Review of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000) by Andrew C — 07 Aug 2011

Being half Chinese, I somehow feel obligated to review a Chinese-language film. So when flipping through the TV listing on AMC, I jumped at the chance to watch "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon." But instead I recorded it and watched it later, as I really wasn't looking forward to the commercials. Having never seen a Hong-Kong style kung-fu film, (aka wuxia film) I wasn't sure what to expect. Was it going to be a cheese-fest full of tacky wire effects, or a juxtaposition of beauty and bad-assery?

I'm glad to say that this film is the latter. While not a perfect film, director Ang Lee creates a something really special here. The story follows Master Li Mu Bai (Chow Yun-Fat) and Yu Shu Lien (Michelle Yeoh), as they try to recover a 400-year-old sword of great power, stolen by Jiao Long (Zhang Ziyi), a politician's daughter and protegee of Jade Fox (Chang Pei-Pei), another powerful warrior who murdered Mu Bai's former master. What could easily have been a cliche-filled odyssey film was transformed into a multi-layered story of vengeance, power, love and kick-ass fight scenes. The film also explored themes of gender discrimination (such as Jade Fox's situation in which she is denied access to learn a certain martial art, causing her to commit murder, forming the backbone of the plot.).

All the actors are great in the film, and a lot acting is very subtle when the actor's aren't engaged in full-on kung-fu battle, such as the scene when Mu Bai and Shu Lien's hands touch, both expressing overwhelming, but secretive love. Jiao Long also has a love interest, shown in an extended flashback between a bandit and herself. And although this aspect of the film led to great depictions of forbidden love and heart-ache, I wasn't quite sure if it was necessary.

The action sequences are extremely cool in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. I especially love the fight-scene between Zhang Ziyi and Michelle Yeoh. For a large portion of that scene, the camera was placed above the actors (or stunt-women), allowing for a birds-eye-view of the epic, fast-paced, and beautifully choreographed sequence, involving a plethora of weapons. A lot of fights involve the use of wires to suspend the actors in the air. At times a felt that the use extensive use of wire were very unrealistic (in some cases, the actors were practically flying), but at the same time, similar sequences were scene in the Matrix (which was mad a year before Dragon) so I quickly dismissed this little quibble.

Overall, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon is a beautiful, masterfully crafted, epic and breathtaking piece of cinema that contains the right balance of action and sophistication that can be enjoyed by many across the audience spectrum. Totally recommended.