Demon Hunter
Apr. 28th, 2014 09:41 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccaelizabethAs seems to happen a lot with these translated asian movies, 'Demon Hunter' is a rubbish title for this movie. It's as if someone watched Buffy the Vampire Slayer, without any changes, and decided to name it Xander. The Demon Hunter is the comic relief exposition guy, is all.
He's also the guy who writes the story down at the end, which at least Watsonially explains why he'd name it after himself.
But on the Doylist level, we have to look for another explanation why the movie is named for a guy who is like fifth most important to the story and has two blokes on the front cover who don't even turn up until the three main women have been introduced, and one of them's the boring bad guy.
I'd call the film 'The Princess and the Fox', kind of like The Emperor and the White Snake, only there actually is a princess in it. The two films sort of have a theme in common. And make me want to learn more languages so I can poke at the translations. 'Demon' just seems misleading. I mean, okay, they're nigh immortal magical beings who trick humans and eat their hearts, but they can change. That's the key in both films. They can just realise their error at any time. And that's not an option Western demons traditionally have, though you get it in a few modern movies. It just seems to me misleading and a misreading to call them demons and focus on the demon hunter, because hunting them isn't the point of the film at all.
I'm pretty convinced this is just part of the usual trend of misrepresenting these movies on the outside of the box, not a cunning twist or anything. And it annoys me, because I'd have watched this waaaaay sooner if I knew what it mostly was. Which is: about three women, a bird spirit, a fox spirit, and a princess, plus a general bloke and a demon hunter guy in there somewhere. The key to the story is the transformative power of a human heart, willingly given. And the whole thing is very queer, in ways I expected to end poorly but was more or less pleasantly surprised by.
Warnings and spoilers under the cut.
Warnings first: the fox spirit uses demon magic to get men under her power, so there's quite a lot of the sort of noncon where it looks like he's into it but he'd quite like his free will back actually. And then the general decides that, since the demon power goes in through his eyes, there's a way to free himself.
So, 18 rated for violence and sometimes mutilation.
I did not like that bit at all. It's a point of view shot from his point of view as he raises the blade. That was a bit vivid, that was.
Plus there's a couple of moments that are probably arty attempted suicides. But they get rescued.
There's also the hearts thing. Demons eat hearts, so they keep yanking them out of people and chowing down. It's a bit meatier than vampires. Demons go cold and white, and need the warmth of human hearts to sustain them. But all those stolen hearts aren't worth very much, so they keep on needing a new one. They're thousands of years old and haven't figured out the trick yet, because that's what evil is, being kind of stupid about important stuff.
So the fox spirit needs a human heart, and men's hearts are just rubbish, she's never met a man she couldn't trick and control into bed but after that they still won't give their hearts willingly. But then a warrior saves her and resists her power, and has a heart warm enough to thaw the fox spirit even while it's still beating. The warrior helps willingly too, holding the freezing fox spirit to share the warmth. Even after she knows who she is.
Yes, it's a she. Which is apparently a new thought to the demons, even though they've concluded that all men are rubbish. So after that the film is all about trying to get the girl's heart.
But in a demon way, with magic and a beating lump of muscle. And lies and tricks and traps, because that's what the demon knows how to do. And also a lot of getting naked in baths together and running hands all over each other and smushing together. ... to swap skins and bodies. As part of the magic trick. Of course.
And this was where I was expecting it to just go horribly wrong and end with the demon getting banished and the princess realising that blokes are better. Or possibly just everyone getting dead. There's a lot of everyone gets dead movies around.
But it gets complicated in the middle instead, and turns into the demon and the princess swapping lives by a gift of a heart, because they think that will mean getting away from their own problems and getting everything they want. So the demon who becomes the princess goes off to an arranged marriage but can feel everything with her new heart now, and the princess who becomes a demon goes off to magic the bloke she fancies into bed. Which is a low point for both of them and works out poorly. The demon finds out the 'marriage' is to a guy she ripped the heart out of months ago, and instead of a human life she's scheduled for a human death. The princess finds out that she can magic the guy, but it isn't going to be happily ever after, given that she's got insatiable demon hungers now and that he is going to hurt himself to stop the noncon. They've both tried to use tricks and traps, and both gone and caught themselves.
