Excellent, but not quite excellent enough.....

Rating: 10/10 (20 January 2001)

Note: spoilers contained herein.
Now don't get me wrong, this film is a classic (already) and is easily one of the best films I have seen in the last couple of years (Fight Club & American Beauty also make the list), however when I went into the cinema I wanted to be amazed, and thrilled (which I was), but I also wanted to see a movie which would revolutionise Hollywood. Unfortunately this is not that movie. The fight scenes are spectacular and reminiscent of those classic Chinese kung-fu films from the 70's, incidentally the characters don't fly, they float (Ang Lee's words, not mine). Although these fight scenes are choreographed by Yuen Wo Ping, they are totally different to those found in The Matrix (despite what you may have heard), they are much more balletic, and if you can believe it they are much more stylised. Take for example the first 'fight' where Yu Shu Lien (Michelle Yeoh) is chasing Jen (Zhang Ziyi); they jump from roof-top to roof-top barely touching the roof once. The fight continues on the ground where Shu Lien runs about thirty feet up a wall as if she were running on the ground! This type of action is obviously not to everyone's tastes; about 70% of the audience were, like me, in awe. 20% were sitting, shaking their heads and laughing, uttering things like, 'nah, nah maaan... they've taken it TOO far!'. The others, who had probably never seen a 'traditional' Chinese martial arts film, were simply thinking to themselves, 'What the F**K is this!'. I can appreciate how people would think all of these things, but if you let it, the film will drag you in, and by the time you witness the chase between Li Mu Bai (Chow Yun-Fat) and Jen across the cloud forest you could easily believe that they have total control over gravity.
As you may have gathered the martial arts scenes have stuck in my head (to the extent that I had to see the film several times), however it is not just the fighting which makes the movie. Romances between the lead characters are interwoven between the fights, and thankfully the romance lacks all of that Hollywood slush which everyone hates so much. In my opinion the romance between Jen and Lo in the desert is much more effective than the romance witnessed between Li Mu Bai and Shu Lien, this is because I felt that a few of Chow Yun-Fat's lines were erring on the wrong side of cheesy. Having said that the emotions are very well conveyed considering it is subtitled and could have easily lost the whole essence in the translation. On that same note, the humour, amazingly, remains intact. Something notoriously difficult to do, I don't think I've ever laughed at a subtitled film before, unless it was at the appalling translation. As many say, the secret to successful comedy is timing, and the translators have somehow managed to preserve the comedy in the film.
All of these things are wrapped up in some of the most beautiful cinematography I have ever seen, and I wish the film the best of luck at the Oscars.
Bad points? Well like I say I was hoping for a revolution in the way people make and view movies, but this is an unrealistic hope, since I'm not sure any film in the history of moving pictures has truly changed the direction of cinema, perhaps nudged it off the beaten path, but never in a totally different direction. So, my only real criticism was the predictable ending (the instant Lo was relating the story of the boy who leapt from the mountain to make his wishes come true, you just KNEW what was going to happen at the end). Still better a predictable ending rather than an awful one.
I hope people won't ignore this film simply because it is subtitled, to do so would be criminal since it is undoubtedly going to be one of the best films of the year. I implore you to go and see it.