The things I do for love.
"Musical Vampire" is awful. It features an unstoppable hopping vampire. Nothing effects it, not talismans, not a bagua mirror, not beheading, nothing. Its only apparent weakness is that it grows motionless upon hearing the song "London Bridge Is Falling Down," which means that you, the audience, are forced to listen to seemingly endless repetitions of people whistling the ditty.
That's seriously annoying.
Anyway, that's not why we're here. If we wanted quality filmmaking, we'd look to Wong Kar Wai, Ang Lee, Johnny To, and any number of talented auteurs of Hong Kong cinema.
We're here for kung fu, and we're here for spirit magic.
So what does "Musical Vampire" teach us about spirit magic?
Lam Ching Ying has a bow and he fires yellow talismanic arrows. At one point these arrows create a kind of bulletproof force field.
He also has a pair of magic yellow paper umbrellas. He can fly, using them.
He uses a bagua mirror to hypnotize a squadron of troops, and he spins an umbrella to make the soldiers run in a circle.
He performs shoujue that force a man to turn his gun on himself.
Bored yet? None of the magic I've discussed so far has the flavor of authenticity -- I already know that if I research this material, I won't find it in any Chinese texts. And it all lacks any form of mythic resonance.
Oddly, the film picks up in the last few minutes. There's more energy, more turnabouts, and more compelling spirit magic.
There are also old-fashioned acupuncture needles inserted into specific points along the jiangshi's energetic meridians, when the full moon is obscured by clouds, at a time and place specific to the dead man's birthdate and hour.
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"Musical Vampire" is awful. It features an unstoppable hopping vampire. Nothing effects it, not talismans, not a bagua mirror, not beheading, nothing. Its only apparent weakness is that it grows motionless upon hearing the song "London Bridge Is Falling Down," which means that you, the audience, are forced to listen to seemingly endless repetitions of people whistling the ditty.
That's seriously annoying.
Anyway, that's not why we're here. If we wanted quality filmmaking, we'd look to Wong Kar Wai, Ang Lee, Johnny To, and any number of talented auteurs of Hong Kong cinema.
We're here for kung fu, and we're here for spirit magic.
So what does "Musical Vampire" teach us about spirit magic?
Lam Ching Ying has a bow and he fires yellow talismanic arrows. At one point these arrows create a kind of bulletproof force field.
He also has a pair of magic yellow paper umbrellas. He can fly, using them.
He uses a bagua mirror to hypnotize a squadron of troops, and he spins an umbrella to make the soldiers run in a circle.
He performs shoujue that force a man to turn his gun on himself.
Bored yet? None of the magic I've discussed so far has the flavor of authenticity -- I already know that if I research this material, I won't find it in any Chinese texts. And it all lacks any form of mythic resonance.
Oddly, the film picks up in the last few minutes. There's more energy, more turnabouts, and more compelling spirit magic.
- If a man finds himself becoming a jiangshi (stiff corpse, or hopping vampire), he can cure himself of his condition using the following formula: take red sand, dried shrimp, and weed, and grind them into a powder. Make tea from this powder, drink it twice a day for three months.
- Three weeks after a man dies, his corpse can't speak. Five weeks after he dies, the corpse can speak ghost language. After nine weeks, it can speak corpse language.
There are also old-fashioned acupuncture needles inserted into specific points along the jiangshi's energetic meridians, when the full moon is obscured by clouds, at a time and place specific to the dead man's birthdate and hour.
