An Epic

Rating: Null/10 (3 October 2004)

I never liked subtitled movies, until this one. Just watched it last night and couldn't stop thinking about it.
The movie started with the life of two brothers before the war, a life that was almost perfect until the war shatters all. Everything goes downhill from there. Despite all their best intentions, the two brothers helplessly watched their fate sinking and themselves drifting apart, with only dotted moments of hope and triumgh, when unconditional love and human spirit break through the darkness.
Comparing to "Saving Private Ryan", this movie gives characters a more human touch. "SPR" seems to moralize too much, no flaws, just hero's. The result is the characters came off plain and two-dimensional. Agree with Saturday-3's comment on SPR posted on 9/13/04 that "SPR almost seems like nothing more than a visually stunning, flag-waving movie". By the way, I am a big fan of Steven Spielburg and Tom Hanks, so there wasn't any bias there. On a side note, "Band of brothers", on the contrary, is very very good.
What I don't get, is how a mediocre subtitled movies such as "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" and "Hero" gets so much marketing effort and a truly amazing one like this gets nothing. By the way, I am a Chinese currently living in the States. So I guess that wasn't a very patriotic thing to say. IMHO, "Hero" is just a compilation of beautiful pictures. "Crouching Tiger" is even worse. (It's probably because I was able to understand the original dialogue and can tell how little effort was put into anything other than making the pictures look pretty.)
Hats off to Koreans for making such a great epic. "Tae Guk Gi" is a reminder of the difference between art and entertainment, a reminder that wars, as well as movies, are not about bang-bang actions and special effects. They are about human beings.
The only complaints that I could think of are: 1. The music during the beginning of the movie seems a little too sentimental. 2. The camera shakes too much during action scenes, probably deliberately, to create the chaos with a limited budget. But I don't have a problem with the length of the movie. The two and half hours felt like 1.5 hour when you were drawn into the intensity of the film.
If you are still wondering if you want to see this movie, go watch the trailer on the internet. Make sure you watch the one starting with the announcement of "ShowBox". Oh, hell, just watch the movie. Chances are you won't regret it.
As for myself, I am going to pre-order the DVD. I can't remember when was the last time that I want to see the bonus material of a movie so badly.
If you like the movie, I would also recommend "When trumpets fade" and "Band of Brothers".