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The sequel to the epic Julie Andrews road show picture wasn't a hit, but it tells a good story of its own. Charlton Heston is okay but the central character is a Chinese immigrant played by Tina Chen. Against all odds, the peasant matriarch survives plagues and leprosy to found a family dynasty for the new Hawaii. The Hawaiians Blu-ray Twilight Time Limited Edition 1970 / Color / 2:35 widescreen / 134 min. / Ship Date February 9, 2016 / available through Twilight Time Movies / 29.95 Starring Charlton Heston, Tina Chen, Geraldine Chaplin, Mako, John Phillip Law, Alec McCowen, Miko Mayama, Virginia Ann Lee, Chris Robinson, Naomi Stevens, Keye Luke, Khigh Dhiegh, Mary Munday, Harry Townes, Lyle Bettger, James Hong, James Gregory, Harry Holcombe, Victor Sen Yung Cinematography Lucien Ballard, Philip Lathrop Film Editor Byron Brandt, Ralph Winters Original Music Henry Mancini Written by James R. Webb from the novel by James A. Michener Produced by Walter Mirisch Directed by...

*full disclosure: a DVD screener of this film was provided by Indican Pictures for review.

Director/writer: Oscar L. Costo.

Cast: Vivian Wu, Richard Burgi and Honglei Sun.

Shanghai Mystery (originally titled Shanghai Red) is one of those hugely character driven films where, if director Oscar L. Costco ("Seaquest Dsv") was driving, he must be moving at 20 miles per hour. The type of film he developed may not be for everyone. What he creates is a slow mystery drama that starts with a lady in a slinky red dress.

She arrives at a penthouse in Shanghai, shoots a 'client,' and gets caught. The rest of the film bounces between her time in prison, talking to a lawyer, and revealing her life in flashback.

Mei Li's (Vivian Wu, Strange World) life is explored in exquisite detail. Viewers first learns that her husband was killed during a business trip that she urged him to take.

Monika Treut's Ghosted is an abject lesson in how good intentions can overwhelm a film, whatever the director's talent. Her latest production in a twenty-year career in which she's already repeatedly explored lesbian and transgender themes, Ghosted is fundamentally a very simple love story - girl finds girl, loses girl, needs to learn to move on. But for all the obvious empathy and understanding Treut lavishes on the material she wanders much too far off track with her insistence on pushing the kind of heavily weighted dialogue and symbolism that suggest this is supposed to be a narrative for the ages.

Hopping repeatedly from Taipei to Hamburg, Ghosted first introduces us to Ai-Ling (Ke-Huan Ru), newly arrived in Germany to stay with her uncle (ubiquitous character actor Jack Kao) while she investigates some sensitive family history.

Skipping forward in time, we meet artist Sophie Schmitt (TV actress Inga Busch...