House of Flying Daggers!


I don't know. Its very tough for me to generate any enthusiasm over this after Yimou has fallen out of my favor. How does everyone feel about it?

Its at 83% out of 60 submissions on Rottentomatoes, which normally is not a good sign, but might be in this case, as I've noticed how off they were on Hero, whilst they didn't give flying colors to either To Live (89%) of Shangai Triad (86%) which are my two favorite movies of his.

I'm not psyched with Yimou's turn to martial arts, he seems to think its an excuse to be thoughtless, or worse, enforce things he historically never stood for. But this movie may not have the political undercurrent of Hero, so will be less offensive. I hope he doesn't resort to the kitschy coloring of Hero either though, cause that could ruin this film completely. Not that it will do poorly in the Box Office, Hero did quite well (two weekends on top) and Zhang Ziyi is the probably the biggest Box Office name-grabber for a woman to come out of China ever. I just don't know if the film will be any good.

I'm going to sit on this one, and probably finally get around to seeing Bad Education tonight, but how is everyone feeling about Flying Daggers?

I'm not going to get all excited over this one like I did for Hero, because it will just leave me in dissapointment. I'll check it out when it gets to DVD, though, because it looks interesting.

I've heard mediocre comments here and there though I'm really anticipating this one. With my rare visits to the theatre I think I'll most likely get to see it on DVD.

House of Flying Daggers is far more politically innocuous than Hero. The story is simpler. So give it a shot.

Have you seen it already??? Was it any good visually? Tension story line etc? I just thought Hero felt a bit like a car commercial with its cinematography, and wasn't sure how to approach Flying Dagger. You live in California don't you? How do you get to see all these movies so early?

I hope so. Hero looked incredible to me before it came out, and was a rather big disapointment afterwards.

I haven't seen it since it won't be shown here until Dec 17th. A lot of my friends have, and from what I heard, the visual is on par with Hero, and the story is much more about love (closer to CTHD) instead of this political message of sacraficing a few for the good of all, but still shadow with a not-so-good ending. I never felt story telling is the strength of Yimou anyway. He likes to tell simple stories, such as in Not One Less, The Road Home, The Story of QiuJu, and Happy Times. Supposedly Zhang Ziyi is really good in the movie. That's all I know.

xiayun, what did you think of Hero? If you saw it.

I don't think in his earlier years he told "simple stories" I think he told rich stories about "simple people." Story of QuiJu is pretty intense in the scheme of things, even though its just about one woman looking for voice in authority. But yes, he often is very explorative of landscapes, specifically rooted in Chinese history, which might be one of my problems with his move towards martial arts flicks. They aren't grounded in a particular space or time, so then those "simple stories" as you say, don't really hold my attention enough. You're right that with the exception of a couple in the mid-nineties his characters really depend on understanding the socio-economic and political landscape they occupy. Now that that has been removed in the name of action, there's really no way to get a sense of the people and their struggles.

I saw it the opening day when it was released in China. Visually it's perfect. I think it's hard to find a film with more breathtaking cinematography. If you take a picture of each shot, every one of them can be used as wallpaper. However, the story really pales in comparison. Unlike the normal films where the setting is to help develop the story, Hero is the other way around. The story is really irrelevant; it's just there so that Yimou can paint his intepretation of martial arts (wuxia in Chinese). That's why he chose such a politically-correct theme. I'm a person who pays a lot of attention to the story, and Hero is a film that I admire its technical achievement, but leaves me cold. so overall I give it a 7.5/10. I still prefer Crouching Tiger much more (9.5/10).

Well i've seen it early but don't have good news to report

Take away the fantastic visuals and action sequences and what you are left with is an emotionally thin and awkward story which has no depth nor exciting resolution.....

The first 30 mins or so are breathtaking with the wonderful dance/ribbon sequence however be prepared for a boring 2nd half as the movie gets burdened with the love story and lengthy dialogue exchanges.......you get a feeling that Yimou is trying too hard with this one.......all the money shots are in the trailer leaving little else......

The ending is so thin which when compounded with the twist makes it even more ridiculous.....the progression and linkages are just not strong enough......

Maybe its just me, but this movie promised to much and delivered too little overall.......

All that being said, i have to say that the standout performance is Zhang Ziyi, outstanding...

Meh .. I thought hero was great, even storywise. I had little issues with the sacrificing few for the good of the many theme, as much as I disagreed with it.

My thoughts exactly. I don't think I've seen a better movie visual-wise in years. I'd give it about a 7/10, or a C+.

Guess who was on the cover of Time Out New York this week?



