Good, despite being disappointing on nearly every level (contains minor SPOILERS)

Rating: 7/10 (3 April 2003)

My DVD of 'Hero' (the latest epic soon-to-be-blockbuster to come out of China) arrived yesterday from Hong Kong. Who knows when it will even reach the cinema here. Anyway, I unexpectedly found myself with a free evening, so I settled down to watch it. It has 2 of my favourite Chinese actors in it, Jet Li and Donnie Yen, as well as Zhang Ziyi (who you will know from Crouching Tiger and Rush Hour 2), the critically-acclaimed Maggie Cheung, and Tony Leung, who I've only seen in comedies before. I'm afraid I will make comparisons to Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (hereafter CTHD) - I know I shouldn't, as the films are very different, and intended to be very different, but to an international audience, this is probably the only other Chinese film they will know/have seen. And there are certain similarities... For example, the music in Hero is once again composed by Tan Dun. I say composed, but he practically takes the CTHD score and changes 2 notes, then says 'look what I came up with'. It's that similar, which slightly annoyed me, as I was never that impressed with CTHD's music anyway. It works for some scenes, but Tan Dun (for me) doesn't know how to add atmosphere to a fight with his music. Nor was I particularly impressed with Faye Wong's theme song, despite being a big fan of her's generally.
The storyline of the film, once I understood what direction it was taking (3 variants on the same story told from different perspectives), was pretty good and worked well, avoiding become boring by repetition. However, the character development was really not up to much. The film only scratches the surface of the characters, particularly Broken Sword (Tony Leung) and Flying Snow (Maggie Cheung). In acting terms, these two are Chinese superstars, and were sorely understretched. We learn far too little about their relationship in the past, their devotion to each other, and their current difficulties. All this is explained away in a few sentences. Thus, I never felt the intended emotion at the prospect of their separation through death, or convinced by the commitment they finally decide to make. Perhaps this is the limitation of telling a story 3 times in 90 minutes. Similarly, Zhang Ziyi was underused, and her role was overly similar to her character in CTHD: a young, impulsive and passionate girl. Jet Li, I thought, did well, as did the Chen Daoming as the Qin Emperor.
And, like CTHD, this was beautifully filmed, although again a few scenes seemed to borrow from its famous forerunner; fighting in treetops or skimming across a beautiful lake, for example. Having said that, the scenery is also very different - this is northern China as opposed to the leafy green south of CTHD. Overall, I still enjoyed the film, despite being a little disappointed with just about every aspect of it. I'm glad it didn't win Best Foreign Film at the Oscars; it's certaintly not that good. And, I don't think, as good as CTHD. Above average, but unspectacular. 7/10