The movie Painted Skin has been released since a month now in China and it is a commercial success. As with any blockbuster, there is a lot of writing around it on the Internet. Despite its commercial success, the movie has also met some critiques.
These critiques are of three kinds: Some address mistakes or inconsistencies in the plot; some address the fact that cuts were made into the movie by the film authorities; some finally criticize the fact that film director Chen Jiashang (Gordon Chan) takes a traditional and well-known ghost story and makes something else out of it.
Inconsistencies
Since Painted Skin is a success, it also gets a lot of scrutiny. People dissect the movie like a dead animal and look for mistakes. If you look long enough you will inevitably find some. One example is a scene that is supposed to take place during the Chinese New Year's eve and were there clearly is a full moon. According to the traditional Chinese lunar calendar, Chinese New Year can not take place on a full moon...
Cuts
There are three versions of the movie: the 128 minutes unabridged version by Gordon Chan that can only be seen in a very view Hongkong cinemas; the 113 minutes official Hongkong version with cuts made by the Hongkong film authorities; and the 98 minutes mainland version with cuts made by the mainland Chinese film authorities. The scenes that were cut are scenes that were judged too gory (for example a scene, where a human heart is being eaten) or that contained too much nudity. The picture below has been circulating on the web as being one of the censored nudity scene:
Not a ghost story
Gordon Chan made many changes to the classical story from Pu Songling. He didn't place the story in the Qing dynasty (1644-1912), which is the dynasty in which Pu Songling lived and in which the original story unfolds. Gordan Chan placed his story in the Han dynasty (207BC-220) instead, because he doesn't like the aesthetics of the Qing dynasty. Chan's main male character is an army general, whereas Pu Songling's is a scholar, ...
But these are only minor changes compared to the biggest reproach made to the movie: Gordon Chan took a classical ghost story and a made a love drama out of it, where the relationships between ghosts and humans are just a metaphor for relationships between humans. If you were expecting a faithful adaptation of the original story, you will be disappointed by this. But in a way Gordon Chan is not completely unfaithful to Pu Songling's spirit. Pu Songling often used ghost stories as a way of criticizing the society in which he lived. By addressing the question of infidelity and extramarital relationships, Gordon Chan is using a ghost story to talk about a common problem in modern Chinese society.
If you are waiting for 
