Mek Torres Monster Hunt begins telling the history of the war between mankind and monsters, when the humans won, the monsters have separated themselves from them until years later, their queen escaped while bearing a child who will become the prince and being tracked down by other monsters and a human army. The opening doesn't bring anything fresh within its backstory, the actual plot doesn't get any less original either, when we cut to a young hero who doesn't get any luck after this plot came and other colorful set of character join to his journey. Despite of these done to death tropes and premise, the movie however brought something appealing, and that's definitely how seriously weird it is. It's packed with a lot of amusingly strange ideas which becomes its own personality. It's good if it runs less than two hours. The stock plot doesn't get any better and the climax feels a little too long for its own good. But to what it is, there is something delightful to its weirdness.So the hero lives in a small village, he lives with a relative anyone but his parents, he feels like an outcast, an underdog, etc. At this point of this film, it's just totally uninteresting witnessing the same tropes, even without trying to make its own spin out of it. And then he discovered that there is more to this world than what he has always knew. There is a girl who is stronger than him... is this even worth paraphrasing? You get the bottom line, however, the film gets better when it shifts to being downright weird. The pregnant queen can transfer her egg to another womb, which is given to the male hero. And this little antic is actually quite amusing. After the laboring, the movie continues to play off the concept as they raise this little monster. It's a delight, but it still doesn't help the plot that much.Even before the climax comes, it's still felt uncertain where the story is going. It feels a little busy playing around to some of its side villains. Now when it comes to the actual climax, it would have gone better if it was shorter than it was. And then a twist reveals that is kind of generic. There just isn't much to it, the story between the relationship of the monsters and humans remain thin. It's the main characters and the baby prince is the only strong moments in here.And to be fair, before the climax that eventually wears off, the pacing is kind of nice, making every moment reasonably entertaining. The action scenes are watchable. The special effects are alright, though the only likable digital creature is the prince which is admittedly adorable. The performances seem to be having fun on what they're doing, bringing energy into this film's silly nature of being a cartoon.That's pretty much what Monster Hunt mostly feels like, a cartoon. Yeah, the tropes and plot are pretty stock, but it really gets more interesting when it's getting weirder and weirder, from a pregnant male protagonist to some dark sense of humor it keeps things entertaining. I sort of wished they establish more of this mythology and how this monster prince can change their world, but the movie doesn't have much of that opportunity. To what it is, it's fun, though I wish it was a little shorter, or spent those other minutes to develop the fantasy stuff. But the main characters eventually become charming, in spite of how faulty the plot is. Monster Hunt is entertaining for the outrageous stuff alone.

DareDevilKid Reviewed by: Dare Devil Kid (DDK)Rating: 3.8/5 starsWhat makes "Monster Hunt" so appealing is its easily digestible story arc, refreshingly devoid of Confucian morality, educational historical background or nationalistic grandstanding — in short, everything that makes most Chinese children's films such a yawn. Stylistically, the film blends Western demon-slaying elements, Japanese yokai folklore, and even a distant echo of "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" into a fanciful Chinese setting, beefing it up with robust martial arts action with an eye toward holding the attention of adult viewers.In "Monster Hunt" the protagonists are greenish ogres with mushy hearts — not surprisingly, since this jolly live-action/animated Chinese period fantasy is helmed by Raman Hui, the Hong Kong-born animation supervisor who was involved with the genesis of the "Shrek" franchise. The toon creatures are the real stars in this zippy, technically accomplished entertainer, which has become the highest-grossing Chinese film of all time.Jing, who has so far been a sturdy foil for showier leads like Eddie Peng in "Rise of the Legend" or Huang Xiaoming in "The Guillotines," trudges along with little charisma in the earlier scenes, but perks up as soon as Bai arrives on the scene. With her pixie-like charm, Bai is the spark that fuels their larky courtship. However, the narrative is at times bogged down by celebrity comedians and A-list stars jostling for attention in what are essentially glorified cameo appearances.The film is supposedly inspired by "Classic of Mountains and Seas" ("Shan Hai Jing"), a 206 B.C. Chinese tome in which the monsters look like blowfish that have swallowed dinosaurs. But Director Hui's artistic input no doubt helped inspire a creature-design aesthetic that's recognizably Asian, yet spunkier and less parochial than most Chinese animation, with their slavish reproductions of classical Chinese templates. Thanks to high-caliber visual effects — supervised by Jason Snell (the "Pirates of the Caribbean" series, "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince", "Elysium", and "Tomorrowland"), among others — the interaction between the animated and live-action characters is seamless, as are the monsters' dramatic transformations. Yohei Taneda's production design blends ethereal inkbrush landscapes with period sets that range from mundane to spectacular. The tussles between humans are choreographed by Ku Huen-chiu with snappy, cartoonish timing, but remain bound by Hong Kong high-wire stunt conventions.Raman Hui does a perfectly competent job of keeping things together, and his experience in Hollywood working for DreamWorks, including co-directing "Shrek the Third", does give the film somewhat of an east meets west feel that differentiates it from other recent Chinese fantasies. It's certainly easy to see why the film went down so well with local audiences, though thanks to a lack of the usual flag waving patriotism and a focus on universal themes of family and community, there's nothing here to make it inaccessible to those in other countries around the world.The film's status as a genuine home-grown blockbuster is cemented through some excellent production values and heartwarming character designs, with some top notch special effects, sets and costumes making it visually impressive from start to finish. There's really a great deal to like about "Monster Hunt", and it should have a much wider appeal than most other fantasy or family films from Asia. An important benchmark of sorts as a smash hit Chinese blockbuster made primarily for Chinese audiences, it's well-deserving of its success, and hopefully the inevitable sequels will attain the same level of highly enjoyable tomfoolery.Chinese blockbuster

