True magic

Rating: 10/10 (9 January 2001)

I don't know where to start. Should I begin by telling you about the beauty and sadness of the story? Or by describing what went through my head while watching? Impossible. Should I analyze and interpret the details or the movie on the whole? Or should I make a statement about the absolute poetry and love that has been put into every single frame of the film? Maybe then can I explain how this movie moved me, touched me and raised a storm in my head  and became the best movie (all categories) I have ever seen, after 6 years finally pushing `Heat' down the ladder to a venerable second. I want to savor this moment. I almost want to resist. But how can one resist `Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon'?
Set in China some time in the middle ages, two warriors, Yu Shu Lien and Li Mu Bai (Yeoh and Yun-Fat) battle an elusive enemy called the `Jade Fox' and are surprised to almost meet their match in a disciple, led astray and onto the wrong path by the Jade Fox (the Anakin-Skywalker-syndrome). The adventure revolves much around a sword that the Master warrior Li Mu Bai gives away as a gift, after deciding to give his warrior life up. But before he can give it up completely, he must face his Master's nemesis. The film is filled with stunning scenery and photography, violent and riveting martial art, a dialogue so poetic and justified it made my head spin. Refreshing and wondrous in the art of storytelling, `Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon' has made a profound impression on me.
I am relatively new to the Hong Kong movies, and movies where martial arts play a considerable role. Therefore, I don't know how far Lee and his crew has pushed the ideas and the filming  but to me, this film was so deeply compelling and spellbinding, I have a hard time imagining anything like it. It's not a `martial arts movie'  it's much more of a drama, a love story and a retelling of Chinese lore. Magic is the essence, the aerial ballet of the fight scenes and the absolute control over every move in close combat, trigger and inspire a sense of wonder and adds beauty to the art of killing that Li Mu Bai is tired of. I understand that Ang Lee must have borrowed a great deal of material from Hong Kong movies, but like I said, to someone unfamiliar with those, this film appears quite revolutionary. There's poetry in every single detail: the story, the dialogue, the characters and their every trait, the scenery, the camera work and, of course, the fighting  violent and almost feverish. Colors, sound, the language, the trees, the desert and the warrior code. It all nailed me to seat and kept me on the edge of it until the very end. This is the kind of experience I so often want but seldom get. When the awkward position I had doubts that I could take for 2 hrs has been completely forgotten, then there's something great afoot.
I say if the film feels absolutely spotless, if there are no flaws that appear on the first viewing (be it goofs or serious flaws in the storytelling), then the makers have achieved something extraordinary. Those films are few and far between. `Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon' is of that special brand that not only appears flawless, but entirely perfect. I'm not saying that it is perfect  I'm saying that the depth and scope of the film makes it seem so. And that is not something that happens very often, not to me anyway. I think the last one must have been `Heat' or maybe `Se7en'. Before that...who knows.
A clearer case of 10 out of 10 I have yet to see.