The Rope Curse 3

Watched Taiwan's 2023 The Rope Curse 3 (1:48:33), which has a promising beginning but a disappointing middle and ending. It is the seventh lunar month, Hungry Ghosts Month, and the Gate of Ghosts is open. We are immediately shown altars with Thai kuman thong; a banishing ritual performed with paper talismans, mugwort, yin-yang water. rice, and salt; and a kao ka performed by a troupe that features the Taoist character Zhong Kui, known in the Philippines as the Demon Queller. We are informed that, as long as the actor playing Zhong Kui masters and performs his steps well, all evil spirits will take him for the real Zhong Kui, fear him, and flee.  

Alas, both the screenplay and the direction are gravely flawed. Kuan-Yu, the kao ka director's son, performs as Zhong Kui and introduces unwarranted parkour moves to his role. We are led to believe that a series of misfortunes is the outcome: an actress is possessed by an evil spirit, a hotel guest hangs himself in his room, an invisible boy plays ball in the hotel corridors as seen on CCTV, Kuan-Yu's best friend is killed, and evil spirits vow to take seven lives and seven bodies to kill Zhong Kui.   

To make things worse, all of the characters are basically unpleasant persons, and the injection of Freudian incidents--especially in the midst of horrific scenes--to explain away their pasts does not make them deserving of audience sympathy. The result is an Asian horror movie hodgepodge that gets lost in its own chop suey. which is what happens when mythology is translated into horror, like what Hollywood has been doing to the Christian religion all these years.   

The ending is gentle and nostalgic, though, and the end titles long and complete, which is atypical of Netflix movies. This is, however, a movie of many misunderstandings, especially of the Thai demon and the Thai kuman thong. That this is a Taiwanese and not a Thai production is not a good excuse.

What people still do not understand to this very day, hilariously, is that everyone who likes lighting firecrackers, including born-again Christians, is, whether they like it or not, a staunch follower of Zhong Kui.