WTF China?!?: Shaolin vs. Evil Dead 2

Don't you just hate being left waiting?  I know I did when it came to this movie.  As I mentioned in yesterday's review, the producers of this film chose to end it on a cliffhanger without bothering to make sure that funding was there for a sequel.  Would this be doomed to end up like Jet Li's Evil Cult or The Super Mario Brothers?  Tell me it wouldn't end up like Deep Rising, the movie that still begs to have a sequel!  As it turns out, that would not be the case.  No, we get closure to this story, but at what price?  This film came out about two years later, although there were definitely some changes in store.  Why talk about it...when I can talk about it below the title card?  This is...

The film begins with...something completely unrelated.  Um, remember the cliffhanger where the most powerful Taoist was possessed by an evil spirit?  He was going to kill our heroes.  Nothing, huh?

So yeah, the bulk of this movie is designed to show how the bad Taoist monk would become a bad guy.  It has something to do with kung-fu fighting, poison and demons.  Do I care?  No.  Way to waste two-thirds of a movie, guys!  Give me the real movie now.

The final battle takes place between the two Taoist monks and it's...um, weird.  It involves the two of them fighting in a Cube (not that one!) and battling through rooms that represent the Four Elements.  It's weird, random and full of low-budget CG crap.  It has a certain charm, but what the hell does any of it really mean?!?  Who the hell knows?!?!?  The End.

You may think that I was just being lazy or negative here, but that's the vibe the movie gives off.  Seriously, it took nearly two years for this film to get funding, get shot and make it onto the international market & that's what they gave us.  What the hell?!?  You clearly had some footage made for this movie- you showed it in your damn credits!  Instead of giving us more of that, we get an hour's worth of back-story that has nothing to do with anything.  Did we need build-up and explanation for Fan Siu-Wong's character being evil?  No.  For one thing, they already explained it in a simple manner in the first film.  Secondly, he gets possessed!  Let's put this movie in perspective.  Imagine if you were a kid who would had just watched the ending of The Empire Strikes Back.  Now imagine that the three years have gone by and you got...an hour summary of the entire prequel trilogy.  How pissed would you be?  Exactly.  I need to think about something less irritating and more innocent...

Next up, I celebrate a recently-popular internet holiday: 4/20.  In honor of that, a film that I'm sure celebrates drug use.  Stay tuned...