The Treasure Hunter might star a charismatic Jay Chou as a gungho hero. But it's Taiwanese eye candy Lin Chiling who shines most brightly
In the movie, 35-year-old model-actress Lin Chiling plays Lan Ting, the clingy sidekick and childhood love of archaeologist protagonist Qiao Fei (Jay Chou).
Time and again, she gets rescued by the gungho hero who goes around the desert kicking grave plunderers' butts, so that he can return artefacts to their rightful owners.
In reality, it's probably Chiling's looks that will save this movie, which opens here today, from becoming a $21-million disaster.
After all, the combination of megastars and a colossal budget means expectations will be high.
Too bad these megastars are known more for their celebrity hijinks than acting chops.
In other words, The Treasure Hunter will probably fall short of meeting these expectations.
Perhaps director Kevin Chu was counting on Chiling's natural allure. She has been hailed by Taiwan media as the sexiest model on the island.
Well, she does ooze sex appeal onscreen.
The way the buxom beauty clings onto the 30-year-old Jay will appeal to males who may envision themselves as a hero saving a damsel in distress.
(The artificial sandstorms and ugly baddies on horses add to the hero fantasy too.)
Chiling also exercised her singing chops when she recorded the film's ending theme, Take Me Flying - in her famous girlish voice, of course.
She even penned its lyrics, with multi-hyphenate Jay writing the tune.
Kudos to the 1.74m-tall actress for shattering her image as a 'vase', or an ornament, as the Chinese metaphor goes.
The Chinese media had given her that moniker after she played Tony Leung's demure wife in the two-part Red Cliff in 2008 and 2009.
To film The Treasure Hunter, she had to brave the scenic yet harsh Mongolian desert for more than two months.
Sometimes, she went without a shower for two days.
Sand was everywhere, in the crew's food, in their tents. Chiling even had her face scraped by flying sand when the wind picked up.
But she told the local media it was 'all good fun' when she, Jay and Kevin flew into town last week to promote the movie.
She also performed all her own fighting scenes. (Jay did more than 90 per cent of his action stunts.)
In one particular scene, Chiling leapt on Jay's shoulders and wrapped her legs around him, as he swung her around like a rag doll.
She also wielded a spear in the movie.
Beefed up role
Pretty impressive for someone with no prior training in martial arts.
'My greatest regret is not preparing myself sufficiently before filming started,' she told FiRST.
She had to learn her stunts on the set.
Why so unprepared? Apparently, it's because her fighting role was only beefed up halfway into filming.
On the last-minute changes, director Kevin explained: 'Her potential in shooting action scenes surprised me so I increased the number of her fighting scenes.'
And although Chiling's terrified of horses - she fell off one in 2005 while filming an advertisement - she gamely shot a scene which had dozens of horsemen attacking her and Jay while they escape on a motorcycle.
'I was really afraid, so I begged Jay to ride faster. That wasn't in the original script,' she said.
Ah, no wonder there was a look of genuine fear on her face as she clung on to her co-star during the shoot.
The way she tossed her tresses in the wind - shampoo-ad style - and how she put her face on Jay's leather-clad shoulders gave new meaning to the term 'in hot pursuit'.
So the chemistry sizzled between the stars then?
Not really.
While Chiling and Jay claimed they share an excellent rapport - he had taken her on desert drives to secluded places to talk about 'personal stuff' in between shoots - don't expect first-class acting from them.
How bad is it? Let's just say other cast members like Chinese actor Chen Daoming and Hong Kong veteran Eric Tsang were more expressive.
Even the CGI-created demons showed more facial expressions than these onscreen lovebirds.
Lan Ting's sadness over the loss of her father, tragically, wasn't convincing at all.
And while Kevin praised Jay for his martial arts prowess (coached by top Hong Kong action choreographer Tony Ching), no number of high kicks can compensate for Jay's deadpan acting, which we have seen in his other films such as Initial D, Secret and Kung Fu Dunk.
Perhaps Jay was just being himself? Again.
Not that his gongfu moves are that great anyway.
Pitted against heroes of recent action flicks, Jay's skills would probably get thumped by Donnie Yen's ability (Bodyguards And Assassins) and Rain's abs (Ninja Assassin).
Even the vampires and werewolves from The Twilight Saga: New Moon would beat The Treasure Hunter, and that's just on their growls alone.
We can only hope that Jay, who's currently playing Kato, a superhero's sidekick in a re-make of The Green Hornet, will pick up a trick or two from gongfu icon Bruce Lee, who first played that role.
Yet, something is more disturbing than sub-par acting in The Treasure Hunter - like the director's poor memory.
In our interview with him, we asked 57-year-old Kevin whether he finds his film similar to past Hollywood adventure flicks.
He said in Mandarin: 'How can that be?
'I don't think they fought a mummy in a desert.'
Er, Brendan Fraser did that in The Mummy in 1999 - and its two sequels in 2001 and 2008, we reminded Kevin.
1/02/2010 12:39:00 AM
kenmouse
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Jake Gyllenhaal is desperately trying to win back Reese Witherspoon.
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