A truly great film.

Rating: 10/10 (18 December 2000)

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon is truly a great film. I'm normally very critical towards the films I watch so I don't give this praise lightly. First off, this movie shows the talent level of Hong Kong/Chinese and Taiwan movie making in particular which we North Americans have been so deprived of all these years. Even the recent releases of Hong Kong films in the US aren't even close to the best films that came out from that area. Unlike most action movies nowadays, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon uses action as a means of furthering the story instead of using a plot as an excuse for action. The fight scenes were beautifully choreographed, far surpassing the Matrix and the actors have done an excellent job pulling it off. I enjoyed the Matrix, but it's not in the same league as this film.
Don't get confused though. This movie wasn't inspired by the Matrix. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon is part of a very popular chinese genre called Wu Xia (roughly equivalent to our swords and wizards fantasy genres), which has existed for a long time. Matrix actually got it's inspirations from this genre because Hong Kong and other chinese regions have come out with such movies for a long time. The action director and martial arts choreagrapher for the Matrix is actually from Hong Kong and has worked on countless chinese films before the Matrix.
I would strongly suggest anyone to see this film, as it's not just an action film, but something far surpassing it. Films like this don't come by very often so check it out. It's much better and more original than many Hollywood films we get now that shamelessly follows the same formula.