Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon
Innovatively combining martial arts with Chinese fairy tale narrative with effects so state of the art that they are almost unnoticeable, Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon also layers in a guy-movie-in-drag (think of woman-hero Aliens as a guy movie in drag) which makes it a rare treat in cinema. You may remember director Ang Lee from such films as Sense and Sensibility, The Ice Storm, and Eat Drink Man Woman. He has always been keenly observant of the small things that make real characters out of words on a page, and he repeats that success here. China (particularly the ancient China depicted here) has never been known for featuring women as independent creatures, much less powerful ones. Here, Michelle Yeoh and Zhang Ziyi are women who dream of freedom, or who live it, who walk among the men as equals but also as the treasures that women are. There will also be ass-kicking served.
Chow Yun Fat, comfortable and intense in his native tongue, dances through the fight scenes (it sounds so base to call them that!) like he was in a 1940′s musical, yet depicts the repressive instincts of his character’s upbringing as if he were physically bound. Yeoh is luminous and powerful, yet still a woman in ancient China, and a gentle and wise one at that. Fairy tales seldom have complicated characters, and because of that I committed the moral sin of accepting them at realistic face value. So, I admit, while I was visually impressed and emotionally impressed, I found the story’s finer points slipped past me. You know, metaphors and stuff. Hey, it’s hard to read and watch lightning quick moves at the same time!
It has a fantastic score, (Tan Dun) which my more musically educated companion noted was using the stylings of traditional music, without actually being traditional. Everyone I saw it with compared it to the many flying dreams one has in life, and that is an excellent descriptor. It doesn’t have to make sense all the time to be exhilarating, and it doesn’t even have to have a linear story. Crouching Tiger takes a 30 minute detour to have some lengthy back story thrown in for one of the characters, which I found distracted me from the dreamy aspect, but it was fine. Nominated for two Golden Globes and no doubt a contender for other major awards, soon it will be available everywhere for your viewing pleasure. My old roommate and movie pal saw it at a special screening last summer and hadn’t stopped entreating me to go see it.
Now for the “fight scenes.” There is no other thing to call it, but they are as purposefully balletic as a Jackie Chan movie, without all the comedy and with an element of deadliness absent from Chan films. Not a one is gratuitous, nor mundane. But it’s not just “Hya! Ho! Haiiie!” in old-fashioned costumes – the Oscar for best rigging goes to this film, because they play out their chases and battles over the rooftops and treetops and along the walls, gallivanting through an Escher-designed set with no gravity and plenty of open sky. This sets it apart from any regular martial arts film; that, and the idea of a near-sacred sword, a woman with secret ambitions, and unrequited love.
Be forewarned – there are subtitles, so you’d better see it in the theatre instead of waiting to rent. It’s pretty cool. Check it out. The only reason I did not give it Full Price Feature was the interruption of the second story line and it’s troublesome reality checks.
MPAA Rating PG-13
Release date 12/22/00
Time in minutes 120
Director Ang Lee
Studio Sony Pictures Classics
