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The Mermaid (2016): A Hilarious and Heartwarming Tale of Love and Adventure



Based off of the original tale by Hans Christian Andersen, Little Mermaid tells the story of a young mermaid (Rosie Mac) leaving the sea for a human (Michael Murray) that she's watched from afar. When everything isn't as it seemed, she must find her own way. After getting a job dancing at a club and staying with a kind stranger, she strikes a new deal with the sea witch to stay in her new reality.




The Mermaid (2016) 




Liu Xuan is a businessman who has only one love: money. When he buys the property for a reclamation of the sea, he is met with support from his uncle Yeh and an old flame, businesswoman Li Ruolan. At a party to celebrate his latest acquisition, he meets a young crazy woman named Shan. Shan insists that Xuan meet with her to discuss business. Xuan avoids Shan for quite some time. However, when he finally does call her, little does he know that she is actually a mermaid hired by the other mermaids and the second in command Octopus to kill Xuan so they can save their land.


In this environmental activist comedy from Stephen Chow, mermaids whose environment is being destroyed by an evil developer plot to kill him, using a pretty mermaid as bait. The complications are unsurprising.While lacking any comical martial arts, the movie still has Chow's usual slapstick humor and weirdness. This includes a very funny scene of a series of hapless assassination attempts, a goofy singing duet, and a cool special-effects driven scene involving splashing water into objects. Some scenes are a bit too dumb, but overall this is a reasonably amusing movie, although nowhere near as funny as Chow's masterpiece, Shaolin Soccer.The plotting doesn't make much sense. The developer unconvincingly shifts from fairly cartoony awfulness to general sincerity, and the mermaids are, weirdly, more concerned with vengeance than with fixing their problems. But within its silly, slapsticky world, this isn't a huge problem.What is a huge problem is the shift into violence towards the end. It's both upsetting and nonsensical; a classic example of a movie that makes its villains evil to the point where they do terrible things that not only don't benefit them, but that would seemingly work against their interests. This whole part of the movie is pretty terrible, and to some extent ruined it for me.One last note. I had a dual audio version of this, and started off watching the English dub. I'm not someone who automatically rejects dubbed movies, but I strongly suggest that you do not, under any circumstances, watch the English dub of this, because it is horrendously bad. I think it's a shame that a successful director's biggest hit of all time doesn't rate competent English actors. If I were rating this based on the dub, I would take another star off. It's an embarrassment.


The film is a romantic comedy. Lui Xuan is a real estate developer. He has sonars around his island, "The Green Gulf" to keep away protected species so he can develop it. Unbeknownst to him, it has trapped and is killing off the local indigenous mermaid (and men too) population. Shan has been assigned to lure Mr. Lui so she/they can assassinate him. Lui courts her as this turns into an odd Chinese version of Romeo and Juliet involving two different species. Shakespeare sells.The film has English subtitles. The comedy was good. It made me laugh out loud. The police scene was a riot. The sound track fit neatly into the film using mostly stuff we hear in American and old European films. The opening scenes of a side show scam artist sets the comedy mood. The film also has action. It hits on all cylinders.Guide: Quick male butt showing. Implied topless scene. Use of SOB and frequent "bitch." A large tentacle is where manhood should be. Shooting and killing. Even the music has subtitles.


Mermaid Shan is sent to kill Xuan in order to stop his project which threatens marine life and the entire mermaid race. This brings them into falling for each other, which leads a hidden organisation into hunting them down. Eventually Xuan has to save Shan before it's too late.


April and the Extraordinary World [Avril et le Monde Truqué] (2015) * The Baby of Mâcon (1993) * Bad Girls Go to Hell (1965) * Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans (2009) * Big Man Japan (2007) * Casino Royale (1967) * Celine and Julie Go Boating [Céline et Julie vont en bateau] (1974) * The Congress (2013) * Donkey Skin (1970) * Electric Dragon 80000V (2001) * The Fabulous Baron Munchausen [Baron Prásil] (1962) * Gemini (1999) * Green Snake (1993) * The Happiness of the Katakuris (2001) * Jesus Shows You the Way to the Highway (2019) * Juliet of the Spirits (1965) * Keep an Eye Out [Au Poste!] (2018) * The Lighthouse (2019) * Mad God (2021) * Mirror [Zerkalo] (1975) * Prometheus' Garden (1988) * Saint Bernard (2013) * She's Allergic to Cats (2016) * Singapore Sling (1990) * A Snake of June (2002) * Son of the White Mare [Fehérlófia] (1981) * Titane (2021) * Under the Silver Lake (2018) * Walker (1987) * The Warped Forest (2011) * The Wolf House (2018)


This little 2016 indie film is simply titled as Little Mermaid, and is a modern-day, adult adaptation of the Hans Christian Andersen story. Rosie Mac plays the little mermaid, who sells her voice to a sea witch for legs, and the chance to gain an immortal soul if she can win the love of a human. The film opens pretty much on land and with the little mermaid already having traded her voice for legs, though there are some very brief flashbacks of her swimming in the ocean, and her tail is gorgeous.


There are some other twists involved in this adaptation, most of them of an adult nature. Among them is howin the original story the little mermaid entranced people with her dancing, while in this adaptation she entrances them by her burlesque stripping. The guy the little mermaid originally made the deal for turns out to be nasty and self-centered, but the sea witch gamely allows her to switch him out for another guy, Jack, who is kind, sweet, and has allowed the homeless, near-penniless little mermaid to move into his apartment.But although the little mermaid and Jack end up having a relationship, there is still a "dark-haired rival", and the way she nudges the little mermaid out of the way is deceitful.


Overall, this version is more cynical than magical, and is more interested in the little mermaid learning the hard way how selfish and unkind the human world can be. The sea witch is just plain cruel, and all the people the little mermaid meets during her time as a human end up betraying her in one way or another. One thing though, is that Jack's fate may be even worse than the little mermaid's, which is saying something.


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