This contrasts with the uncomplicated and pretty much happy thing that the demon hunter and the bird spirit have going on, where he just plain likes her, and she likes him. She shows it by meals with bugs in and he shows it by trying to show off about being a demon hunter and kind of burning her, but they work things out and start getting to know each other and learning new things about themselves.
It's all building up to a thing scheduled for an eclipse, which I kind of figured in advance would be like High Spirits, where they've all got the words wrong and nobody gets what they expected and hopefully everyone gets what they need. But I didn't guess the details at all at all.
I liked the ending, so usually wouldn't spoil it, but having mentioned a lot of it read like a lesbian love story I kind of feel like I should explain the ending so nobody goes and gets disappointed and everyone actually looking for such an ending finds the right movie.
So it's complicated, because the general dude blinds himself but still fights a big battle and the princess-becoming-demon decides not to eat human hearts and freezes and the demon-becoming-princess is all up on a big bone sacrificial thingy singing sad songs when they arrive and then there's an eclipse. They rescue the sacrificial demon-princess but the princess-demon is probably dying. So the blinded general says the demon-princess can have his heart instead, willingly offered, no tricks or anything, just as long as she gives the princess-demon her heart back. And the demon princess pushes him away, and there's a moment where she might have just been refusing, but instead she lies down with the frozen lady and cuddles up to her and holds her and gives her her heart, willingly, expecting that'll freeze her, and without having anything for swaps at all. And they float up in the sky in the middle of the eclipse and start glowing and then explode in sort of rainbows.
No, really, rainbow princess kaboom, and then sparkly pieces float down.
And then only one person floats down, and she's kind of the princess and kind of the demon, and it turns out that when a demon has a human heart given willingly for really real then the demon and the human merge and get to live out a human life as one person.
So the princess kind of rides off into the flowers with her general, and kind of spends the whole rest of her life with the fox lady too. Sort of. Ish.
It's not exactly princess kisses happily ever afters, but since I was kind of expecting it to go all horribly wrong, I think I quite liked it.
It's probably supposed to be about beauty and appearances and how superficial things don't matter and how having a true heart is best even if you've only got one between you. The general dude made it so he couldn't be fooled by appearances so the girl would stop doing demon things to try and be prettier.
But the ending depends on ladies loving each other best, and learning what it means to really care about someone when the someone in question is a woman. So, you know, rainbows.
None of that says whether it's any good at all, really, unless you have few enough movies with ladies in that that alone is adequate selling point. It's not even good depictions of ladies, because sexy demon ladies who control men with their beauty and are obsessed by appearance doesn't have a lot defensible about it.
The bad guys were... stupid looking. The music is kind of terrible. There wasn't much fighting and it wasn't very impressive mostly. If you slow motion all the cool bits you actually take all the cool out of them. And having someone's best trick be shooting things blindfold is interesting in its way but just looks quite a lot like anyone else standing there shooting arrows, it's not like fancy martial arts sequences. It seems to put most effort into good pretty striking images.
So quite possibly the film is not very good.
But it's very pretty, I liked most of the acting, and I had fun for a couple hours watching it. And I'll probably rewatch it happier, now I know I don't have to worry about the ending.
It just irritates me often that the covers on these things aren't better. People wanting to watch a fighty movie about a demon hunting bloke will probably be annoyed at what they find, and people looking for this film with ladies and magic and romance wouldn't know it was inside that wrapper.
... aaaand googling suggests it was renamed, because it's a sequel to a movie called Painted Skin, and the company making this DVD didn't own that one. Also because it's not much like that one? Huh, I don't even know what's going on there.
