It's so pretty...Yawn

Rating: 4/10 (20 February 2005)

Hero: 4/10: This movie reminds me of that old computer game Myst. Very pretty to look at (every frame is like a painting with incredible color) very popular (ranked 131 all time favorite on IMDb) and left me empty and frustrated.
Put Clint Eastwood and Lee Van Cleef in flowing robes and give them each ballet lessons and you have this movie. It's really a bad spaghetti western in disguise with a musical score that will drive you nuts and a story so old and obvious as to be almost worthless.
Add in characters that I was simply unable to connect to and that flying kung fu that removes any sense of realism magic or otherwise, and the sense of waste is palatable.
The movie puts together huge armies and then has them sit around or shoot a volley of CGI arrows at one building. They might as well be a crowd at a football game.
Hero is frustrating like that since the lack of emotions and the story itself keeps one at such a distance all you can do is admire the pretty pictures. But man do they deliver those pretty pictures in spades.