Crazy, Wild and Confusing... and did I mention Noisy too?

Rating: 6/10 (2 April 2005)

The thing that confuses most people about this film is what part Quentin Tarantino played in the film. A lot of the people I heard talking outside of the theater said he wrote and directed the film. Most of them thought that was the case, since Tarantino's name is the first thing you see in the trailer. But, he did not write or direct the film. He merely saw it after it was completed, and decided to help promote it. I found it quite comical people actually thought Quentin Tarantino wrote and directed a film in an entirely different language then his own.
Moving on, I thought Hero hit and missed. Viewers going to see it merely for the traditional "chop sake" wire effects and finesse fight sequences won't be disappointed. However, viewers going to see it for an easy to follow plot and good acting will be sorely disappointing. The story in Hero is so jumbled and out of place, it will take you five minutes to get a grasp of what's going on when a new scene begins. The acting is decent, but nothing to write home about. I thought Jet Li would show a better side of his acting abilities, since the film is in his own language, and he doesn't have to concentrate on English. I was sorely mistaking. Jet Li's acting is substantially poor. He speeds his way through his lines, but doesn't disappoint when a sword fight scene comes up. All the other actors are pretty average, except Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon's Zhang Ziyi, who turns in easily the best performance of the film.
An element of Hero many people will find surprising is the lack of blood. There is probably two specks of blood in the whole ninety minute feature. For those who don't understand why, the no-blood technique is the way old martial arts films used to be presented. There is a lot of flying around in the air during fights in Hero. It was entertaining to watch the first couple of times, then it got to be tired, and easy to poke fun at. It resembled scenes from Peter Pan. I think the whole flying through the air technique is really starting to get tired in Asian cinema.
A part of the film, which drew many people to theaters, was the greatly anticipated re-match scene between Jet Li and Donnie Yen. It has been twelve long years since the two battled on screen in the martial arts hit Once Upon a Time in China 2. The reason the re-match was so awaited was because Jet Li and Donnie Yen are some of the best martial artists of the Eastern hemisphere. It would be like DeNiro and Pacino facing off in a crime movie once again  that's how big this was. People anxiously awaiting this battle sequence won't be let down, because the fight scene between them is perhaps the best action scene in the entire film.
In conclusion, Zhang Yimou's Hero is worth seeing in the theater if you are into the mindless and neat action epics, with no room for intelligent plot. I predict it will be on video fairly soon. (review written 8/27/04). Grade: B-