A feast for the eyes that, ultimately, ends up being mostly empty calories.

Rating: 5/10 (18 June 2018)

There's no doubt 'Hero (2002)' is lavish, with opulent production design decorating sometimes upwards of eighteen-thousand period-dressed extras and elaborate fight choreography coming up in almost each and every scene (whether or not it's honestly needed). However, all of its splendour tells a tale that essentially amounts to very little other than thinly veiled pseudo-propaganda (though an argument can be made for full-blown propaganda) that paints one of China's past ruthless dictators as a misunderstood 'hero'. No amount of overindulgent excess can fix that or do anything towards making you care about the admittedly impressive visuals you're seeing. All it does is drive the budget through the roof. This was - at its release, at least - China's most expensive motion picture and, while it certainly shows in the scale of the scenery, it isn't reflected by the scope of the story. It's not like the movie is particularly bad. The action-sequences are usually quite breath-taking, using their literal 'story' nature to 'make sense of' - or otherwise solidify - and accentuate their slightly fantastical nature. They often fall into a place of total inconsequence, though, with some being entirely invented even within the possibly invented narrative in which they appear. They also usually lack the weight to make them feel tangible, impactful or properly consequential. This is something not helped by the fact that we know how most of them turn out, due to the poorly acted framing device. This actually acts as more of a limitation than a unique way to tell the tale. It does allow for various perspectives to be placed upon similar events, which are portrayed with varying colour schemes to initially unnoticed but ultimately appreciated effect, but doesn't allow for enough divergence within the narrative and neuters the possibility of anything having any real consequence until the movie catches up with itself. Once it does, its message becomes even more confused and more likely to inspire an eyebrow being raised than the swell of pride that's intended. By this time, the poor pace of the piece has become grating, to the point that the previously somewhat awe-inspiring fight-work has become kind of a chore to sit through, which, perhaps strangely, makes the ending feel less definitive than it actually is. This is really because there isn't a sense of structure, no proper finale outside of an uncharacteristic choice that only serves to pander to the movie's agenda, as opposed to the natural direction of the character's intentions. There are some slightly resonant themes stuck in there, though, even if you have to read past some pretty operatically iffy outside elements to get to them. In the end, the film is much more impressive from a visual standpoint than a narrative one. Even this doesn't hold up, though, because you don't really care about the characters and, as such, can't stay fully engaged throughout. 5/10