I keep hoping some day to strike the motherlode of asian movie reviews and find someone who likes the same ones I like and has watched more, but thus far, not so much luck. So I keep watching whatever was in the supermarket discount rack. Which this time worked out fine.
He's also the guy who writes the story down at the end, which at least Watsonially explains why he'd name it after himself.
But on the Doylist level, we have to look for another explanation why the movie is named for a guy who is like fifth most important to the story and has two blokes on the front cover who don't even turn up until the three main women have been introduced, and one of them's the boring bad guy.
I'd call the film 'The Princess and the Fox', kind of like The Emperor and the White Snake, only there actually is a princess in it. The two films sort of have a theme in common. And make me want to learn more languages so I can poke at the translations. 'Demon' just seems misleading. I mean, okay, they're nigh immortal magical beings who trick humans and eat their hearts, but they can change. That's the key in both films. They can just realise their error at any time. And that's not an option Western demons traditionally have, though you get it in a few modern movies. It just seems to me misleading and a misreading to call them demons and focus on the demon hunter, because hunting them isn't the point of the film at all.
I'm pretty convinced this is just part of the usual trend of misrepresenting these movies on the outside of the box, not a cunning twist or anything. And it annoys me, because I'd have watched this waaaaay sooner if I knew what it mostly was. Which is: about three women, a bird spirit, a fox spirit, and a princess, plus a general bloke and a demon hunter guy in there somewhere. The key to the story is the transformative power of a human heart, willingly given. And the whole thing is very queer, in ways I expected to end poorly but was more or less pleasantly surprised by.
Warnings and spoilers under the cut.
Warnings first: the fox spirit uses demon magic to get men under her power, so there's quite a lot of the sort of noncon where it looks like he's into it but he'd quite like his free will back actually. And then the general decides that, since the demon power goes in through his eyes, there's a way to free himself.
So, 18 rated for violence and sometimes mutilation.
I did not like that bit at all. It's a point of view shot from his point of view as he raises the blade. That was a bit vivid, that was.
Plus there's a couple of moments that are probably arty attempted suicides. But they get rescued.
There's also the hearts thing. Demons eat hearts, so they keep yanking them out of people and chowing down. It's a bit meatier than vampires. Demons go cold and white, and need the warmth of human hearts to sustain them. But all those stolen hearts aren't worth very much, so they keep on needing a new one. They're thousands of years old and haven't figured out the trick yet, because that's what evil is, being kind of stupid about important stuff.
So the fox spirit needs a human heart, and men's hearts are just rubbish, she's never met a man she couldn't trick and control into bed but after that they still won't give their hearts willingly. But then a warrior saves her and resists her power, and has a heart warm enough to thaw the fox spirit even while it's still beating. The warrior helps willingly too, holding the freezing fox spirit to share the warmth. Even after she knows who she is.
Yes, it's a she. Which is apparently a new thought to the demons, even though they've concluded that all men are rubbish. So after that the film is all about trying to get the girl's heart.
But in a demon way, with magic and a beating lump of muscle. And lies and tricks and traps, because that's what the demon knows how to do. And also a lot of getting naked in baths together and running hands all over each other and smushing together. ... to swap skins and bodies. As part of the magic trick. Of course.
And this was where I was expecting it to just go horribly wrong and end with the demon getting banished and the princess realising that blokes are better. Or possibly just everyone getting dead. There's a lot of everyone gets dead movies around.
But it gets complicated in the middle instead, and turns into the demon and the princess swapping lives by a gift of a heart, because they think that will mean getting away from their own problems and getting everything they want. So the demon who becomes the princess goes off to an arranged marriage but can feel everything with her new heart now, and the princess who becomes a demon goes off to magic the bloke she fancies into bed. Which is a low point for both of them and works out poorly. The demon finds out the 'marriage' is to a guy she ripped the heart out of months ago, and instead of a human life she's scheduled for a human death. The princess finds out that she can magic the guy, but it isn't going to be happily ever after, given that she's got insatiable demon hungers now and that he is going to hurt himself to stop the noncon. They've both tried to use tricks and traps, and both gone and caught themselves.
