Comments on: Tea Fight!

By: tyler

tyler — Thu, 07 May 2009 03:04:27 +0000

haha it has tea in the name i want to see it to now.

By: Cinnabar

Cinnabar — Sat, 02 May 2009 15:12:17 +0000

Thanks for pointing out that broken link so I could fix it. I think you’re right that the mix of languages (and tea cultures) is a pretty good way to make it accessible to a broader audience. If I hadn’t read anything about it and just watched the trailers I would have guessed that it was a fight between the Japanese way of tea and the Chinese way of tea, which would be a very odd story line for a film!

By: kali

kali — Sat, 02 May 2009 07:20:55 +0000

Oh yes, I was responding to the imdb quote (though the imdb link actually does not go to imdb, btw). Well, anyway, that person sounded perturbed about the chinese characters all knowing japanese and the japanese characters all knowing chinese, but there are possible ways to get around that, if it annoys anyone else. (Not only is it just convenient for the plot, how else are they supposed to market this thing to both countries, anyway?)

Well, I hope the movie provides you fodder for at least another post on it. XD

By: Cinnabar

Cinnabar — Sat, 02 May 2009 03:58:22 +0000

It sounds like your comment is in response to my quote from IMDB written by someone else. The fact that the movie’s dialog is in Japanese and Chinese is perfectly logical because part of it takes place in each country and the language changes accordingly.

It is set both considerably before WWII, during an ambiguous and legendary “ancient China,” and after WWII, in 2007.

By: kali

kali — Sat, 02 May 2009 03:40:29 +0000

Hm… well, is this set in Taiwan, and is it set before/within a generation or so after WWII? Seeing as Taiwan was a part of the Japanese empire for a while–my maternal grandparents were fluent in Japanese, and apparently that’s what they spoke at home. (Er, my mother’s side of the family being Taiwanese Chinese.)

OK, I skimmed the summary and the setting seems… complicated, but anyway, there are actually ways to justify this! should you not want to accept things as is. Assuming WWII even occurred in this universe.

But actors speaking languages other than their native tongues can be good for a laugh–and that just seems to be how crossover entertainment works in Asia.