General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20265 min read

Mojin: The Worm Valley (云南虫谷)

Mojin: The Worm Valley (云南虫谷) is a 2018 Chinese fantasy adventure film directed by Fei Xing (非行) and adapted from Tianxia Bachang's (天下霸唱) novel Gui Chui Deng zhi Yunnan Chonggu (鬼吹灯之云南虫谷, part of the Candle in the Tomb series). It follows the tomb-exploring trio Hu Bayi, Shirley Yang, and Wang Kaixuan as they enter the tomb of King Xian of the ancient Dian kingdom in Yunnan to find the Muchen Pearl (雮尘珠), an artifact said to break the curse marked on their bodies. The film was released in mainland China on December 29, 2018, and earned about 150 million yuan, well below expectations for a major franchise adaptation.¹

Key fact	Detail
Chinese title	云南虫谷 (also written 云南虫谷); English title Mojin: The Worm Valley²
Director and writer	Directed by Fei Xing; based on the novel by Muye Zhang (Tianxia Bachang)³
Release	December 29, 2018 in mainland China; January 4, 2019 in the United States¹^•⁴
Lead cast	Cai Heng (Hu Bayi), Gu Xuan (Shirley Yang), Yu Heng (Wang Kaixuan), Cheng Taishen (Professor Sun), Ma Yuke, Chen Yusi¹^•²
Box office	Opening day 64.59 million yuan; about 150 million yuan cumulative in China; $22,381,583 worldwide gross⁵^•¹^•²
Reception	IMDb 4.9/10 from about 770 users; Douban ratings reported at 3.5 in early January 2019 and 3.2 in a 2021 retrospective²^•⁶^•⁷
Runtime	110 minutes per IMDb, Moviebuff, and Apple TV; Baidu Baike lists 156 minutes²^•⁴^•⁸^•¹

Spoilers

Story and source material

The film adapts the Yunnan Worm Valley volume of Tianxia Bachang's Candle in the Tomb (鬼吹灯) novel series. Hu Bayi, Shirley Yang, and Wang Kaixuan, the "Mojin" trio of tomb explorers, carry an eyeball-shaped curse mark from a previous expedition. The Muchen Pearl, said to lift the curse, has become a funerary object in the tomb of King Xian of the ancient Dian kingdom, so the three travel into the miasma-covered wilderness of Yunnan to reach it.¹^•⁸

On the way they pass through a secret underground waterway beneath the Zheilong mountains and encounter millennium-old "tong" sorcery traps, thousands of hanging "tong figurines" made from enslaved people, monster-infested waters, and an ancient undying worm, before reaching the tomb entrance.⁴^•⁸ English-language listings describe the destination as the Tomb of Emperor Xian on an island of monstrous creatures.³

Place in the franchise

The film followed 2015's Mojin: The Lost Legend, and English listings present it as a continuation of that blockbuster's storyline.³ The Candle in the Tomb film and television rights are split: the first four novels are held by Dream Author Pictures and the later four by Wanda, and adaptation quality across the franchise has varied.⁷ The same novel was adapted again as the 2021 Tencent web series Candle in the Tomb: The Worm Valley, directed by Fei Zhenxiang and starring Pan Yueming, Zhang Yuqi, and Jiang Chao; IMDb lists the 2018 film as an alternate-language version of that series.²^•⁷ The web series opened with a Douban score of 7.9 that later fell to 6.7, and accumulated more than 830 million views by September 14, 2021.⁷ A separate low-budget web movie, The Legend of King Xian (云南虫谷之献王传说), also adapting the same novel, was released on Youku in January 2020.¹²

Production and release

Casting and preparation. The production chose relatively unknown actors to match the novel's character descriptions; the cast underwent intensive pre-shooting training, and the large amount of action footage caused repeated injuries during filming. The screenplay took more than nine months to write, and the film used an international visual effects team.¹

Companies and schedule. The principal production companies were Dream Author Pictures and Huayi Brothers Film, with Tencent Penguin Pictures and other co-producers; the film was released in 3D, IMAX 3D, and China Film Giant Screen formats.¹^•⁹ It was first scheduled for September 30, 2018, and the release was moved to December 29, 2018, the year-end holiday season.¹ Well Go USA Entertainment released it in the United States on January 4, 2019, and Shaw Organisation released it in Singapore on January 10, 2019.⁴

Box office and reception

The film opened at number one in China on December 29, 2018 with 64.59 million yuan, edging out the comedy A Gaiety Dream by a narrow margin. Because of weak scores on the ticketing platforms Maoyan (5.1) and Taopiaopiao (5.8), its daily box office fell to third place the next day.⁵ Cumulative Chinese box office reached 150 million yuan as of April 29, 2019.¹ IMDb records a worldwide gross of $22,381,583, of which $101,516 came from the United States and Canada.²

Critical response. Douban ratings were reported at 3.5 out of 10 in early January 2019 and at 3.2 in a 2021 retrospective on the franchise.⁶^•⁷ A contemporary review in Jiemian argued that the film dropped the novel's core elements of tomb raiding and the supernatural, apparently for censorship reasons, and converted the story into a monster-adventure plot, losing the traditional Chinese elements of yin-yang, feng shui, and secret arts that distinguish the source material.¹⁰ Huayi Brothers' 2019 annual report identified Mojin: The Worm Valley as one of the films that produced a single-film loss and contributed to a decline in the company's film business revenue that year.¹¹

References

Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Franchise and series entries as standalone works › Action, thriller, and crime series film entries › Entries released in the 2010s › Action and adventure entries › Titles L to Y

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026

Notice something wrong?