Review of Year of the Dragon (1985) by Hiroshi M — 28 May 2008

Cimino, Rouke, John Lone. You get three gifted talents at their peak, but also at the edge of downfall, all 3 seemed to disappear only a few years after into obscurity and crappy movies. This being Cimino, he can't just make a cop movie, he wants Moby Dick, he goes for epic, American classic.

Can't say he succeeds but at least the results are more interesting than the majority of Hollywood action flicks.Tho it's an 80's movie, it feels 70's with its location shooting, grey area characters, lots of non profesional actors, and Cimino's got a good eye for where to put the camera.

It got slapped with knee jerk accusations of racism when it first came out. Just because the Polish cop played by Rouke is racist doesn't mean the movie's racist, point is that the drugs at the end comes smuggled in a Polish ship.

Almost all the Asian characters are gangsters, so the majority of Asian characters are "evil" but at least they come off much more 3 dimensional than most Hollywood movies. Compare that to circa mid 2000, for example with something like the the Rush Hour movies, Speed Racer, ect.

Even a great director like Scorsese in the Departed gives us the standard cliche evil mysterious Asian gangsters. In Year of the Dragon at least you get some characters, gotta love White Powder Ma, and the Thai General.

I always like "the player on the other side" stories. Like a lot of 70's cop movies, Rouke and Lone, cop and gangster are just opposite sides of the same coin. Two men with a scorched earth personality on a collision course with each other (literally).

I like movies with oddball confrontations, this one ends reminiscent of Blade Runner.Script by Oliver Stone. What really happened to Cimino?