The Secret of the Magic Gourd DVD with Corbin Bleu (G) +Movie Reviews

"Don't forget to clip your nails!"

iansomniak | USA, Planet Earth | 03/06/2009

(4 out of 5 stars)

"This is the story of a Chinese boy by the name of Raymond (a.k.a. Wang Bao) who has a creative imagination, but is chronically lazy and forgetful. Ray has a hard time getting out of bed in the morning, and he stubbornly refuses to trim his toenails on a regular basis (which, of course, can eventually wreak havoc on one's socks and shoes). The flaw that gets young Raymond into the most trouble, however, is his habitual failure to study for the rigorous math exams, administered daily by his demanding teacher, Miss Lee. It seems that in China, students work in groups, so one slacker will negatively affect the whole team's grade. Thus, Raymond's carelessness infuriates not only his instructor, but his classmates as well. One fateful afternoon, a dejected Raymond flees the jeers of his peers and heads for the lake to do some fishing. There he makes a wish, a wish to succeed in school and life without having to do any work or spend any time studying. Enter Bailey (or Bao Hulu), a diminutive genie in the form of a Chinese bottle gourd.

Bailey seems like an odd name for a gourd (Gordon would be better), but this little fellow is no ordinary gourd. Looking a bit like a dollop of soft-serve ice-cream, this anthropomorphic calabash has widely spaced button-like eyes on the upper half of his body, a hollow mouth in the middle of his belly, and no nose whatsoever. He appears to be made of plastic, like a Mr. Potato Head toy, and his rubbery limbs stretch and expand like Mr. Fantastic's. The Magic Gourd is also a shape-shifter, like the Shmoo, who can morph into anything from a speedboat engine to an alarm clock. He can melt into a puddle or grow into a giant monster...he can even burst into flames at will, without being consumed in the inferno. What's more, Bailey is an infinitely powerful sorcerer who can fly jet planes and make cheeseburgers and snack cakes materialize out of thin air. He can build robots...calculate complex mathematical problems...and YES, he can clip toenails like nobody's business! Can the gourd really free Raymond from life's day-to-day drudgeries...or will he only cause more trouble?

The Magic Gourd DVD boasts a beautifully clear and colorful widescreen transfer with Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound. Bonus features consist of Bailey's computer-animated bloopers; a DVD game; a behind-the-scenes featurette; and a music video of the Chinese version of the movie's theme song. In addition to the English dub, the Mandarin and Cantonese vocal tracks are included, but the only subtitle choice available for them is the closed captioning of the English version. Since Bailey the Gourd is trying to do for nail care what Smokey the Bear did for forest fire prevention, it would have been nice if Disney had included a free pair of clippers in the DVD case. Well, maybe they're saving that for the platinum edition.

The tale of the Magic Gourd is apparently a well known story in China, but Americans will probably find the whole concept of a gourd-shaped wizard to be kind of bizarre. The folks at Disney have tried to Americanize this production by casting High School Musical's Corbin Bleu, changing all the Chinese names and having the characters say the word "awesome" a lot...but I doubt that the Magic Gourd will become the next Hannah Montana. Nevertheless, this is a pretty entertaining family film with a positive message."

Cute film but weak compare to others................

Jenny J.J.I. | That Lives in Carolinas | 09/17/2009

(3 out of 5 stars)

"The plot is almost silly: A magic gourd which talks and grants whatever wishes you have? Hmm...I don't know kids nowadays are more intelligent to buy this load of make-believe. But there is also something idealistically engaging about thick Mainland Chinese production which will appeal to the kid in you. The cutesy picture brings live action and animation together quite decently to appeal to the younger viewers. There are some imaginative and adorable sequences which involve fishes, chess pieces, a ferocious dinosaur and an army of toys. Just don't expect Pixar standards.

The magic gourd is a somewhat awkward creation but Chinese voice actor Chen Pei Si (who also voiced Edna Mode and Mushu in China's version of "The Incredibles" and "Mulan") brings life to the delightful character with enough zest.

Also, watch out for Gigi Leung's otherwise bland performance as a Mathematics teacher who manages to make us giggle in amusement whenever she recites lines which are oh-so-righteous. Child actor Zhu Qi Long (whose biggest screen credit is in Jet Li's Fearless) gives an earnest performance as a kid who, well, just wants to be happy.

There are certain sequences which will remind you of other Disney flicks like "Toy Story" and "Dinosaur," but of course, not as excitingly rendered and played out as the American versions. This wholesome family movie is obviously targeted at the younger audience but that doesn't diminish its whimsical charm, stylish production values, or family-friendly moral.

"

My Family Enjoyed this Movie

S William Shaw | The Nether | 03/03/2009

(4 out of 5 stars)

"My family enjoyed this movie. While it was not the nest children's movie we have seen this month, it was fresh and entertaining.

My only beef with the flick is that Disney tried in nearly every way to mask that this was a Chinese film with overdubbed voices. When started to weatch the movie, we thought something was wriong with the audio because the words didn't match the actor's mouths. Of course we quickly realized why...they were speaking Chinese.

Despite being enjoyable, some of the overdubbed voices were over the top, and didn't feel authentic.

In any case, this film is worth watching if you have children 10 and under."

I simply reflect your heart's desire. If you think bad thou

TheTerrorBeyond | McKinney, Texas USA | 02/26/2009

(3 out of 5 stars)

"A lazy, daydreaming, 11-year-old kid learns the value of hard work when he catches a magic gourd while fishing and it begins granting all his wishes. The problem, as we have seen in so many movies, is that the wishes have consequences. As Raymond makes more and more wishes, more and more things go wrong and his friendships are strained.

