Prince of the Sun (1990)

"Your bodily functions have cost me a lot of gold." - May

A young boy gifted with Buddha's magic must be protected from evil.
Starring: Conan Lee, Sheila Chan, Shun Lau, Ching-Ling Lam, and Cynthia Rothrock

Link to IMDB

When the holy leader of a group of Shaolin monks dies, his spirit is reincarnated into the body of a six year old boy. Some of the monks are jealous of this and see an opportunity to take the power for themselves, so begins a battle between the forces of good and evil as the loyal monks fight to protect the Boy.
The Boy escapes into the big city where he is unexpectedly rescued by a petty thief named Ben. The two become friends, and for the next 40 minutes the movie is all about their misadventures into the realm of "comedy hijinks."

The Boy and Ben

Ben and his sister, May, begrudgingly live together, and their constant arguing creates plenty of slapstick fighting and low-brow sitcom scenarios about having the Boy live with them. The Boy has some magical Buddha powers and is often visited by the ghost of his uncle, which also adds to the wacky madness going on here.

I can't tell if the comedy is aimed at children or not, or maybe something got lost in translation, but the Hong Kong humour wasn't working for me and it was hard to be maintain a sense of honest amusement.
At least Magic Crystal always had a story to follow, but the entire middle of this movie loses all forward momentum.

              Uncle Ghost                                              Bencheuk
in the TV                                                

Sitting through all the tedious comedy is worthwhile, because eventually it gets back to the main plot about Shaolin monks fighting each other. A powerful monk named Bencheuk (Cynthia Rothrock) is tasked with finding and protecting the Boy, but she better act fast because the forces of evil are growing stronger!

When the movie does give us action, it's top notch stuff. The battle scenes are intricate and expertly choreographed, making the last 30 minutes a flurry of epic action as Ben and Bencheuk fight the evil monks into submission.
Despite the annoying comedy bits, I still enjoyed watching this. There should have been more of a focus on the battle between good and evil instead of weird sitcom comedy, but the fun energy throughout the movie kept me entertained anyways.


Be sure not to miss:
- Dog in microwave.
- Who needs shurikens when you can throw birds?
- The doll used to substitute the Boy in action scenes is pretty funny.
- I honestly could not figure out if the Boy even had a name.

Internet review:
"Holy cow!! What A suuuuper-silly movie!!" - BorisK

Should I watch it?
It's a mixed bag, but not a waste.

Where can I find it?
A link here.

Prince of the Sun gets...