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Hero Reviews
Heroic art direction
I just saw Hero on the region 3 asian release dvd, in chinese with english subtitles. This is perhaps the most beautiful film i have ever seen. The stunning art direction, colour and costumes take your breath away let alone the deliciously slowed martial arts sequences.
The use of different colours to mark each scene was just incredible. After just one watch i'm thinking in terms of colour - the red caligraphy scene, the orange leaf sequence, the blue library scene, the green palace curtain sequence (my favourite) and many more.
Some of the performances may leave you cold and the politics colder but the depths of the characters feelings are intensely wrought and left me with tears in my eyes. The cost of Flying Snow and Broken Sword's love and conviction is heartbreakingly portrayed. Jet Li's Nameless is cool and crisp, but isn't that what Jet Li fans love?
For my money, if you like CTHD, you'll love Hero.
Mainland China's Crouching Tiger
This film premiered while I was living in China,and it was quite the anticipated event. I don't recall anyone being disappointed in it; quite the opposite, most found it quite moving and stirring. Personally, I think it is one of the best martial arts movies around, and that it scores quite well as a film. It's true that the movie isn't brimming over with fights, but that's not the mark of a great kung fu movie. The true mark is the artistry of the fights, their context, and the way in which the Chinese martial arts tradition and culture is conveyed. Hero does well on all these counts.
I must disagree with the New Zealand poster; I think it's quite interesting to compare this movie to Crouching Tiger. Hero was quite widely held to be the mainland's answer to the Taiwanese/Hong Kong produced CTHD.Overseas Chinese seem to be a little disappointed in Hero, while Mainlanders seem to prefer Hero. Aside from sharing a cast member (Zhang Ziyi, in a rather thankless role), they are pretty different movies, but both are Chinese in their own way. Both capture the stoic melancholy of Chinese culture, CTHD in terms of love, Hero in terms of patriotism (though there is an understated romance at the heart of Hero). Perhaps it's the heavily politicized climate, but mainlanders seemed to find Hero much more moving. The not-so-implicit premise is that law and order are more important to a nation than freedom, a view Americans are unlikely to sympathize with (though you have endorsed if you voted for George W. Bush.)This is a pretty realistic philosophy, and it's an idea that has driven Chinese political thought for three thousand years. Mainlanders are intensely patriotic, and this film hits them where they live in depicting the wrenching sacrifices of the characters. CTHD, by contrast, is a much more personal movie, and I think it captures the sense of loss and dignity, the sense of preservation, that makes Hong Kong and Taiwanese culture different from that of the mainland.
Which of these films you prefer depends less on their respective qualities and more on what draws you in personally. I prefer CTHD, but there's no denying that the nobility on display in Hero is quite stirring.
Zhang Yimou is one of the world's great directors, and it shows. The film is beautifully shot, impressively edited, and well acted (if you've never thought of Jet Li as an actor, you may revise your opinion somewhat). It also serves as a mini-geography lesson, with some of the most spectacular scenery in all China on display. The fighting, when it happens, is top notch. Donnie Yen (Iron Monkey fame)puts in a brief but impressive performance in one of the best fights in memory. This is a wire-fu film, but don't dismiss it on that count. Wire-fu, while artificial, is arguably more true to the culture of wushu than the old-school stuff. George Lucas' Jedi are linear descendents of the fighters in Chinese martial fiction, and this movie shows why.Wire-fu takes as much physical talent and effort as any other kind of martial display; no one can seriously think that just because his jumps are enhanced that Jet Li is a sub-par wushu artist. I admit, even I rolled my eyes a little at the arrow deflecting scene, but it is cool. Even cooler is the way the calligraphy students continue working while the arrows fall around them. Now that's Chinese.
Bottom line: when it gets here, see it. If you liked the pathos and pageantry of CTHD, you won't be disappointed. Just don't expect to be moved quite the same way.
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