing realism for a patently fake setting that’s obviously the work of the art department. Liberal use of dutch angles, blue backlighting and wirework add to the grateful familiarity. Director Wilson Yip keeps things moving briskly, and collaborates with cinematographer Arthur Wong to create a spruced-up vision of that old Hong Kong Cinema feeling. The film recalls the original with a number of solid reverential nods the filmmakers reuse Leslie Cheung’s classic song, and the film possesses the same costumes, character designs, and even the same "feel" as the original. Truthfully, there’s nothing terribly wrong with this remake of A Chinese Ghost Story. Eventually, everything and everyone will collide in a winner-take-all battle for love, destiny and box office earnings. Meanwhile, the Tree Demon still exists, and it’s none-too-happy. Unwilling to let Ning become food for her evil spirit sisters (Lin Peng and Gong Xinliang), Siu Sin hides him, and the two slowly begin to bond. Yin Chek Ha shows up to rout the other evil spirits, but the presence of the amnesiac Siu Sin causes his face to contort with great emotional pain (Louis Koo calls this “acting”). Tasked with finding water for a drought-suffering village (led by Hong Kong Cinema veteran Tsui Kam-Kong), Ning heads into the mountains where he meets Siu Sin in a loving slow motion shot stolen straight from the 1987 film.
Siu Sin is freed back into the forest while the tortured Yin continues in his quest to bring down the evil 10,000 year-old Tree Demon (Wai Ying-Hung).Ĭue the beginning of the 1987 Chinese Ghost Story, with the arrival of Ning Choi-Shan. The film opens with Yin and Siu Sin falling in love before duty impels Yin to remove Siu Sin’s memory. Previously, Yin Chek Ha was played by a unibrow-sporting Wu Ma, but here he’s embodied by the much hunkier Louis Koo. Yip’s new version modifies the love story between klutzy scholar Ning Choi-Shan (Yu Shaoqun) and forest spirit Siu Sin (Liu Yifei, playing a fox demon and not a ghost, as SARFT would require), creating a love triangle between those two and ghostbusting Taoist monk Yin Chek Ha. Unless you’re completely cinema illiterate, you should know that Wilson Yip’s 2011 fantasy adventure A Chinese Ghost Story (called A Chinese Fairy Tale in mainland China) is a remake of the 1987 Ching Siu-Tung classic A Chinese Ghost Story. Really, putting together a satisfactory remake of A Chinese Story was probably an impossible proposition. Wilson Yip's remake of the 1987 Chinese Ghost Story is OK for big budget audience fare, but it's impossible to forget that the original film exists and was also a whole lot better.
Louis Koo Tin-Lok, Crystal Liu Yifei, Yu Shaoqun, Kara Hui Ying-Hung, Louis Fan Siu-Wong, Wang Danyi Li, Gong Xinliang, Lin Peng, Li Jing, Tsui Kam-Kong, Fung Hak-On Yuk-Sing, Alan Chui Chung-San, Fan Chin-Hung Liu Yifei and Yu Shaoqun make like Joey and Leslie in A Chinese Ghost Story.