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movie review - Green Snake

the journal of Michael Werneburg

twenty-seven years and one million words

This is a Chinese-produced movie on Netflix that my daughter and I watched for "Movie Night". It's about a pair of demon sisters who for reasons that are not clear are trying to destroy a certain temple guarded by human magicians. One of the sisters is taken captive and the other spends more than two hours trying to recover her. It's a visually arresting piece, and it's got an original world in which demons, humans, and 'raksha' (which appear to have been lifted wholesale from Indo-Pacific culture) travel between worlds, avoiding ghostly winged monsters that will attempt to convert them into more ghostly winged monsters. There are a few unexplained elements in the movie that detract from the whole, such as the sister taken captive handing off her baby -- and then it never becoming clear what happens to the child.

There were some rough parts. "The Girl" and I lost count of the number of plot points and scene developments that we'd predicted. Also, the action at certain points became exhausting not only in their frenetic energy but the sheer volume. I do like me a good action piece, but when it's all an animated blur somewhat less. Still, it's entertaining and noticeably better than quite a bit of what's available on Netflix.

Recommended.