For the record, “Detective Dee and the Four Heavenly Kings” is kind of a deceptive title. The Four Heavenly Kings have no actual part in the story, and their statues only play a passing role. It might as well be called “Detective Dee and the Umbrella Stand.”

But the title is the least of the problems that plague the third Detective Dee movie, once again directed by the legendary Tsui Hark. While the cast mostly produce good performances and there are some good ideas here, the actual plot is a rather confusing mess — the plot feels like it is only half-baked, both simplistic and overcomplicated, with awkwardly-woven subplots and a thuddingly clumsy final battle.

Following the events of the previous movie, Dee Renjie (Mark Chao) has been given directorship of the Department of Justice, as well as the powerful Dragon-Taming Mace. This angers the Empress (Carina Lau), who sees him as a threat to her power. So she enlists his friend Yuchi Zhenjin (Feng Shaofeng) to steal the mace from him, as well as a troupe of formidable illusionists, the jianghu.

But the jianghu’s (literally) poisonous tricks aren’t enough to thwart Dee, who is two steps ahead of the Empress. And as the Empress prepares to take over his department, Dee discovers that a sect of masked sorcerers are pulling her strings, scheming to take the Dragon-Taming Mace for themselves. As strange and impossible things happen — including Yuchi being framed for murder — Dee must unravel a plot that threatens the entire country.

I’m not sure exactly what is missing from “Detective Dee and the Four Heavenly Kings” that makes it unsuccessful. It’s directed by Tsui Hark, features the same core cast as the previous movie, and the special effects are still quite impressive. Furthermore, the ideas behind it — sorcerous tricks that can warp the mind, the Empress scheming to get the Mace — aren’t bad. But somehow, this movie just doesn’t quite gel together.

A lot of that comes from the fact that the plot doesn’t feel like it was entirely finished; it feels like it could have used a few more rewrites. The central plot is a pretty simple one, but the subplots are woven in awkwardly to make it appear overcomplicated. There are some elements like Dee’s mysterious illness that are just sort of dropped, but admittedly there are some stunning moments, such as when a golden dragon wall decoration comes to life and starts terrorizing the Imperial court.

And the final battle is clumsily handled. It feels like writer Chang Chia-lu just sort of didn’t know how to resolve the battle, so a character we’ve barely seen is suddenly the key to victory, and everything just sort of crashes into finishing without a proper denouement.

The saving grace is the cast, who are all quite good — Chao gives a smooth, deft performance as a Sherlockian genius who can see patterns that elude everyone around him, and Lin Gengxin is excellent as his best buddy Shatuo, who finds himself entangled with a jianghu assassin. Shaofeng has a lot of wide-eyed intensity as an officer who finds his loyalties divided, and Lau is quite good as the fiercely ambitious Empress.

After two very solid movies, “Detective Dee and the Four Heavenly Kings” is something of a stumble — a plot that doesn’t entirely come together, buoyed up by the solid cast. Hopefully any fourth installment will be a return to form.