Terry Chen, a Chinese-Canadian, and his Caucasian wife Jaime King are living in Shanghai when word comes that an uncle of Chen’s, has died. They and their young son (Regan Oey) fly back for the funeral. King soon learns that the uncle was known as the Bone Collector, apparently because he exhumed the bodies of Chinese immigrants and shipped their bones home to be buried near their ancestors, or else their spirits would never settle. Anyhoo, Oey starts seeing dead people and they ain’t Bruce Willis, causing him to become seriously ill. Meanwhile, distraught and clueless King learns through a neighbourhood mythology expert (Henry O) that this is the mythological ‘Ghost Month’, or some such hooey. As the boy lies seriously ill in hospital, King starts to investigate the truth about the deceased uncle’s activities, something that everyone else, especially widowed Aunt Pei-Pei Cheng, seems to want to keep secret. Needless to say, there’s gotta be a few skeletons in this family’s closet to come out. Michael Biehn plays a concerned buddy of King’s, who helps her investigate the family’s history.
Have you ever wanted to see a Canadian-made, Chinese folklore-infused version of a J-horror film? One starring Jaime King, Michael Biehn (why is he always wearing a cap or beret these days and hanging out with Chinse people?), and Pei-Pei Cheng, and executive produced by the infamous Uwe “House of the Dead” Boll? No? Well, it’s your loss because I actually don’t think this Ernie Barbarash (the awful Cuba Gooding Jr./Val Kilmer sci-fi thriller “Hardwired”) film is too bad. In fact, I think it’s at least better than any horror film with “The Ring” or “Ringu” in its title. And it’s definitely the best film Uwe Boll has ever been associated. Yeah, OK, that last one is faint praise, but still, you could do a lot worse than this.
Things start off a bit weirdly, with the timeline and structure all out of whack, and it’s a little odd that Chinese-Canadian Chen is going to Canada (albeit Chinatown) to be with his Chinese relatives after living in China, but after a while you kinda get used to it, as it has relevance to the plot. With all these Asian characters in Canada it kinda seems like a reverse of the situation in the Americanised version of “The Grudge” (one of the few J-horrors that I like, both versions). And admittedly, the J-horror vibes are hard to shake at first, and I’m no fan of the genre. That said, there’s a definite unease permeating the film, and young Oey’s first encounter with a ghost is hilarious. He’s terrific, in fact, all the Asian actors are pretty good here. Jaime King? Not so much, but I really dug the film’s sinister air of conspiracy all around her. Former martial arts star Pei-Pei Cheng is hard to recognise at first, as she actually looks younger here than she did in “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon”. She has a great scene where she spews up bones one by one.
It’s actually a really weird and creepy film, much weirder than any J-horror film, with some truly bizarre mythology being thrown out there. And hey, it even tries to work in a little Chinese immigration stuff too, which is probably the most original thing in the film. With a few tweaks I could even see this film working as a horror film for young adults. As is, I actually think it’s still pretty fun, and one of the better films of its type. That is, unless you actually like J-horror, but I seriously don’t. This one at least doesn’t have a monochromatic colour scheme, so there’s that to be thankful for.
The screenplay by Trevor Markwart (based on his story), Carl Bessai, and Doug Taylor won’t win any originality awards, admittedly, stealing from most J-horror films you can think of, especially “The Grudge”, albeit not in great chunks.
OVERALL SUMMARY
It’s not great, but if it had a more traditional structure, it might’ve been really entertaining. It’s still very watchable, so long as your expectations aren’t set too high going in.
