Highly Recommended
A gorgeously animated film with an elegance to its elements. Child friendly elements mix it up with some mature themes, but for us big kids it comes together to retell the Legend of the White Snake in a fresh and lively way.
The Legend of the White Snake, also known as Madame White Snake, is counted as one of China’s Four Great Folktales. The subject of countless retellings, it has been adapted to the screen dozens of times, beginning with Xinhua Studio’s 1939 film and carrying through to several web dramas released in 2019. So, while Amp Wong and Zhou Ji’s WHITE SNAKE (白蛇：緣起) isn’t the first time the tale has been animated, it is arguably the most beautiful.
Damao’s screenplay reinterprets the legend as something of a two-hander, as a young woman who has lost her memory is rescued by Xuan, a snake catcher. As the duo attempts to find out more about the young woman’s past, an entire mystical world is opened up to them both.
Fans of Hong Kong and Chinese cinema will be no strangers to variations on this tale, and will arguably be most familiar with Tsui Hark’s 1993 Green Snake with Maggie Cheung or the Jet Li starring The Sorcerer and the White Snake, notable at the time for its use of 3D. In comparison, this WHITE SNAKE is a more ‘Disneyfied’ affair, although it’s still filled with a wuxia vibe and is filled with familiar touchstones of Chinese cinema.
Where this edition separates itself from all others is in the stunning animation. Light Chaser Animation Studios, the production house behind 2016’s Little Door Gods, brings an elegance to everything on screen. Every shot looks like a photograph. There’s one sequence where the lead duo float through the landscape on an umbrella, and it is possibly one of the best examples of CG rendering on screen in the last year. It can happily sit alongside Big Fish and Begonia as a top example of China’s contemporary animation industry.
There is a slight tonal tension though, or at least a mix that western audiences may not be as familiar with. On the one hand, there’s the animated staple of a talking dog providing comedy relief. On the other, there’s a fair bit of animated violence, some scary monsters (and super creeps), and at least one bit of of PG-13 sexy times in a temple that you would definitely not see from the House of Mouse.
Yet there is so much to love here, from the delicately crafted action sequences to monsters appearing out of the mists like a Gareth Edwards film. If the post-credits sequence is anything to go by, it won’t be the last we see of these characters either.
2018 | China | DIR: Amp Wong, Zhao Ji | WRITER: Damao| CAST: Zhang Zhe, Yang Tianxiang | DISTRIBUTOR: Joy Pictures (China), Warner Bros., New York Asian Film Festival (US) | RUNNING TIME: 99 minutes | RELEASE DATE: 7 July 2019 (NYAFF)
