There’s a significant difference in quality between the
mediocre scenario (and dialogue) and thrilling production design (and
direction) in “White Snake,” the new Chinese animated fairy tale about a
shape-changing demon snake who falls in love with a romantic human
demon-hunter. The movie’s uneven quality is especially disappointing given the
timing of its American theatrical release: five months after “Ne Zha,” a
superior Chinese animated fantasy, made a noticeable dent in the global box
office (“White Snake” was released in mainland China this past January).
The biggest difference between “White Snake” and “Ne
Zha”—two fables about accepting yourself for who you are rather than who you’re
expected to be—is that “Ne Zha” is thrillingly imaginative while “White Snake”
is only really exciting when its humanoid or anthropomorphized characters
(including a talking dog) are eclipsed by their vividly rendered mountain
valley environment (mist, waterfalls, foliage, etc.). Both movies are visually arresting,
but also generally hamstrung by their Misunderstood Outcast Hero Conquers Their
Seemingly Inevitable Destiny stock plots. Still, only one of these two cartoons
is more weird and well-designed than its more familiar elements. Unfortunately,
“White Snake” is not it.
Based on the famous Chinese fairy tale, “White Snake” opens
with a genuinely dreamy nightmare: Blanca (Zhe Zhang), a white-scaled/skinned
human-snake demon, imagines that she, while on the verge of achieving
immortality, is physically restrained by a cluster of mysterious tendrils that
appear suddenly and without explanation. This is a recurring dream for Blanca,
and one of a handful of distinguishing characteristics (that are ultimately not
followed through on).
Instead, we watch as Blanca goes through the motions of a
contrived action-romance story involving: battle-induced amnesia (she’s knocked
out after an anticlimactic battle with Yaohan Zhang’s “Dark General,” an evil
wizard!); a concerned but selfish older sister named Verta (Xiaoxi Tang); and a
manipulative sorceress (Xiaopu Zheng) who tries to take advantage of Blanca’s
confusion (she’ll give you what you want, but at a cost!). Blanca’s basically
the Chinese version of a Disney princess, only she’s not as sympathetic nor as
compelling as those bar-setting American heroines.
Blanca also doesn’t have an especially compelling love
interest since loverboy Xuan Ah (Tianxiang Yang) is too selfless and dewy-eyed
to be recognizably human. Xuan is an outsider in his own hometown of Snakecatcher
Village, because he doesn’t like collecting the snakes that his neighbors use
to pay the Dark General’s unreasonable, uh, snake tax (long story short: the
General steals the snakes’ energy to become a more powerful magician). Xuan
also sings and plays with his goofy dog Duduo (He Zhang).
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