Detective Dee and the Mystery of the Phantom Flame

Movie Review

Mystery and the martial arts

September 23, 2011|By Mark Feeney, Globe Staff

Andy Lau plays Detective Dee, an utterly unflappable martial arts master. (INDOMINA RELEASING )

**½

DETECTIVE DEE AND THE MYSTERY OF THE PHANTOM FLAME

Directed by: Hark Tsui

Written by: Kuo-fu Chen Lin Qianyu, and Jialu Zhang

Starring: Andy Lau, Li Bing Bing, Chao Deng, Carina Lau

At: Kendall Square

Running time: 123 minutes

Rated: PG-13 (some leach-like beetles, the occasional impolite subtitle, an attempted seduction)

In Mandarin, with subtitles

It’s the year 689, and the Dowager Empress Wu (an actual historical figure) is on the verge of being crowned China’s first female ruler. To observe the occasion, a 200-foot statue of the Buddha is being erected overlooking the imperial palace. Several strategically placed amulets are on site to ward off bad magic. Master Jia, who oversees the project, moves a couple. Shortly thereafter, he self-immolates, courtesy of what’s dubbed “the phantom flame.’’ Cause and effect? Soon thereafter, another official goes up in his own smoke - this time in full view of the empress and her court.

Visually, the phantom-flame murders are quite cool. They’re like having the “Lost’’ smoke monster stuck inside you determined to get out and not taking no for an answer.

So who you gonna call? Smokebusters not being an option, the empress summons Detective Dee. She has to spring him from prison before putting him on the case, since Dee has been there for eight years on treason charges.

Dee is based on a Chinese folk hero, Di Renjie, who inspired a series of Western detective novels by Robert Van Gulik. As played by Andy Lau, Dee is a martial arts master (Sammo Hung did the film’s fight choreography), as well as smart and flip and utterly unflappable. The last quality is almost as important as his skills at detection, since he has to deal with everything from fire beetles to sleeping smoke to a talking deer.

If all this is starting to sound a bit nonsensical, that’s as it should be. “Detective Dee’’ even has a “Release the kraken!’’ equivalent: “Release the molten metal!’’ Director Hark Tsui offers the occasional wipe and zoom, the camera equivalent of winks, to go along with lots of CGI, wire work, slow motion, and overhead shots (Tsui loves overhead shots almost as much as that deer likes to talk).

“Detective Dee and the Mystery of the Phantom Flame’’ has a title worthy of a ’30s matinee serial, with a sensibility to match. It’s slambang in pacing, bald in exposition, and offers cast-of-hundreds spectacle.

Dee has two helpers, Jing’er and Pei. “The world is so big, but you can’t fit in,’’ the former tells Dee. “Everyone wants to kill you.’’ Might that include Jing’er and Pei? Perhaps the empress has assigned them to Dee for just that reason. Betrayal is as much a danger here as spontaneous combustion or flying daggers.