Review of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000) by Viet Phuong N — 22 Sep 2014

~14 years after this movie is released I finally get around to watching it.

While the premise is fairly straightforward (legendary sword gets swiped and needs to be hunted down), it's a graceful blend of drama, romance, and extremely impressive martial arts sequences with gravity defying stunts.

Although the aerial tricks can perhaps come across as silly, I can't really fault it for that - the movie does have a bit of fantasy vibe to it, so you just kind of go with the supernatural take and enjoy it for what it is.

Chow Yun-Fat fits his role well as a wise, experienced master of martial arts. He has a certain effortless presence that helps convey who he is.

The elegant Michelle Yeoh brings a lot to the movie as well - showcasing some good dramatic acting alongside some incredible fighting prowess. The dialog between these two concerning their unspoken love works well, bringing some emotion to the characters and the movie.

The conflicted character played by Zhang Ziyi is central to the main plot and also central to much of the movie's drama and issues brought up about love, life, regret, and redemption. She also has to do a whole lot of fighting on top of that. Her character is somewhat ambiguous in terms of how we are supposed to feel about her. A rather complex role that I think is done well.

Chen Chang fits the rugged yet charming bandit well in a lengthy flashback that serves as backstory. This might seem like a bit of a pace killer for people who were expecting non-stop action, but I've always felt that fleshing out your main characters is usually never a bad thing and really makes every other part of the movie more enjoyable.

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon excels at drawing you in with great visuals, audio, character drama, and fast paced, fluid fight scenes that are among the best I've ever seen. I think when a movie inspires awe like that, transports you somewhere and you just want to take it all in - it really shows what movies are most capable of.