adam_uppal As someone who often enjoys Chinese movies, and lives in China, I thought I would be able to appreciate this film. I was wrong.This movie is somehow boring, sappy and stupid at the same time. The plot is inconsistent, the characters are flat, and the baby monster is simply annoying.While the movie makes an attempt to include a blossoming romance, again everything is inconsistent and often ridiculous.More often than not, I found myself getting upset at how terrible the writing was. I would not recommend this movie for anybody older than five. Forget that. I would not recommend this movie to anybody at all.

rongrudy The Chinese local film "protection week" has been heavily criticized by Hollywood, especially when, the Universal's recent hit, Jurassic Park's run was cut short with gas in the tank. However, this year's protection week finally accomplished something. It gave birth to the top- grossing Chinese film in history – Monster Hunt. The fantasy comedy film that led by, "Shrek"'s creator，Raman Hui sets the new Chinese box office record this week. The movie's production was a huge adventure, itself, with no predecessor Chinese film containing heavy interactions between CGI characters and real actors. It has been generally considered as too risky, considering the comparably big budget and the government's potential intervention. A typical Chinese college love- story film, the genre that dominated the market in the past six months, costs less than one tenth of Monster Hunt's investment. According to the record, our government had not been a big fan of imaginative characters, which can stop the expensive project from going on to the screens. The creative ideas in Monster Hunt, such as the promotion of harmony between monsters and humans, are unorthodox, which could be raised to a political level. However, the producer, Bill Kong -- the producer of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, still wants to take the bet. As a kid, he was a fanatic gambler on horse racing and card games. Later as a movie producer, he gambled on high budget movies and won numerous awards along with billions of dollars. He believes that the market is finally ready for partly animated, largely live-action films and the Chinese visual effect teams are mature enough to make an attractive one. Besides the production method, Monster Hunter is also one of the few movie franchises that were one hundred percent originally created by the production company in China and could be expanded to a collection of movies, books, and TV episodes. It was made to be a commercial movie, but its creative original content and the production team's accurate understanding of the market's favor end up fulfilling the interest of a wide range of Chinese audiences, which won them the praises that exceeds anyone's expectation. The movie begins with a cartoon that mimics the style of wall painting in the era of cave men combining with an unidentified narrator's voice that sounds mysterious and antique. Through the prologue, we understand that the story sets in a world where humans and monsters co-exist, but humans got tired of this and started a war driving the monsters into the far reaches of the mountains. The story's background is familiar to the audiences, since the similar backgrounds were portrayed in Chinese classics "Shan Hai Jin" and "Liao Zhai Zhi Yi". Instead of shouting out the theme of comedy, the movie gives a sense of "Lord of the Ring" or "Harry Porter". However, the mood of a thriller was broken when the camera zooms in on the adorable image of the monster queen and her chubby tummy. When the reckless evil monster revolutionaries try to overthrow the royalty, the queen flees to the land of humans and impregnates a human man with Huba, the cute monster baby. They started an adventure together to escape the capture. I can hear the audiences' hearts melting, when they go AWW during the scene that the radish looking Huba opens his eyes as a lovely baby monster. The casting was another factor that contributes to the success. The movie was originally finished in 2014. However, the protagonist, Kai Ko, was arrested for using marijuana before the movie's release. The movie was banned with his involvement. However, the producer, Bill Kong, still believes that Monster Hunt has to be finished. He invested another $15 million to retake the parts of Kai Ko, which basically is 40% of the movie. Many famous actors and actresses admired Kai Ko's persistence and offered to be guest actors. The movie ended up with an all-star team that covers fans' age group ranging from 15 to the 50s. Monster Hunt is a new break through in the Chinese Movie industry. Creativity is Chinese movie industries' future. We are glad that the protecting good monster's theme was not banned, that Raman Hui found an investor that was persistent and visionary, and that the new attempt of comedy fantasy was widely accepted.