House of Flying Daggers

A Sheer Feast for the Eyes and Senses, November 22, 2004

I

I have just seen a special preview of this artistically colourful and spectacular film from Zhang Yimou. It was so delightfully engaging, a sheer feast for the eyes and senses. Such is the artistic imagery, numerous frames from the film which spring to mind could stand-alone as paintings in themselves, particularly the Echo Game, the Ukraine Forest, and the Chinese Bamboo Forest scenes. The film is really a love story, (the film is a.k.a. “Lovers” in Asia), dealing with the concept of ultimate sacrifice with various surprise revelations emerging throughout the story, (on first viewing some of the subtleness in the narrative might be missed). With the marvellous Martial Arts set pieces the whole film feels so stimulating and breathtaking. The three leads are well cast and bring a full potency to their respective parts in the love triangle. Zhang Ziyi smoulders so beautifully and captivatingly. After the screening I also had the opportunity to listen to Shigeru Umebayashi’s superb and so apt musical soundtrack. I agree with a reviewer of the CD Soundtrack who pointed out on the Hong Kong based www.yesasia.com that it is “ever so reminiscent of the late great Nino Rota and his intensely touching love themes found both in Franco Zeffirelli’s, Romeo and Juliet and Francis Ford Coppola’s, The Godfather”. International opera singer Kathleen Battle抯 moving operatic rendition sung in English touchingly closes the whole musical work during the end credits.

Reviews by the New York Times

In the latest chapter of Zhang Yimou’s triumphant reinvention as an action filmmaker, Zhang Ziyi plays Mei, a blind courtesan who turns out to be a member of the Flying Daggers, a shadowy squad of assassins waging a guerilla insurgency against the corrupt and decadent government. She is pursued by two government deputies, Leo (Andy Lau) and Jin (Takeshi Kaneshiro), whose loyalties come into question as the chase turns into a love triangle. Everyone is engaged in several layers of deceit, and some of the third-act revelations are more likely to provoke laughter than gasps of amazement. But realism is as irrelevant a criterion here as it would be in an Italian opera. The movie is about color, kineticism and the kind of heavy-breathing, decorous sensuality that went out of American movies when sexual candor came in. Though it is in constant, breathtaking motion — with fight sequences as headily memorable as any dance numbers the MGM Freed Unit ever shot — the picture is not especially moving. Unlike the greatest operas (in whatever medium), it inspires you to gasp, but not to weep.