A Chinese Ghost Story III (1991)

"Let's chant"

A Chinese Ghost Story 3 was the final film in the trilogy and took place 100 years after the original. Gone were Leslie Cheung and Wu Ma with Tony Leung, Lau Shun, and Jacky Cheung taking their places. Joey Wong returned as a ghost working for the Tree Demon played once again by Lau Siu Ming. If the set up sounds familiar it was.

Monk Fong and his master are carrying a gold Buddha statue to the Imperial Temple. In a rough and tumble town, clownish Swordsman Yin accidentally reveals the statue to a group of thieves. Attempting to stay dry during a downpour the two Buddhists take shelter in the haunted Orchid Temple with the miscreants in close pursuit. While the golden Buddha will protect the monks, the thieves find themselves in the clutches of beautiful ghosts. When Fong’s master goes into the forest to expose the demon within, Fong loses the statue. A beautiful ghost uses this time to tempt the young monk with numerous erotic games.

In the first film Wu Ma’s Swordsman Yin buried the Tree Demon for 100 years. Thus, this story takes place with the Tree Demon having broken free and starting the whole cycle again. The film felt overly redundant. The major difference being that the slapstick comedy level was increased with this film, something I’m not a fan of. While I tolerated Jacky Cheung’s helpful swordsman in the second film, the lecherous, greedy swordsman in this one wasn’t nearly as likeable. Lau Shun was fine as the wise old monk, but I still missed Wu Ma from the first two. Joey Wong playing a similar character in a similar film was too much for me. The Demon Tree having the same actor made sense, but without Leslie, why not recast the alluring ghost as well? If the Demon Tree events were bound to happen again, they needed to shake up the whole story instead of repeating it with different characters doing much the same thing.

The special effects were better in this film, but that’s not saying much. Buddhist and Taoist magic were on full display as well as demonic and ghostly abilities-elongated tongue, fingernails, and hair. Not to say the effects were great, there were places the wires could be seen in the smoke/fog.

I found the first two thirds of the film tedious as much as I wanted to like it. The last third with the full on battle with the Tree Demon and the Lord of the Black Mountain was more entertaining. My chief complaint is if they were determined to essentially do a remake, it needed to be better than the first, not an obvious retread of the source material that was only four years old. Not even Tony Leung could save it for me. If you are a fan of Hong Kong 1990’s slapstick, you will likely enjoy this more than I did. While it had some highlights (a building coming to life!), it didn’t stand a ghost of a chance of being better or even as good as the first two.

29 October 2026

Trigger warnings: SNAKES. Several scenes with numerous snakes. Ick.

Sticky Note: Wardrobe must have used super glue to hold up Joey’s dress in one running scene, no double- sided wig tape could do the job they were requiring to keep the film PG.

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