A beautiful painting first and foremost

Rating: 9/10 (10 May 2005)

I watched Hero about five times but I never took it as a mere movie. Its story contents, historically and politically, may very well be questionable; I can agree on that without hesitating. The one thing however that seems to be without discussion is its tremendous visual beauty and amazing music score. I sometimes put in the Hero DVD just to listen to the music only.
To get a broader view of the historical topic, the Chinese unification of the seven kingdoms under the emperor of Qin, the movie "The Emperor and The Assassin" by Kaige Chen may be taken into consideration as well. Yet when it comes to Chinese movie arts, Hero surpasses every Chinese movie I have seen up to now (not very many I have to admit).
In contrast to other opinions I will not comment on the martial arts aspects, nor on symbolisms found all over the place. To me this movie simply represents a beautiful painting containing people moving and fighting, loving and deceiving. The painting is accompanied by one of the most wonderful Chinese music scores I have listened to so far.
Hero clearly needs to be enjoyed, not discussed.