Leslie Cheung is the scared, weak scholar (in this case, a tax collector). Hey, they even have their own themesongs, which recur throughout the film. Producer Tsui Hark and director Ching Siu-Tung take the material and make it their own with creative special effects, crisp pacing and editing, memorable characters, and a lot of humor.Ī Chinese Ghost Story centers on three characters: the beautiful ghost, the young scholar, and the recluse priest. But the details are fleshed out in such an entertaining and joyful way that the film rises beyond its written origins. In other words, the general outline of the film appears to be a faithful adaptation of Pu Songling's The Magic Sword, right down to the names of the principal characters, Ning and Hsiao Tsing. When ghost and scholar meet, they fall in love, and he swears to help her escape from the tree demon's evil clutches. She's a ghost, in the reluctant employ of a thousand year old tree demon who uses its massive tongue to suck the life out of their victims. He elects to stay, and it isn't long before he is lured by the sound of a lute out of the temple to where Hsiao Tsing, a beautiful woman, awaits him.īut there's more to this woman than meets the eye. He settles into the strange and silent Lam Ro temple, empty except for one very energetic Taoist priest who warns him away.
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![a chinese ghost story joey wong a chinese ghost story joey wong](https://ae01.alicdn.com/kf/H01da6d92478c4b4b986ba3b91aca7e59U/1-6-Scale-Joey-Wong-Head-Sculpt-A-Chinese-Ghost-Story-Bowknot-Hair-Head-Played-Model.jpg)
He needs a place to stay for a few days so he can re-write the books. When the lowly tax collector Ning Tsai-shun(Leslie Cheung) gets caught in a downpour on the way to town, his tax books are ruined and no one will pay.
![a chinese ghost story joey wong a chinese ghost story joey wong](https://alchetron.com/cdn/a-chinese-ghost-story-iii-96095f11-df2d-4717-9a2d-fc903389497-resize-750.jpg)
Beautiful ghosts, giant tongues, and warrior priests battle it out with scholar Leslie Cheung right in the middle of it all. This is the classic Tsui Hark tale that made ghost stories popular again.