Writer: Ezekiel Lee Zhiang Yang

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Watch this if you liked: "Shadows In The Palace", "The Mermaid"

If you screwed up your face when you saw Donnie Yen on the poster, then you might find this review rather agreeable - "Painted Skin" is a rare and successful Hong Kong attempt at marrying genres while making the most out of star appeal without forcing the story.

That's the easiest part to mess up, really - the story. So it comes as a pleasant surprise that this horror-thriller-mystery-action (what a mouthful of a movie!) turned out quite decent, never mind the fact that it is a remake of a 1966 Fong Pao movie of the same name, which is itself based on a memorable piece of Chinese literature. They kept Donnie Yen's shirt on for once (hooray!) and limited him to a few brief banters and fighting scenes, while letting pale beauties Zhou Xun and Zhao Wei do most of the drama bits.

Three cheers for director Gordon Chan, then!

Back to the story - it's a simple period movie about this demonic jinn woman who falls in love with a human being. Our man is an army general who is torn between his wife and the beautiful demon but being the macho virtuous type, he chooses his wife anyway. Donnie Yen and a ghostbuster sidekick enter the fray to expose the demon but find it harder than they thought. The demon has an aide, a frog-like beast (clearly inspired by Nightcrawler of X-Men fame) who is in love with her too.

The best thing about the whole movie is the interplay between the wife and the demon - they are very intriguing and had a lot of old charm. Watching it in Mandarin is a plus point too since it adds to that charm. However, watching it in any language would not help the mediocre performance of Chen Kun, who can't fool anyone about being a private let alone an army general. His acting is rubbish and his screen persona is weak.

If you forgive the odd flying scenes and a couple of other substandard CGI assists, the technical credits for "Painted Skin" are rather impressive, especially the make-up and costumes. They might not be historically accurate but they sure are nice to look at! When the credits roll, you might think it took too long but still it's the refreshing content that makes it stand out among the other Hong Kong films this year. It can be sexy and scary at the same time. Hell it's rather romantic even.

Most of all, it gives a complete new meaning to the phrase "I'd give my heart to you". Watch it to find out!

Cinema Online, 25 September 2008