Wow! Flying men!

Rating: 4/10 (31 May 2001)

This is probably the WORST movie that was ever nominated for the Oscars. A complete failure, from all points of view, that somehow turned upside down the heads of all americans (including the critics).
Okay, i must admit, it is not really that incredibly bad. But considering that it's been nominated and even won some Golden Globes and Oscars make it look like something really great, which is not.
Why, you ask? Well let me tell you.
First, the plot. Yes, it's intriguing and complex, but it has absolutely nothing special in it. A plot concerning a stolen sword, the attempts to recover it, everything mixed in with a love story between a girl about to marry someone she didn't love and a crook determined to change.
As you can see, nothing special. Then , the dialogues. Some of them are really stupid and unappropriate (maybe it's because of the doubling in English), some normal and only a few really good.
The characters: except for the girl, played beautifully by Michelle Yeoh, they are all pretty un-interesting.
Okay... then open the book with all the cliches in the american films, and you'll see that most of them are in this one. It's full of them, sometimes i even had the urge of leaving the theater, but the only thing that kept me in was the laziness and sleeping feeling that i had because of the movie. Example of a cliche? The almost ending scene, in which Jade Fox is about to be killed and, just like in all the cheap B-type action flicks, she confesses everything, what she wanted to do and why, because the movie was unable to make you understand these things by yourself.
At least the ending was a bit better and saved the general poor aspect of definetely the most overrated movie of all times. But even in the ending, and although i watched the movie carefully, the dramatic scenes never made me sorry, not even one bit. Although in many movies i am touched if the ending is dramatic. Here, i didn't feel sorry at all, maybe because that Ang Lee didn't manage to make you really feel for the characters.
Oh, and another thing... the action scenes, although some of them really well made, are so ridiculous sometimes... when there were the flying scenes, with these men travelling like UFO's from tree to tree, laughter raised from the whole theater. And for a good reason.
All in all, if you haven't seen this one, don't let yourself be fooled by most opinions in here. This is just another low class asian movie, only with a bigger budget that made it have the door opened in Hollywood.
Vote: 4 out of 10.