One of the greatest kung fu classics of all time

Rating: 10/10 (8 December 2004)

Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon is a bona fide masterwork.
It's an off-beat kung fu movie with an epic love story, and every single part of it works stunningly well. I can watch it again and again, and keep being totally enthralled by the action, the acting and the beautiful cinematography. It is clearly Ang Lee's finest two hours.
This is a true classic, which sets a new and far higher standard for subsequent kung fu movies to live up to. And while some movies have matched and even exceeded this standard in terms of visually stunning martial arts spectacles (see Legend of Zu and House of Flying Daggers), the thing that no later movie has yet matched is the quality of the story and characterization. In fact, I doubt *any* martial arts movie ever made has the satisfying level of emotion and character that this movie has.
Crouching Tiger generally avoids clichés of any kind, and doesn't conform to traditional storytelling structures, either; most notably in that it lacks a great climactic fight at the end. To the movie's great credit, the viewer never feels that such a violent climax is necessary.
It also lacks a happy ending, which is the only thing about the movie that I think borders on the problematic. I would really have liked to see Shu Lien and Li Mu Bai end up together, now that they have suppressed their love for so long.
The strange end, with Jen throwing herself off the mountain, is indeed bordering on the nonsensical, but somehow it works. It brings a kind of serene closure to the experience, and one leaves the movie feeling nothing but elation.
The only modern kung fu movie that is on par with Crouching Tiger is Hero, which has an even better story (in my opinion), and even better cinematography, but not quite as much sheer entertainment value and excitement. The two movies are too dissimilar to be compared by the same criteria; Hero is much more of an art movie and has a totally different tone and message. Rate-wise, both movies are perfect 10's, though.