Tie Shan Gongzhu

Tang Sanzang and his three protectors—Sun Wukong, Zhu Bajie, and Sha Wujing—are journeying far to the west when they encounter "Fire Mountain." The flames of Fire Mountain are so ferocious that no man dares to brave its scorching flames; unfortunately, there is no other path to their destination.

A local villager informs Tang Sanzang that Princess Iron Fan owns a magical fan that can quench the mountain's fire. However, she is also unlikely to give it to them, as Sun Wukong previously angered her husband, the Bull Demon King. Unwilling to give up their journey, the three protectors must use their shape-shifting powers and formulate a plan to steal the magical fan from the grasp of the princess.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

Wan, Guchan Producer, Director

Wan, Laiming Producer, Director

Reviews

May 19, 2012

jonahthefurious

Mixed Feelings

After seeing Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarves in 1937, the Wan Brothers in China were inspired to created their own feature-length film in 1941. Princess Iron Fan was the result, China's first feature-length animated film.

STORY - 7/10
Based off of the Journey to the West from the sixteenth century, it follows the Buddhist priest Tripitaka and his three bodyguards Monkey, Pigsy, and Sandy as they come across a cruel buffalo-headed king who controls a mountain of fire and his wife who has the only item that will allow them to pass - a magic iron fan. Monkey has to defeat the princess in ... order to quench the flames and save the villagers. All in all, it's a pretty predictable adaptation of Journey to the West, and nothing really stands out as creative.

ART - 6/10
For 1941, the animation is neither very good or bad. It features a odd mixture of rotoscoped animation (the tracing of live-action footage) and traditional, clunky and stilted animation. The rotoscoping was done to save time and money, and it was actually used to a pretty good effect in the film and the result is very smooth animation. The problem is that it sticks out like a sore thumb every time it's used because it contrasts with the clunky animation everywhere else. The backgrounds are beautiful though, and some of the effects animation with fire and wind is pretty impressive.

SOUND - 5/10
Pretty standard 40's soundtrack. Nothing spectacular. The voice acting could be better as well, as it's pretty much non-stop yelling. A few songs are thrown in for good measure (probably a result of Snow White's influence on the Wan Brothers) but they're basically just a stop to the story and don't really add much.

CHARACTER - 5/10
The Monkey King character was actually pretty likeable, despite being slightly predictable. Most of the other characters are pretty one-dimensional, however.

ENJOYMENT - 7/10
I enjoyed it, but I was watching for the historical aspect, it being China's first animated feature film. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone as a film on its own, though, as it's not very interesting and hard to watch at some points.

Reviewer’s Rating: 6

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Feb 24, 2021

AlanDSouza1

Mixed Feelings

As one of the first feature length animated films ever made (the 12th documented one), Princess Iron Fan has to be applauded for its ambition in both technical and narrative scope. Portraying a singular story set within the Journey to the West canon, this Chinese film was filmed and broadcasted during the Japanese occupation of the Middle Kingdom and inspired a gamut of artists in Japan and around the world to create their own feature length narratives. More than anything else, I can see heavy influences of Fleischer in this work, but there are distinctive Chinese aesthetics and stylistic syllogisms in place that give the ... story its texture and vibrancy. Unfortunately, the sound quality as well as the visual archival process was a disruptive one and it doesn't make for the best watching experience. It is worth taking a look at purely for its historical significance and the animated platform that set the stage for future innovations of the artform.

Reviewer’s Rating: 6

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Mar 14, 2019

Assthete

Not Recommended

When adapting a simple tale, all you can fuck up with is, well, the adaptation. The reason why Snow White is so acclaimed and memorable isn't because of its ingenious storytelling, but rather its audiovisual timelessness. By displaying so much prowess, it stood the test of time quite effortlessly. The same cannot be said about Wan Brothers' attempt to make animation on pair with Disney's high quality standards.

Tie Shan Gongzhu is fluid with passable backgrounds... and as far as presentation goes that is pretty much it. On the negative side however, everything is kinda messed up. The positioning of cels is inconsistent throughout, the ... lighting is so poorly done it's sometimes impossible to distinguish elements on screen, characters go off-model when they shouldn't, vectors are all over the place making it a lot harder to discern directions, weirdly unseemly angles, numerous glitches, and depth during some scenes is pretty much nonexistent. All that combined is disorienting enough already, but honestly, nothing comes close to how annoyingly loud and erratic the sound recording is. It can deafen you, so beware.

I really appreciate the ethos at play here and that various artists struggled through war to realize their artistic vision, but it's undeniably dated, to a degree it is almost an impossible watch. They wanted to make the first full-length Chinese animated movie, and they did just that, in a case I can only call sacrificing quality for historical achievement. With that said, I don't recommend watching it unless you're interested in what it represents rather than what it has to offer.

Reviewer’s Rating: 3

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