Detective Dee is an enjoyable romp without much substance, kind of like that cheerleader you dated back in high school with the great looks and bubbly personality but nothing whatsoever important to say. Director Hark Tsui's film does a commendable job creating a period piece that puts the viewer in the middle of the Tang dynasty when China's empire rivaled that of Ancient Rome. The visuals are stunning and the towering Empress Wu statue adds a mystical aura to the film despite the small special effects budget.
The mystery plot however is not fully developed with too many leaps in logic and petty motives to please most fans of the genre and the action sequences fail to add any new twists, just more unbelievable "Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon" wire tricks that seem out of place in the historical setting.
I'm sure this movie would have been more enjoyable in Mandarin - the English voice-over dialog was stilted and shallow and strangely enough the subtitles varied considerably from the voice-over so "fire beetles" becomes "fire turtles" in the voice-over. Perhaps the word for "beetle" is "turtle" in Chinese but I was personally disappointed to see that the vicious flaming snapping turtles I had visualized turned out to be harmless-looking creepy crawlers!
The mystery plot however is not fully developed with too many leaps in logic and petty motives to please most fans of the genre and the action sequences fail to add any new twists, just more unbelievable "Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon" wire tricks that seem out of place in the historical setting.
I'm sure this movie would have been more enjoyable in Mandarin - the English voice-over dialog was stilted and shallow and strangely enough the subtitles varied considerably from the voice-over so "fire beetles" becomes "fire turtles" in the voice-over. Perhaps the word for "beetle" is "turtle" in Chinese but I was personally disappointed to see that the vicious flaming snapping turtles I had visualized turned out to be harmless-looking creepy crawlers!