Respond to these rapid questions in our The Mermaid quiz and we will tell you which The Mermaid character you are. Play it now.
You’ll find yourself laughing while watching “The Mermaid.”
It makes no difference if you do not enjoy reading subtitles. It makes no difference if you are completely unfamiliar with the director. It makes no difference if you’ve never watched a movie from China in your entire life.
It will make you laugh. Guaranteed.
Stephen Chow, known for his roles in “Kung Fu Hustle” and “Shaolin Soccer,” is the actor, director, and producer behind the romantic comedy fantasy film “The Mermaid.” The film is about a billionaire who falls in love with a mermaid. The phrase “a simple thing to hang a bunch of stuff on,” which Paul Reubens used to describe Pee-Wee Herman, could be applied to this movie. It’s a joke machine with gears that never stop turning, and it never stops making people laugh. The broad and sometimes crude sense of humor that Chow possesses is tamed by his keen eye for composition, and his comedic timing allows even the silliest and most ridiculous jokes to be successful. In point of fact, the vast majority of jokes of each variety are successful. If you had told me this prior to my first viewing of the film, on opening night in a theater in Manhattan, I wouldn’t have believed you, but the sound of a sold-out audience laughing from start to finish is the surest metric of whether or not a comedy is successful. If you had told me this, I wouldn’t have believed you. This movie works.
But you shouldn’t waste any more time and start this The Mermaid quiz.
The jerkish business tycoon Liu Xuan, played by Deng Chao, has made a ton of money off of sonar technology, which, unfortunately, kills all marine life in the surrounding area. This includes a community of mer-people who are understandably irate, led by a spiteful Octopus (Show Luo) and a naive mermaid named Shan (Lin Yun). Because Liu Xuan has a soft spot for the ladies, Shan has been given the mission to exact revenge on behalf of her fellow cryptids by seducing and then murdering Liu Xuan.
However, there is an issue: Shan and Liu Xuan have feelings for each other.
In “The Mermaid,” Chow’s signature style of working-class egotist-makes-good-in-the-world comedy is on full display. It’s possible that, unlike in many of his other public appearances, Chow is not playing the (apparently not-so) exaggerated version of his petulant public persona here. However, Liu Xuan is easily interpreted as a stand-in for Chow due to the fact that he is wealthy but “low-class,” to use the words of Shan’s vindictive and mega-wealthy rival Ruolan (Zhang Yuqi). The lifestyle of a nouveau riche person like Liu Xuan is characterized by ostentatious attire and parties in the “Cribs” style, complete with poolside babes and wine that has been aged for decades. When Shan finally does show up, everyone will be aware that Liu Xuan will continue to pursue her even though she will be concealing her fins with smeared makeup and unsightly rubber weights. The pasted-on pencil mustache that he wears draws attention to the fact that he is a fraud. He is not Tony Stark at all. But this is part of his character’s wispy appeal because it makes him immediately recognizable as a fraud who nevertheless wants to succeed.
The Mermaid Quiz
Also, you will find out which character are you in this The Mermaid quiz.
However, although Chao’s suitably over-the-top performance makes Liu Xuan a likeable antihero, Lin’s performance as Shan is the film’s most effective use of its hidden potential. Lin has the unenviable task of making you believe that Shan is as awkward as she appears to be. A skilled supporting cast of comedians, including Shan’s fellow sea-people, all earn laughs, but Lin is the only one who can pull it off. When Shan flashes Xiu Luan and he insists on getting a better look at her wild charms, you have to be willing to accept the notion that Shan is being sincere.
Since Chow’s sense of humor is almost always more outlandish than you anticipate, it helps a great deal that Lin seems to be completely sincere. Even though I’ve seen quite a few of Chow’s movies, his sexual or violent humor still manages to catch me off guard every time. For example, there’s a police-sketch routine that involves a merman penis, and there’s another routine that involves roast chickens and cunnilingus. It is to Lin’s credit that she is able to convince the reader that such a naive woman could accidentally fall in love with a man whom she intends to kill. Lin is not someone who has fallen prey to Chow’s perverted thoughts; rather, she is an indispensable collaborator.
You could be asking yourself, “If this movie is so strange, so wonderful, and so funny, why haven’t I heard of it?” The response to that inquiry is extremely frustrating. Both “Shaolin Soccer” and “Kung Fu Hustle” were huge successes for Chow around the world, and he is an absolute megastar in his home country of Hong Kong. The box office for “The Mermaid” in China broke all previous records over the past weekend, making it the second highest grossing film in the world after “Deadpool.” Because of poor management on the part of its American distributor, Sony Corporation of America, the release of it in the United States has been treated as an afterthought. (The film is, in theory, distributed by Asia Releasing, which is a subsidiary of Sony Pictures that is responsible for the release of Asian films in the United States and Canada; however, the print that I saw had a standard Sony logo in front of it.)
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It’s a shame that Sony is keeping such a good movie hidden from American audiences who aren’t already a part of the Chinese diaspora community. Sony should feel ashamed. When I spoke with four different representatives from Sony, three of them had no idea that the company was going to be releasing “The Mermaid.” The fourth representative I spoke with informed me that his company had not even considered sending an email or holding advanced screenings for members of the US press. He also stated that his company had not even considered setting up advanced screenings for members of the US press. I was told that the movie had already received positive reviews, all of which were tied to its release in Asia, and that Sony didn’t expect it to interest many people, other than fans of Chinese or Chinese-American films. These reviews were all tied to the film’s release in Asia.
Also, you must try to play this The Mermaid quiz.
The domestic marketplace in the United States is so hopelessly biased in favor of English-language films, the majority of which are produced in the United States of America, that the second most popular movie in the world is treated as if it does not even exist. This is the unfortunate reality of foreign films in the United States in the present day.
Demonstrate to Sony that their assumptions are based on ignorance. Attend this movie if you can.
Simply click this link to find out if it is being shown anywhere near you.
For more personality quizzes check this: Maggies Plan Quiz.