The next Julia Roberts is definatley not American. I think she's starting to over-take Kirsten Dunst in Star-power and that's saying something.

She's going to become a permanent ficture with Flying Daggers and also Geisha next year.

l dont get it til like Jan.21....but l really wanna see it...

Saw this one yesterday - it is freakin' beautiful! (How 'bout that ultra-cool bean and sleeve dance!!!!!!)

I only wish they could have had a bit more straightforward storyline, but I guess that's what you get for kickin' it old school...

Not a contender for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon's martial arts melodrama throne - but it's pretty darn good!

4 out of 5.

Kypade, why only Jan 21st? What country do you live in?

Bradley, I assume by your comments that you loved Crouching Tiger. Did you like Tiger's storyline better? Or was it more for the visuals? Sounds to me like you're saying this is another empty but good looking film. Well I didn't think even Hero was that good looking, but for people that did think so, they said similar things. Good looking but weak theme/story.

What's the final consensus everyone? Yimou should gracefully bow out of Martial Arts and return to drama's or is he doing a good job with this genre?

I remember Caige really struggled with Emperor and the Assassin for the same reason, but he didn't keep with it afterwards that I know of.

I posted my brief review in two other threads as well:

One word: Wow! Going in, I was expecting something similar to Hero where I would be awed by the visual but not be able to get into the story, but it turned out to be quite different. The visual is as stunning as ever, but unlike Hero, it flowed with the story very well. With Hero, I felt I was constantly reminded how good the film looks to the point it really distracted the story, and that's also because the story didn't work that well with me. With HOFD, I was very much into the story the whole way and never felt the visual was taking over the film. The multiple twists were very well done and took me by surprise. Zhang Ziyi really showed her skill here and gave the best performance of her career IMO. It's hard already to play a blind person convincingly, and it's even harder when you have to fight and do martial arts blind. Ziyi pulled it off magnificantly. Her eye expression and body movement were perfect throughout. She also showed off her great dancing skills at the beginning Takeshi Kaneshiro was also very good, but I found Andy Lau's performance rather bland. The dialog in Chinese is still cheesy at times, although they did a very good job with the English translation. They should've cut a few more minutes from the final act because it dragged on a little too long and diminish the overall emotional impact. The lady sitting next to me was choking tears and crying for the last 30 minutes of the movie, and I was afraid she might stop crying before the movie ended. That would be a failure IMO since it should leave the audience at their emotional high, such as what CTHD did with Michelle Yeoh dying at the end.

Overal, a great experience at the movie theater. I highly recommend it, especially those who are disappointed with Hero. I believe you'll find it quite different. The story here is simpler and flows better. Currently my No. 3 film of the year. A-.

I don't think Yimou can top this in his martial arts adventure, but I'm surely glad that he decided to enter and make one.

....


OK. Well on wednesday and thursday I am going to watch a good six movies in celebration to wrapping up finals tomorrow, so I guess this has pushed me over my hesitation. I will check it out. Thanks Xia.

l live in Florida....but l looked on the main site, (or some site) and the theaters here arent getting it til then...dunno...then again, l wasnt expecting garden state at all (according to some site with release dates) and it opened like 2 or 3 weeks after its limited release...so, we'll see...

Well RT has it up at 88% fresh now with 105 reviews. 7.6/10 average rating.

Cream of the Crop is pretty high. 94% with an 8/10 rating, so I guess everyone likes it. Though I'm not comforted by the refences to pretty much just the "beauty" of the film, and Berardinelli combines it with Hero. :?


Where's Zingy? He ended up thinking a bit similarly about Hero as I did, so I'd like to know what he's thought of this if he's seen it too.

He hasn't seen it yet since it won't be released in Phily until January.

It actually came to my theater this Friday.

I'll see it. I will.

Woah. What'd Zingaling think of Hero and what was your argument?

I didn't know he was capable of intellectual conversaaa....*runs from Zingaling's newly built guns (muscle ones, of course...)*

To me, if you enjoy Kill Bill, you shouldn't have any problems with Hero. Like Kill Bill (not to mention Kill Bill's equally contrived plot!), Hero is all about the style! And it's great fun. I still stand by my B+ rating...

EDIT: I see Zingaling's comments now. But, what stands out about AVP, Zingaling, if not the technical stuff? Is it the "subtitle" thing or your "excitement" factor?

Dolce, I haven't seen it yet, unfortunately. It won't come out here until January. If it's playing in Atlanta when I go this weekend, I'll definently check it out. They have huge theaters over there, so there's still hope. Otherwise, I'm waiting until January.

torrino, I don't think you've ever made one single post about me without referring to AVP. That's amazing.