"I'm just doing everything you tell me to. I simply reflect your heart's desire. If you think bad thoughts, I become bad..." - Gourd

He learns that he must rebuild others' trust in him and his faith in himself. The only way for him to do this is to do it himself and not rely on the gourd to do everything for him.

This film might work well for parents of young children, as they can use it as a tool for teaching their children the value of hard work and responsibility, but I don't see it being very entertaining for kids over the age of 10 or so. My 11-year-old son watched it with me and wasn't thrilled with it, and he isn't terribly picky when it comes to movies. The movie is, for the most part, overly sentimental and a tiny bit heavy handed on the morality.

The movie was made for Chinese audiences and is based on a Chinese children's story, so it might not resonate with American audiences. Your average American 11-year-old kid might not even know what a gourd is and it will probably seem like a strange choice for a main character. With this said, the movie was made for a Chinese audience, so this was exactly what the movie was supposed to be.

The acting is slightly sub-par, even for your standard kid's movie, with no standout performances from any of the cast. I watched it with the dubbed soundtrack, so I am not sure if the original Chinese voices were more inspired, but the voice acting wasn't anything special.

The computer animation is passable, but definitely not the greatest you will see. Some of the CG characters look much better than others, such as the dinosaur in the movie theater. The main CG character, the gourd, kinda looks like a blog of play-doh or something, but this really doesn't distract from the movie.

3/5 stars - recommended for younger kids"

Not a bad first start for Disney, but the overall product wa

Alexander Lucard | Arlington, VA | 02/25/2009

(3 out of 5 stars)

"The Secret of the Magic Gourd is a Disney original started out as a novella by Zhang Tianyi, and was first made into a movie in 1963. This remake, which combines live-action and CGI, was the first picture produced by the Disney corporation specifically for the Chinese market, with English speaking audiences as an afterthought. One of the most striking things about the film was watching it in English and then in Mandarin (with the subtitles turned off) to see if I could get a better handle on the language. I should point out that I've been taking Mandarin for several years now, and although my knowledge of the language is far from fluent, I could piece together the story, moods, and most importantly the intonations. What I discovered is that although the English dubbed version of this film is very different (to the point of changing full sentences and topics to better fit the English speaking audience), the overall tone and message of the movie remained the same. Sadly, this message wasn't very good in either case.

Wang Bao (or Raymond in the US version) is a lazy, selfish, slacker child who really seems to care little for his family, classmates, or humanity in general. This my friends, is your protagonist. He is an amazingly unlikeable character throughout the entire movie, albeit it MUCH MORE SO in the English dub than in the Mandarin, mainly due to the actor doing his lines.

One day Wang Bao finds the magic sentient walking, talking gourd from his grandmother's fairy tales. "Hu Lu" (Or Bailey as it is called in the English version) decides that he will serve the Wang Bao's and use his magical power to grant Bao's every wish. Of course the problem here is that Bao is an extremely selfish child who doesn't understand Newton's Third Law and that everything he wishes for, has to come from someplace else. As well Bailey, not being human is incapable of understanding metaphor or anything other than an extract literal meaning of Bao's wishes. This level of confusion, is of course, where the comedy is supposed to come in.

The moral of the movie is that one needs to take responsibility for one's own actions and that it is better to try and fail, rather than to let someone else do the work for you, lest you never grow as a person. I wholeheartedly support this Afterschool Special type message, but due to a combination of acting/subpar writing, one really doesn't get this fully. You spend almost all of the movie hating Bao for being just an awful child who treats everyone around him with disdain and contempt, while you feel so bad for the cute little gourd who just can't please his master and who doesn't understand why he is always so mentally and physically abusive to him. Now I LOVE slapstick ala the 3 Stooges, but man did I think "Bao is going to grow up to be a wife beater" from the way he treated the innocent little magical gourd.

Bao never truly gets his comeuppance for his actions in this film, which defeats the whole purpose of the movie. At most, he got a wrist slap for cheating on a test instead of full punishment due to how good he has been at everything lately...which was actually Hu Lu's doing. In the end everyone love's him for being awesome and Hu Lu gets thrown into a pond. Only at the very end does Bao apologize for his misdeeds, but that only comes after he wins a Swim Meet and realizes this is the first thing he's ever done on his own without using others to do the work for him. Hu Lu thankfully decides to find another child who will appreciate him better, which is the best part of the movie.

The Mandarin cast did a great job, while the American cast was wooden and phoning it in, much like what dubbing used to be for Japanese movies and anime in the 1980's. The actual DVD layout is odd too, as it just goes into the movie and the special features in succession without letting you choose what to watch and when. The CGI effects, while not up to the level of Pixar, were quite nice and CGI frogs and birds were very well done and quite realistic.

In the end, this isn't a bad first effort for Disney gearing itself toward the mainland Chinese market, but it's also not a good one by any means. Bao/Rodney needed to be a lot less prickish in order to make the audience like him, or at least feel sympathy for him. Moreover, the message of "Take responsibility for your actions" is diluted into "Being a jerk gets you a head in life. Only actually try your hardest when your back is up against the wall. Otherwise someone else will do it for you." That's not cool.

Mediocre movie overall, and this is far better off as a rental rather than a purchase.

"

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