Great Martial Arts Film. Great movie? Well...

Rating: 7/10 (18 March 2001)

After a year of disappointing movies (witness the mediocre GLADIATOR and ERIN BROCKOVITCH), I was hoping to see a Best Picture nominee which I could endorse. Alas, CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON is NOT it. How can one enthusiastically endorse a movie whose opening scene is so
fuzzy, whose dialogue track is so hollow, which has several key scenes which are so choppily edited, whose story is so convoluted, whose ending is so nihilistic and with those stupid "flying" sequences, in many of which the harnesses are clearly visible.
HOWEVER, I can state without a doubt, CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON contains the greatest fighting sequences AND one of the finest film performances I have yet witnessed. That BOTH these can be attributed to one performer, Ziyi Zhang, is absolutely remarkable.
To explain almost any of the story would ruin the fun, so I won't. The film summary does that quite perfectly, thank you. Interestly women totally dominate this movie. All of the fight sequences occur EITHER between a man and a woman, two women or one woman and several men. In almost all instances, the woman wins. When that woman is Ziyi Zhang, one can well believe she would. NOBODY I've ever seen is faster.
By all means, see CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON, particularly if you enjoy great martial arts. Just don't expect too much. This movie is WAY too overpraised.