Beijing Review: gods down from the clouds

Beijing Review reported that, according to data from Chinese ticketing platform Maoyan, the film had grossed more than 1.5 billion yuan (reported as US$221 million) as of August 13, making it the summer's second-highest-grossing release, second only to Stephen Chow's Kung Fu Soccer, and placing it among the 10 highest-grossing animated films in Chinese box-office history.[1]

The feature describes how, rather than retelling the immortals' famous voyage across the East Sea, the film imagines how they earn their divinity in the first place: the Eight Immortals are recast as a motley crew of con artists who pose as deities to break into a celestial treasure vault, only to find themselves obliged to answer the wishes of their worshipers while becoming entangled in a conspiracy threatening the balance between the mortal and immortal worlds.[1]

The feature details the film's worldbuilding: Penglai, long imagined as a remote celestial paradise, is turned into a bustling modern metropolis where gods are graded by an Immortals Management Bureau on how many wishes they fulfill; the floating island is carried by four giant mythical turtles drawn from the Jin-Dynasty collection Xuanzhongji, its elusive nature takes its cue from the Song-Dynasty anthology Taiping Guangji, the fish-drawn carriages were inspired by Han-Dynasty murals, and the celestial spa attendants by Dijiang, a mountain deity from The Classic of Mountains and Seas.[1]

Director Mu Zhengyang told the magazine: "The world was designed in such a way that, at first glance, audiences feel they've stepped into a traditional Chinese fairyland. But once inside, it becomes much more like a giant amusement park"; the feature adds that the film has sparked an Easter-egg hunt across Chinese social media, with viewers tracing its cultural references back to their classical sources.[1]

The feature also covers the debate over the film's liberties with the source legend: one viewer on lifestyle app Xiaohongshu (RedNote) dismissed it as wearing "the trappings of the Eight Immortals while remaining, at its core, a commercial heist movie," while a comment on Zhihu called it "an attempt at redefining divinity," arguing that divinity in the film is "a code of conduct—a moral choice that anyone can make in the here and now."[1]

Mu told Shanghai-based news portal ThePaper.cn that the legend has always been fluid: "There was something remarkably avant-garde about the group in the way it came to encompass people from across the social spectrum"; Zhu Jingwen, a professor at Chengdu University's School of Film, Television and Animation, wrote in Wenhui Daily: "Today's audiences are no longer content simply to look up to mythological figures; they want stories in which they can see their own struggles and growth."[1]