Review of Red Cliff (2008) by Ricardo C — 06 Feb 2015
Written and directed by John Woo, this was his first film to be made in Mandarin since Hard Boiled (1992). He'd had a good run in Hollywood, but work dried up stateside, so Woo returned to Asian cinema with something he'd wanted to do for decades, but he could never get the funding together.
After various successes in Hollywood, he was finally back on form with this majestic and sweeping action epic. Set towards the end of the Han Dynasty in Ancient China circa 208-209 AD. Eastern Han Dynasty chancellor Cao Cao (Zhang Fengyi) leads the imperial army to kill the rival Southern Warlords Sun Quan (Chang Chen) and Liu Bei (You Yong).
Emperor Han (Wang Ning) is reluctant for Cao Cao to lead the imperial army to attack, but acquiesces to Cao Cao's demands. When military strategist Zhuge Liang (Takeshi Kaneshiro) heads south to convince Sun Quan to join forces with Liu Bei against the powerful warlord, Zhuge Liang meets the viceroy Zhou Yu (Tony Leung), who comes up with a strategy to hold back the might of the million strong imperial army.
It's a very epic film, and very long too, but the Battle of the Red Cliffs is a part of Chinese history that has interested Woo for many years, and although he took liberties with history, Woo isn't interested in historical accuracy.
He wants to tell a good story, and make it look good, and he does just that here. 4/5.
This review of Red Cliff (2008) was written by Ricardo C on 06 Feb 2015.
Red Cliff has generally received positive reviews.
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