Truly a Cinematic work of art

Rating: 10/10 (18 January 2003)

How to describe this movie? Enchanting, engrossing, enthralling? It's all of these and more. A tale of love, honor, duty, and betrayal, this story is told in alternating tones of gripping action and deep-felt emotion. If you embrace this movie and share in their struggles between their duty and their desire, their passion and their reason, the ending will just bring you to tears.
I came to this movie, expecting just a standard 'wire-fu' hong-kong movie. What I saw just blew me away. Amazing action in the service of a Shakespearean story, breathtaking cinematography, a haunting musical score by Tan Dun and performed with Yo Yo Ma, all the elements of this film came together into a seamless work of art, compelling the viewer through this gripping tale of tragedy, loyalty, and love. This was art, not of the museum, but of the theatre. The kind that makes you weep for joy.
This movie should have swept the Oscars: Best Picture, Best Director (Ang Lee), Best Actor (Chow Yun Fat), Best Actress (Michelle Yeoh). But it didn't. Fifty years from now, Gladiator, Erin Brokovich, and Traffic will be interesting footnotes on the Classic Movie channel, while Crouching Tiger will still be taught at film schools, and shown to young college students to open their eyes to a classic piece of art, the way that Kurosowa's films did in the '70s, the '80s, and even today.