Reviewed by: ororama Date: 06/25/2020 The Enchanting Shadow is a romance set in feudal China that evolves into a ghost story. A young man (Li Hua Yang, an actress playing a young male scholar, common casting in Shaw Brothers opera movies) is dispossessed of the house belonging to his recently deceased father by his crooked uncle with the assistance of a corrupt official. This causes him to move into an abandoned house reputed to be haunted, where he encounters other tenants who have recently sought shelter there, a beautiful young woman and her dying mother. Love blossoms, but the couple has to deal with local residents determined to rescue the scholar from his bewitchment by a ghost, and with the uncle's efforts to cover his crimes. This ultimately results in the expected ghostly revenge. The romance presents an essentially bland, idealized view of love without any sign of passion. The revenge of the ghost comes late in the movie, and is presented in an unfortunately mild fashion.The villains, however, are suitably evil, and the movie might have benefited by giving more detail of their plots and misdeeds. The Enchanting Ghost is lovely to look at with customary attention to costumes and sets from Shaw Brothers, but could have been far better if the horror and/or the romance had been less timid.

Reviewed by: sharkeysbar Date: 04/22/2011 Summary: Wonderful morality tale This is a wonderful morality tale about good and bad and the choices people make. While this film is not original, the tale being told many times in Hong Kong cinema, this film is well acted, has a good musical score and doesn't go overboard with 1970s style special effects. There are no twists in this story of love, honour, greed and betrayal but it is an enjoyable movie but a somewhat short 82 minutes in all. Definitely worth a viewing while not being exceptional. Reviewer Score: 6