This contrasts with the uncomplicated and pretty much happy thing that the demon hunter and the bird spirit have going on, where he just plain likes her, and she likes him. She shows it by meals with bugs in and he shows it by trying to show off about being a demon hunter and kind of burning her, but they work things out and start getting to know each other and learning new things about themselves.
It's all building up to a thing scheduled for an eclipse, which I kind of figured in advance would be like High Spirits, where they've all got the words wrong and nobody gets what they expected and hopefully everyone gets what they need. But I didn't guess the details at all at all.
I liked the ending, so usually wouldn't spoil it, but having mentioned a lot of it read like a lesbian love story I kind of feel like I should explain the ending so nobody goes and gets disappointed and everyone actually looking for such an ending finds the right movie.
So it's complicated, because the general dude blinds himself but still fights a big battle and the princess-becoming-demon decides not to eat human hearts and freezes and the demon-becoming-princess is all up on a big bone sacrificial thingy singing sad songs when they arrive and then there's an eclipse. They rescue the sacrificial demon-princess but the princess-demon is probably dying. So the blinded general says the demon-princess can have his heart instead, willingly offered, no tricks or anything, just as long as she gives the princess-demon her heart back. And the demon princess pushes him away, and there's a moment where she might have just been refusing, but instead she lies down with the frozen lady and cuddles up to her and holds her and gives her her heart, willingly, expecting that'll freeze her, and without having anything for swaps at all. And they float up in the sky in the middle of the eclipse and start glowing and then explode in sort of rainbows.
No, really, rainbow princess kaboom, and then sparkly pieces float down.
And then only one person floats down, and she's kind of the princess and kind of the demon, and it turns out that when a demon has a human heart given willingly for really real then the demon and the human merge and get to live out a human life as one person.
So the princess kind of rides off into the flowers with her general, and kind of spends the whole rest of her life with the fox lady too. Sort of. Ish.
It's not exactly princess kisses happily ever afters, but since I was kind of expecting it to go all horribly wrong, I think I quite liked it.
It's probably supposed to be about beauty and appearances and how superficial things don't matter and how having a true heart is best even if you've only got one between you. The general dude made it so he couldn't be fooled by appearances so the girl would stop doing demon things to try and be prettier.
But the ending depends on ladies loving each other best, and learning what it means to really care about someone when the someone in question is a woman. So, you know, rainbows.
None of that says whether it's any good at all, really, unless you have few enough movies with ladies in that that alone is adequate selling point. It's not even good depictions of ladies, because sexy demon ladies who control men with their beauty and are obsessed by appearance doesn't have a lot defensible about it.
The bad guys were... stupid looking. The music is kind of terrible. There wasn't much fighting and it wasn't very impressive mostly. If you slow motion all the cool bits you actually take all the cool out of them. And having someone's best trick be shooting things blindfold is interesting in its way but just looks quite a lot like anyone else standing there shooting arrows, it's not like fancy martial arts sequences. It seems to put most effort into good pretty striking images.
So quite possibly the film is not very good.
But it's very pretty, I liked most of the acting, and I had fun for a couple hours watching it. And I'll probably rewatch it happier, now I know I don't have to worry about the ending.
It just irritates me often that the covers on these things aren't better. People wanting to watch a fighty movie about a demon hunting bloke will probably be annoyed at what they find, and people looking for this film with ladies and magic and romance wouldn't know it was inside that wrapper.
... aaaand googling suggests it was renamed, because it's a sequel to a movie called Painted Skin, and the company making this DVD didn't own that one. Also because it's not much like that one? Huh, I don't even know what's going on there.
I keep hoping some day to strike the motherlode of asian movie reviews and find someone who likes the same ones I like and has watched more, but thus far, not so much luck. So I keep watching whatever was in the supermarket discount rack. Which this time worked out fine.