"The Mystery of Dragon Card": a mystery-like mashup movie

Erma Feng

did not have large-scale publicity and momentum, "The Mystery of Dragon Card" was released in mid-August quite "low-key", but the filming rate on the first day was only 6.4%, which is not like what Jackie Chan movies should have. Salary-Although the state of the big brother has long been no longer brave, even in the 2019 Spring Festival schedule of strong players, the Douban score was finally fixed at 3.8 points in "Detective Pu Songling", and the first day's filming rate was 7.8%.

However, the word "starring" may also have to be put in a quotation mark or a question mark: this 124-minute movie, with Jackie Chan actually appearing in the scene, adds up to about twenty minutes. "The Mystery of the Dragon Card" is a "big heroine" movie that Jackie Chan willingly matched the former "Dragon Girl" Yao Xingtong (previously starred in Jackie Chan's movie "The Zodiac"). Actors can't say that they are unwilling to live up to it, and the literary and playing plays that should be done are not considered perfunctory. But acting this thing depends on the level of effort, talent, and the level of cooperation of teammates (director, screenwriter, opponent actor, service, etc.). No item in "Dragon Card Mystery" is above the pass line. If you want to get a passing score, naturally no one can do it.

"The Mystery of Dragon Card" poster

movie is not actually a "new" film. According to Baidu Encyclopedia, the early name of the film was "China Travel Notes", which was established in 2015. It is a film co-produced by China and Russia. Therefore, in addition to Jackie Chan and Yao Xingtong, the other main actors in the film include Jason Fleming from the UK, Anna Qiu Lina and Yuri Kolokolnikov from Russia. ——Of course, it is almost impossible for Chinese audiences to name these foreign actors, and it is difficult for them to remember their unrecognizable foreign faces after watching the movie. The biggest "foreign aid" in the film is Arnold Schwarzenegger, who starred as the warden of the Tower of London prison.

However, just like the double J sparring (Jackie Chan Jackie Chan and Jet Li Jet Li) claimed in "The King of Kung Fu", and the Jackie Chan sparring 007 (Pierce Brosnan) claimed in the "British Showdown", they are just a fake shot. Jackie Chan and Arnold Schwarzenegger’s opponents in "The Mystery of Dragon Card" also disappointed the audience after whipping up the audience's appetite. In fact, the audience shouldn't ask Lian Po affectionately whether he can still eat, after all, time is not forgiving.

’s play of the two people not only no longer has the power that Schwarzenegger once punched to the flesh, but also lacks Jackie Chan’s iconic design of using force and borrowing to fight objects. It is more like taking care of the audience’s emotions. A cutscene that had to be made for. After all, who would want to see Jackie Chan and Schwarzenegger who only act in literary drama? Action superstars are famous for their action dramas, but they can't erase the label of action dramas. This is the glory of the actor and the sorrow of the actor. Especially when actors can actually act in literary dramas, and the acting is not bad. "The Mystery of Dragon Card" may be Jackie Chan's attempt to realize the transformation of his personal drama while playing the role of "passing the band", but he obviously failed.

Arnold Schwarzenegger as the warden of the Tower of London prison in "The Mystery of the Dragon"

movie plot elements are too messy, after mixing and matching, you will not get highlights, but four different. Say it is an overhead movie, in which a character like Peter I appears again, locking the era in the early Qing Dynasty at the turn of the 17th and 18th centuries; Say it is a fantasy movie, the witch as the villain in the plot It seems that there is no dark magic that transcends the laws of science, pretending to be ghosts, bullying villagers, relying on self-developed storable power generation and discharge technology-what kind of a witch, is it better to be a Frankenstein who loves invention and creation?

"The Mystery of Dragon Card" made it difficult for the audience of the genre, because it could not form a stable expectation of the movie. You thought it was a Chinese fantasy movie, it turned out to be a Western steampunk movie; you thought it was a prison escape movie with Jackie Chan as the protagonist, and it turned out to be a princess revenge movie with Yao Xingtong as the protagonist; you thought it was a fake that occasionally mixed elements of Chinese and Western cultural communication. The "History" film is similar to Zhang Yimou's "The Great Wall". It turns out that the actors have no distinction between Chinese and foreign, English, Russian, and Wu dialect (the film is filmed in Chashan near Hangzhou), and can be translated into Mandarin freely. sheet.

"The Mystery of Dragon Card" is a mystery mashup movie. The screenwriter probably thought that he was writing a table full of people, but he didn't know that the audience only saw a table of paste.

Stills of "The Mystery of Dragon Card"

There is no shortage of cannon fodder movies this summer. "Shanghai Fortress", released last week, was so popular that it had to come out and issue statements to apologize to the public. "Dragon Card Mystery" was rated 4.1 on Douban.com (1499 people ratings) as of the time of publication, and the box office was just over 1500 million in 4 days. Paste is the best protective color for rotten films. "The Mystery of Dragon Card" may be fortunate that I don't have much interest at the moment. The

movie is actually untimely: if it were released a few years earlier, even if you can foresee a wave of curses, it might still make a small profit at the box office. After all, it is not uncommon to make money while being scolded in the noisy movie market in the past few years. It's not surprising that "The Mystery of Dragon Card" was shot dead on the beach until the tide receded. However, seeing Big Brother Jackie Chan force himself on the big screen and run and jump up and down to act in action scenes on the big screen.

No one doubts the professionalism of the older generation of filmmakers, but the decline in physical function is a natural law. Although the enthusiasm for not accepting the old is commendable, it is better to spend more effort on selecting and pondering the script. Even at the cost of reducing the number of works, if you can produce more fine works, it is still worthwhile, and it will not ruin your own signature.

"The Mystery of Dragon Card" stills

Editor Zhou Yuhua