Finally watched "Charlie Chan and the Curse of the Dragon Queen"---Aargh!!!
Dear Chan Fans:
This was absolute rubbish! Such a great cast wasted! Did anyone actually read the entire script?! Hindsight being 20/20, I would have used everyone in the cast--even Richard Hatch--but not as the grandson! (Hard to believe, he'll be 67 this year!) I think a remake of "The Black Camel" would have been a much better choice, though, for Chan's return to the big screen. Ustinov could have been a great Chan, if given the chance (and a better script). He did a great Poirot in "Death on the Nile," so why not as great, as Chan? If given a proper story and script, he could have played it straight, and with study of the former Chan actors, he could have brought us a great characterization. Unfortunately, in this debacle, he was truly wasted (as was Rachel Roberts, Angie Dickenson, Roddy MacDowell, Brian Keith [terribly obscene], Lee Grant [give her back her russet red hair, please!], Michelle Pfeiffer, et al. By the way, if you blink, you'll miss David Hirokane, who SHOULD have played Lee Chan (not in just the b/w movie clip.) So, I blame Clive Donner, who brought us such greats as "Old Drac," "The Nude Bomb," and other "classics." And just who gave the green light to Jerry Sherlock's story and Stan Burns' screenplay?!?!? Wretched! Wretched!
Thankfully, there was no mention of Earl der Biggers in the closing credits.
On a side note, I finally, also watched "The Return of Charlie Chan" with Ross Martin. It was played straight, and I think Ross Martin had NOTHING to be ashamed of. The plot is very convoluted; it takes multiple viewings to figure it. However, other than Leslie Nielsen's bad makeup and accent, it's certainly heads above "CCatCotDQ"!
~Teil
Re: Finally watched "Charlie Chan and the Curse of the Dragon Queen"---Aargh!!!
Dear Teil,
Sadly, "Charlie Chan and the Curse of the Dragon Queen" was not much more than a spoof. Maybe they were afraid to play it straight and make a true Chan adventure, as there were, by that time, PC rumblings from special interest groups. We have not seen any attempt at a Charlie Chan project since then - more than 30 tears ago. This illustrates, I feel, the sad situation that we see today where feelings speak much louder than words.
Re: Finally watched "Charlie Chan and the Curse of the Dragon Queen"---Aargh!!!
Dear Teil and Rush,
In my Charlie Chan DVD collection, I include the two titles mentioned in the above posting.
"CC & the Curse of the Dragon Queen" is a bit of a mess. The actors didn't know how to play their parts in this film because the writer and director didn't know which way to take the storyline. Do the actors play it straight? Is this film a parody of the old Chan films from the 1930s-1940s? I think the director was trying to do a Mel Brooks parody, but he didn't have the comic timing skills to make it happen. Good comedy is hard to do. Just watch TV episodes of "The Addams Family" or "Get Smart."
As a result, "CC& the Curse of the Dragon Queen" fails in both directions. It falls somewhere in between a straight mystery and a poor parody. Extra: What's the deal with Peter Ustinov, as Chan, growling? I don't get it.
"The Return of Charlie Chan," featuring Ross Martin as Chan, is a good film with a fine storyline. Martin does a good job as a retired Charlie Chan. In the storyline, there are referances to Chan's past worldwide mysteries. There are three or four Asian-American actors employed as members of the Chan clan.
As I stated in my review of the film (found in the library of this site), I think it is a fine little film. I recommend buying a copy of this minor gem and adding it to your Charlie Chan DVD collection.
