DeuceWild_77 After the global success of "Beverly Hills Cop", Eddie Murphy's next project was to expand his wisecracking on-screen personna in comedy / action flicks to a more adventure / fantasy oriented, galloping on the ressurgence of the adventure films such as the two first "Indiana Jones" films and the major hit of "Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome" released the year before."The Golden Child" was conceived as a straight action / adventure / fantasy / horror film with the 'Master of Suspense", John Carpenter in the director's chair and the rising star, Mel Gibson in the lead role of Chandler Jarrell (the main character's first name was a homage from the screenwriter Dennis Feldman to Raymond Chandler, the famous 'detective fiction' writer and the creator of Philip Marlowe, P.I.).When Carpenter left the project to direct his own (& similar themed), "Big Trouble in Little China" and Mel Gibson took a year off movies before starting shooting "Lethal Weapon", Eddie Murphy stepped in as a replacement (the same happened before when he replaced Sylvester Stallone in "Beverly Hills Cop"), the movie was re-written to acommodate Murphy's humour routine and Michael Ritchie, the veteran director of comedy flicks such as "The Bad News Bears" ('76); "The Survivors" ('83) or "Fletch" ('85) was hired to enhance the lighthearted comedy aspect.The end result is a fun film, but not as fun as the previous Murphy's films and even if it made a good money at the B.O., it was critically torn apart and was considered a financial disappointment by the studio.Murphy returns in a re-hash of his two previous (& widely famous) film roles as Reggie Hammond in "48 Hrs." and Axel Foley in "Beverly Hills Cop", but this time a bit more contained and less vibrant & exuberant as if he tried to pursuit more his dramatic side, following the mixed tone of the movie (part dark fantasy / part lighthearted comedy), but still improvising his trademark wisecracking humour which was probably estipulated on his contract with Paramount Pictures.The movie suffers from the crossover genres imposed, because it's way apparent that it went into production as a straightforward and 'serious in tone' fantasy film and the added comedy, even if some gags were nicely staged and always hilariously performed by Murphy, it still feels a bit out of place.In the supporting cast, Charlotte Lewis is almost as wooden as she is stunning beautiful and Peter Kwong, Victor Wong & James Hong came straight from the "Big Trouble in Little China" set to perform here similar parts, except for James Hong, playing here a way different character than his evil sorcerer, David Lo Pan in the latter. Classical trained English actor, Charles Dance is superb playing the 'Machiavellian' main villain, Sardo Numspa, with his usual wicked bureaucratic snobbery and a touch of exquisiteness.In short, despite its flaws, "The Golden Child", emanates that movie magic that only the 80's could do, it's a very entertaining flick that appeals to both, children (i loved it when it was released, i was around 10 years old or so) and adults (i still like it a lot now) and a good watch for a movie marathon with "Big Trouble in Little China", "Shangai Surprise" and even "Howard the Duck", curiously all also released in '86.I give it a 7 / 7.5 stars, but as a nostalgic film from my youth and because it's way better than the 99,9 per cent of the fantasy / adventure movies that came out nowadays, it surely deserves an extra point.

SnoopyStyle The Golden Child revives a dead bird in Nepal and is kidnapped by the evil Sardo Numspa (Charles Dance). Five days later in L.A., missing kids specialist investigator Chandler Jarrell (Eddie Murphy) is searching for Cheryll Mosley. Kee Nang (Charlotte Lewis) tells him about a 400 year old prediction. The Golden Child's destiny is to save the world and taken to a city of angels. He is to be saved by a man who's no angel and that's Jarrell. Cheryll's murder is linked to the missing Golden Child. In his dream, Sardo Numspa offers Jarrell the child in exchange for the Ajanti Dagger.Eddie Murphy is doing another wise-cracking detective and he's good at that. He has plenty of fun being sarcastic. The movie itself is inferior. Charlotte Lewis is absolutely beautiful but not the most charismatic. Only Victor Wong is able to take full advantage of Murphy. Their back and forth is fun. A lot of this movie is eye-rolling. The first is probably the annoying TV host. He's set up to be funny but he's annoyingly wrong. Many parts of this movie is like that and comedic moments don't turn out to be funny.

scorpiowriter A Classic 80's film. I was born in the late 70's and grew up in the 80's, and they just don't make movies like they did back then. The lightheadedness, silly sense of humor, adventure, magic, fantasy...from moves like Legend with Tom Cruise to Willow, Labyrynth, Krull, The Beast Master, The Dragonslayer, all the Conan movies with Schwarzenegger....they just don't make these awesome, majestic, escapist films anymore. Movies where you are taken to another world and time and magic is real. This is a great movie. It has everything from humor to adventure, romance, suspense, supernatural horror. It's just a great movie, very entertaining and an upbeat and uplifting ending. Watch with your kids, then watch the others or better yet, buy on DVD. I personally love having a physical copy of a movie with the cover art more than downloads which seem 'unsubstantial.'

FilmBuff1994 The Golden Child is a very mediocre movie with a storyline that is actually pretty promising storyline but fails to be interesting because of a not so inspired cast.Edie Murphy did do a good enough job,but he was the only member of the cast that seemed like he actually liked this films script and was enthusiastic about being in this movie.I think that the story sounded really good and if they had made it a bit more serious and less comedy and got a more serious cast it could have been really interesting,I think that it was a bad decision making it a comedy.It is funny at times,but honestly not enough,and because of that I wouldn't really recommend the Golden Child to anyone. A private eye who specializes in finding missing children is called in to track down the peace bringing Golden Child,who has been kidnapped by a Tibetan temple.