The New York Asian Film Festival runs from June 28th to July 14th, 2019. For more information, click here.
If there’s one lesson to be taken away from White Snake, it’s that children’s animated movies are significantly more interesting the further you get from Western culture.
It is not, strictly speaking, clear that White Snake is actually intended to be a children’s movie. The film is another in a long line of adaptations of the Chinese legend of Madame White Snake, which is not necessarily the sort of story that Western culture would find appropriate for children. On the other hand, there’re not a lot of animated movies with talking dogs that are aiming for that sweet, sweet middle aged audience demo. So it may be a bit of a toss-up, really.
Whatever the intended audience, the film itself is a decidedly beautiful version of the tale, the animation less polished than American audiences might be used to, but possessed of a certain graceful kineticism that makes for a preferable alternative to the numbing, hyperactive action of Western kids’ animation. There is a wit and an intelligence here of the type that rarely makes it to our shores.
Being a legend, there are as many versions of the Legend of Madame White Snake as there are snakes… on a plane, or something, I really should have workshopped that metaphor a bit further before committing to it.
At any rate, this one focuses on the White Snake, here named Blanca and voiced by Zhang Zhe, who has been tasked with the assassination of the Dark General, whose quest for power has turned snake catching into the primary source of income for society. A reluctant killer, Blanca’s attempt goes rather wrong, and she winds up with amnesia and recuperating under the care of handsome, amiable villager Xuan. They soon fall in love, but given the snake people’s increasing hostility towards the human world, a ‘happily ever after’ scenario for our young and beautiful lovers seems less and less likely.
More than anything (and like many versions of the tale), White Snake focuses on this romance aspect, which, again, seems like a bold choice for a film seemingly aimed at children. Never moreso than when our heroes express their love in a decidedly physical manner that goes just a little bit further than Prince Charming and Sleeping Beauty ever went.
I mean, it’s hardly Don’t Look Now, but it’s still not anything you’d expect to see in, say, Ice Age 5.
(Well…some kind of directors’ cut, perhaps. But lordy I sure hope not, hasn’t Scrat already been through enough?)
My experience with the original tale is fairly limited, but having seen Tsui Hark’s 1993 adaptation, it’s hard not to make comparisons. Which is unfair, since it’s very much a case of apples and oranges; Hark plays up the textural sensuality and eroticism in a way that any CGI would be hard pressed to compete with. But as well handled as it is, I can’t help but feel that focusing on the romance was a mistake when the relationship between Blanca and her human-hating sister Verta the Green Snake held so much more potential.
That complicated dynamic was what Hark focused on in his film, and it yielded major dividends. It’s understandable that the screenplay by Damao and directors Amp Wong and Zhao Ji would want to take things in a different direction, and the direction they do pick is generally successful. But in the age of Frozen, it feels like something of a missed opportunity. Even if it would be next to impossible to achieve the sort of tactile lushness of that previous live action version.
And so the places where the film most excels are in the most fantastic aspects, such as the sequences involving the Precious Jade Workshop run by a discomfortingly slinky two-headed fox demon lady. These scenes in particular unfold with a certain showy playfulness and make the most of their animated unreality.
White Snake does a fascinating and riveting job of updating an ancient tale, bringing something new to the table for Western audiences tired of the same old fairy tales and their inevitable happy endings. It is, if nothing else, quite unique.
Well… give or take a talking dog…
