![]() Everything is always blowing in the wind like Beyonce’s hair, lending a mysterious grace to Joey in every scene.Īnd Leslie is adorably naïve. Joey is entrancing, a seductive portrait of long flowing locks wrapped in diaphanous silk gowns. With its international acclaim, The Enchanting Shadow set the stage for A Chinese Ghost Story 27 years later.Ģ5 Fiendishly Funny Horror Comedies By Kirsten Howard ![]() It plays out almost like a European gothic horror in its gradual pacing and eerie Theremin soundtrack. The Enchanting Shadow is a gorgeous film with sumptuous sets and costumes, which is what gave it such international appeal. Ning was Zhao Lei who enjoyed a long career of over a hundred films from the early 50s to the late 80s. Betty was a classic beauty, perfect for Nie, and this was her most celebrated role. Nie was Betty Loh Ti, who died tragically to an overdose at just 31. In the lead roles were two of the most popular actors of their generation. For that film, Qian Nu You Hun was translated as The Enchanting Shadow and was Hong Kong’s submission for Cannes and the Academy Awards. There was a notable adaptation of Nie’s tale in 1960. It’s a device to analyze what being human means, akin to the journeys of Data, Seven of Nine, and T’Pol in Star Trek. In Chinese folktales, supernatural beings often strive to become human. After Ning’s wife dies, he marries Nie and redeems her. She tries to capture a milquetoast travelling scholar, Ning Caichen, who manages to free her from her curse and takes her home to help his sickly wife. In the original tale, Nie is a beautiful ghost, doomed to haunt an abandoned temple and hunt for souls for a demon that has enslaved her. Nie Xiaoqian’s tale is a favorite having been retold in over a dozen TV shows and the films mentioned here. Tales from Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio have been depicted in countless Chinese films and TV shows, most recently in last year’s CGI-drenched FantAsia flick The Knight of Shadows: Between Yin and Yang where Jackie Chan played Pu Songling. These were stories of the supernatural world with covert social commentary, akin to The Twilight Zonetoday. All these Chinese Ghost Story films are titled Qian Nu You Hun in Chinese, which translates into “beautiful woman dark spirit.” This is the story of Nie Xiaoqian, drawn from a 1740 short story compilation titled Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio by Pu Songling. The Chinese Twilight Zone from the 1800sĪ Chinese Ghost Story retells a beloved Chinese tale of star-crossed romance. Ching Sui-tung directed all three A Chinese Ghost Story films and continues to deliver FantAsia films like The Sorcerer and the White Snake, but Tsui is the undisputed father of the genre. FantAsia is based on a longstanding body of fiction in movies and literature known as Wuxia, which means ‘martial heroes.’Ī Chinese Ghost Story was produced by Tsui Hark, who spearheaded FantAsia with his Zu: Warriors From The Magic Mountain four years prior to A Chinese Ghost Story, and followed with many other FantAsia classics like The Swordsman, Once Upon a Time in China and Green Snake. It includes superhuman Kung Fu (which means lots of wirework and flying about), magic spells and supernatural beasts. FantAsia is the Chinese answer to sword and sorcery flicks. If the horror, comedy, and Kung Fu menage a trois wasn’t enough, A Chinese Ghost Story was one of the first films of a then-burgeoning period genre called FantAsia. In the wake of that film, Kung Fu Horror Comedies became a thing of its own with plenty of franchises, most notably Mr. ![]() Adding martial arts action comes naturally because in Chinese culture sorcerers and exorcists are Daoist or Buddhist Kung Fu masters. The addition of Kung Fu is purely Hong Kong and can be traced to Sammo Hung’s groundbreaking Encounters of the Spooky Kind in 1980. It releases tension and leaves the audience unguarded for the next jump scare. This makes for great comic hijinks as hapless characters struggle to hold their breath while gruesome jiangshi shove their rotting noses close to their mouths trying to pick up the scent.Ĭomedy is a common horror film device. Often a jiangshi is blind but can smell breath. They hop along mindlessly with their arms outstretched like sleepwalkers, and feed on the life essence – or qi – of the living. Part zombie, part vampire, jiangshi are corpses that are usually reanimated by demons or Daoist sorcerers. Asian horror films are known as jiangshi, which is the name of a specific spooky hopping ghost found in Chinese folklore that proliferates these films. When A Chinese Ghost Story premiered in 1987, it was already part of a unique category – the fusion of horror, comedy, and Kung Fu.
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