Film Name: 魁拔之十萬火急 / Kuiba / Cribug
For this film, I suggest you head to the theater with this mindset—neither higher nor lower expectations: Compared to the domestic lowbrow “all-Flash theatrical releases” and other messy nonsense we’ve seen before, this is a animated film with a normal worldview, normal character designs, normal voice acting, normal plot, and generally normal animation—all set in a fictional universe. And that alone is no small feat.
Oh, and yes—it’s a cliffhanger. I’m kindly pointing this out to help lower your expectations, so you can enjoy the film and leave satisfied… Falling into a cliffhanger isn’t scary, right? It won’t get you pregnant.
Some online reviews are overly harsh, likely because critics set their standards too high or had unrealistic expectations. Those unlucky souls who got burned probably fell victim to overly enthusiastic recommendations—like Mr. Shi Hang’s gushing praise, which stems mostly from his limited anime exposure and naivety. Miss Bai Bangni, meanwhile, promoted it with ample cleavage—though the film has nothing to do with cleavage… Still, her sincerity deserves credit. Even if what she showed was just an ordinary cleavage that even an A-cup could manage, you could argue it somewhat compensated for the film’s severe lack of female hormones?
As for me personally, I’ll be honest: my expectations for Kuai Ba were rock bottom going in, mainly due to the psychological trauma from last year’s all-3D animation “AniMen.” That film… well, setting aside the character designs (or rather, frog designs) and plot, the thing that sticks with me most in hindsight is this:
Come to think of it, there were actually several well-executed 3D animation sequences in that film. They were good enough to be edited into a trailer that could make people’s hearts race and shout, “I see the hope for Chinese animation!!!!” (Later, I searched online and actually found such a trailer…). But the actual content in the main feature? Several scenes featured characters that were clearly modeled and textured but hadn’t undergone any rendering or post-processing (well, I’m not too familiar with 3D animation jargon, so I’m just describing it intuitively). These characters were bouncing around stiffly on backgrounds that were also just modeled and textured but hadn’t been rendered!!!
So when I watched the “Kuiba” trailer online—the kind that makes you shout “I see hope for Chinese animation!!”—and then sat down in the theater, I was shocked to discover the actual film wasn’t “Crazy for Song” —that frustratingly overlong, full-FLASH, stop-motion-style mess. The characters actually had real shadows on their faces instead of those ghostly, weird effects like in “Little Big Panda.” The voice acting was surprisingly lively and natural, not that “OH, GOD!” dubbed-over-the-top stuff, and they didn’t cast those overrated celebrities either. Plus, to quote a reply on my Weibo: “When Long Face Guy got knocked flying, his hair got messed up! I was so moved—hair actually got messed up!” —Seriously, if you’re like me and have countless psychological scars from the “domestic animated blockbusters” of the past decade or so, you’ll understand that what seems utterly ordinary to us—those who’ve grown accustomed to Japanese and Western animation—is actually incredibly precious, rare, and hard to come by.
Enough sentimentality. Now for some ranting. The plot boils down to this: Monkey Dad—an undocumented immigrant squatter and high-risk individual in Wowo Village (…or should we call him Dumbo Dad?)—takes his little monkey son (… looks like he’s only six?) enlists in the army. While inevitably becoming the official father-son pairing destined for love-hate dynamics (not a spoiler—the animation makes this clear from the start), he casually stirs up trouble along the way: confesses to the scheming village chief 132 times, hooks up with a villainous old friend, and gets involved with a new, expressionless, horse-faced lover. Then, decisively, it’s to be continued. (Horseface’s expressionless face is kinda disappointing (his concept art looked gorgeous like Jinglin, you jerk!), while Xuelun is actually quite beautiful and devilishly charming. Though a colleague bitingly remarked, “His fundraising method kinda resembles the Chinese Red Cross…”… I burst out laughing.)
…Don’t accuse me of seeing yaoi where there isn’t any! This isn’t my fault!! There are way too few female characters!! The pink-pigtailed loli Jingxin is just a minor character! Finally, a princess who secretly loves Monkey Daddy appears, about to speak with deep affection… but Monkey Daddy doesn’t even glance at her and rides off into the distance! ! The green-haired loli Ling’s face and voice are insanely cute—so adorable it makes my heart flutter (see, I only remember loli names…). Who’s her voice actor? Please tell me!!!… But she only speaks twice?
…Anyway, I beg for a sequel! Rolling on the floor begging for the green-haired loli wuwuwuwu!!!! (Rolling on the floor!!! Rolling on the floor!!!) My shota-loving coworker was bawling during the little monkey’s emotional scenes, but as a loli-lover, I’m totally unmoved by these annoying little shota creatures (estimated age 6-7)… Give me lolis!!!
One last thing: apparently “Kuiba” had very few screenings scheduled at theaters. Luckily, our editor treated us to a private screening on July 8th. To arrive at the theater promptly at 5 PM, over a hundred of us left work early that afternoon and submitted an absence slip to admin with this supremely badass reason:
“Market research.”
Please specify：Anime Phone Cases » Kuiba 2011 Film Review: For this rare and precious “normalcy”