Detective Dee: The Four Heavenly Kings | Rotten Tomatoes

Detective Dee: The Four Heavenly Kings

Released Jul 27, 2018

2 hr. 12 min.

Fantasy

Adventure

Action

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List

60%

10 Reviews

Tomatometer

66%

50+ Ratings

Audience Score

Accused of wrongdoing by Empress Wu, Detective Dee faces a formidable foe while investigating a crime wave that's marked by strange and seemingly supernatural occurrences.

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Premiered Sep 19

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Audience Member

In my opinion,there's pluses and minuses in this latest Detective Dee movie. On the positive side, it's filled with colorful pageantry, well presented martial arts sequences, terrific acrobatics, and you can throw in an intriguing storyline involving sorcery and treachery. The negatives, as I see it, are a somewhat overly long film, at around 2hrs. and 12min. as well as the movie being a little too confusing and complicated at times. In the film, the intrepid Detective Dee has been awarded the super powerful Dragon-Taming Mace, by the Emperor, for his past heroism. However, his new struggles will be with the evil and power hungry Empress, as well as a reemerging cult that will utilize magic, illusions, and mind control to try and gain control of the Dynasty. Overall, the movie, directed by Tsui Hark, offers rewards to those viewers that can just enjoy its special effects, colorful pageantry, and its intriguing twists and turns.

Rated 3 out of 5 stars

02/25/23

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Audience Member

Muddled, over-long, and over-blown.

Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars

01/29/23

Full Review

Audience Member

Nice imaginative CGI for a HK production. But the ending was way beyond simple.

Rated 2 out of 5 stars

09/03/18

Full Review

Audience Member

Movie was way too long. Way too many computerized cheap looking graphics. Looks like the computer animation was done by a child. The previous detective dee rise of see dragon was way better and had a good storyline. This one heavenly king or whatever it’s called was way too boring of a story to follow. The fights were bad also. Maybe a few good fights but mostly boring. Almost 3 hour movie. Zzzzzzzz

Rated 2 out of 5 stars

08/06/18

Full Review

Audience Member

The story is a complex, multi-character excerise in episodic storytelling. Thre is a full-bodied saga that unfolds in "The Four Heavenly Kings" that offers rich, creative characters drawing on layered back story that, although implied for a lot of the characters, very much recognizable and clear. The main cast give stellar performances potraying what has to be as fascinating a mythos as Disney's fairytale collection. The special effects are extravagant, over-the-top displays that show a strong desire to "one up" Hollywood, and to a degree Bollywood" , producing a true to score blockbuster experience. I have to say that Tsui pulls it off marvelously. Obviously money wasn't a concern. Think ABC's 'Once Upon A Time' meets -well- Hong Kong! Overall "Detective Dee: The Four Heavenly Kings" is a beautifully filmed fantasy tale of mythical mastery.

Rated 4 out of 5 stars

01/12/23

Full Review

Audience Member

Non-stop spectacle, whether it's wire-fu, living dragon statues, giant albino gorillas, eyeball-covered beasts, or just the sets and costumes. Hey, Hollywood, this is how to do CGI fight scenes.

Rated 3 out of 5 stars

02/08/23

Full Review

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Hark Tsui

Director

Mark Chao

Dee

Shaofeng Feng

Yuchi Zhenjin

Carina Lau

Wu Zetian

Kenny Lin

Shatuo Zhong

Ethan Juan

Master Yuan Ce

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Detective Dee: The Four Heavenly Kings: Trailer 1

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Larushka Ivan-Zadeh

Times (UK)

The film's visual imagination is boggling and exhilaratingly strange.

Rated: 3/5

Jul 27, 2018

Full Review

Justin Chang

Los Angeles Times

Dee is invariably the most sane, grounded person in every scene, though once it's time to bust out the wireworks, he can leap from rafter to rafter with the best of them. It's the movie that never takes flight.

Jul 26, 2018

Full Review

Maggie Lee

Variety

The Hong Kong genre maestro's childlike imagination and technical inventiveness seems inexhaustible.

Jul 26, 2018

Full Review

Peter Sobczynski

eFilmCritic.com

At over two overstuffed hours, it may prove to be too much for some viewers, but there is so much nifty and bizarre stuff going on that those with a taste for the odd stuff can simply sit back and let it wash over them like an exceptionally vivid dream.

Feb 21, 2019

Full Review

Edmund Lee

South China Morning Post

The Four Heavenly Kings strives to bridge the events in [the two previous films] - only to unwittingly abandon its seventh-century mystery for some pointless CGI mayhem halfway through.

Rated: 2.5/5

Sep 17, 2018

Full Review

Sean Gilman

MUBI

Four Heavenly Kings is more coherent than Demons Strike Back, and better in just about every way than Dunjia, and its effects are as imaginative as anything in cinema today...

Jul 27, 2018

Full Review

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Synopsis

Accused of wrongdoing by Empress Wu, Detective Dee faces a formidable foe while investigating a crime wave that's marked by strange and seemingly supernatural occurrences.

Director: Hark Tsui
Screenwriter: Chia-lu Chang
Distributor: Well Go USA
Genre: Fantasy, Adventure, Action
Original Language: Chinese
Release Date (Theaters): Jul 27, 2018, Limited
Release Date (Streaming): Nov 13, 2018
Box Office (Gross USA): $132.0K
Aspect Ratio: Scope (2.35:1)

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