When I saw the cover for the 2020 Chinese action fantasy movie "Da Tian Peng" (aka "The Pig King"), I must admit that I was intrigued. There is something alluring about the Chinese mythology when used for telling stories in movie.
And without ever having heard about "Da Tian Peng" from writer Yuan Chun and director Yilin Dai, I opted to sit down and watch it here in 2023, as I had the opportunity to do so.
The storyline, as written by Yuan Chun, was actually entertaining enough. I mean, it wasn't exactly an outstanding foray into this particular genre of Chinese fantasy, but it was fair enough for what it turned out to be. However, the overall enjoyment of the movie was just cut short by lousy CGI effects.
For a grand mythological tale such as "Da Tian Peng", then the movie needs proper special effects to bring the creatures and the wondrous magical effects to life on the screen. But hey, if you think that 1990s computer game graphics does the trick, then you're in for a treat here. A shame really that the CGI was so lousy, because it held the movie back a lot.
I wasn't familiar with the cast ensemble in "Da Tian Peng", but they had some talented enough actors and actresses on the cast list.
Visually then "Da Tian Peng" wasn't great, and it was because of the subpar CGI effects. The wardrobe and props departments, however, definitely worked their magic in the movie, because that looked good.
All in all, then I found "Da Tian Peng" to be somewhat disappointing, because it was difficult to get past the shoddy CGI effects, especially when there are so many of them and throughout most of the movie.
This is not a movie that I would recommend you rush out to get to watch. There are far better, more enjoyable and entertaining, and visually pleasing movies of the same genre out there, so there really isn't all that much speaking for you wasting your time on "Da Tian Peng".
My rating of "Da Tian Peng" lands on a four out of ten stars.
