Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon

Director: Ang Lee (Sense and Sensibility; The Ice Storm)
Cast:Chow Yun Fat, Michelle Yeoh, Zhang Ziyi, Chang Chen, Lung Sihung
Rating: PG-13
Run Time: 120 minutes

THE SKINNY
The Green Destiny sword of legend has been stolen, so mighty warriors Li Mu Bai (Chow Yun Fat) and Shun Lien (Michelle Yeoh) must reclaim it. Will they find time during their quest to open their hearts to each other, or will their code of honor forever keep them apart?

THE BOTTOM LINE
In a year where almost every summer movie crumbled and fell, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon serves as a reminder of what the action film and the love story can be.

THE FULL REVIEW
The sacred Green Dynasty, a sword of legend, has been taken from its resting place within the sanctum of Sir Te. The thief in the night, a masked woman clad in black, leaps across rooftops and scampers along the walls without making a sound.

Her only match is the experienced warrior, Yu Shun Lien (played by that heroic master of the martial art film, Michelle Yeoh,) who pursues her whether they spin through the air, leap across rooftops or fly along walls, their blades swishing through the wind and gliding against each other. Whether on the land, in the air or somewhere in-between, these two women fight while the men wait below.

This fight scene belongs among the birds in the sky, or carried along on the back of an agile preying mantis. Only twenty minutes into Ang Lee’s Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, it has already become the finest scene of the year. It’s only the first of several breathtaking confrontations which are elemental in their purity.

When it finally reached its inevitable conclusion, I started to applaud. It did not come as a surprise that the rest of the packed theater house joined me with their hands to celebrating the magic of cinema.

Ang Lee has already built up an impressive body of work for a relatively young filmmaker. His skill lies in slow revelation of character, found in the silences that linger between words. His intimate dramas follow families and relationships, parents and children, the fear of paralysis in love. With the exception of his Civil War drama, Ride With the Devil, there was no indication that Lee would so effortlessly translate this quiet breed of cinema to the realm of romantic adventures.

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon took Ang Lee seven films to create. He has graduated to become one of the few filmmakers who possess the ability to make a crowd pleasing, rousing, emotionally sweeping melodrama which doesn’t lapse into predictability, cliché, sentiment, or fogginess.

Like many fairy tales and fables, the plot is simple and easy to follow. Li Mu Bai (international action superstar Chow Yun Fat, in a role worthy of his talent) is the master of the martial arts who wields the Green Dynasty blade. Weary from his travels, he only hopes to find some small peace at the end of his journey.

In his search for a different path, Li asks a favor of his trusted ally, Shun Lien (Yeoh). He no longer wishes to wield the Green Dynasty and has her deliver it to the home of Sir Te (Lung Sihung, a warm and welcome presence - he’s the clever father from many of Lee’s previous films including The Wedding Banquet). Shun Lien carries out his wishes while he goes away to meditate.

The bittersweet saga of Li and Shun Lien is one of the two intertwining plots which run through Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. Their scenes are often played seated across from each other at a table unable to express their innermost feelings. As Sir Te points out time and again, these two - the greatest warriors in the land - are idiots when it comes to professing their love, which takes more courage than you might think.

The major subplot involves Shun Lien’s young friend, Jen (relative newcomer Zhang Ziyi), who will marry against her wishes to a politician’s son. Jen dreams of becoming a fighter like her sister-figure, despite Shun Lien’s protestations that the life of a Yuan warrior is not as romantic as the storybooks say. Shun Lien knows well that the role of the woman in this society is constricting. Jen’s road will not be an easy one.

The sword, of course, is stolen. Li and Shun Lien cannot rest until it is rediscovered. We quickly learn that the thief who stole away with it is in the employ of Li’s arch nemesis, another powerful female character known as the Jade Fox (Cheng Pei Pei).

While the secret thief is ultimately no mystery (using Roger Ebert’s Law of Economy of Characters), even to the two warriors, I’ll choose not to reveal that information here. You’ll fare better seeing the movie for yourself. There are richer surprises yet to come.

Chow Yun Fat is perfect as the greatest fighter alive, but he’s gracefully passive as the story is held together by Michelle Yeoh and Zhang Ziyi.

Chow’s role is the one traditionally regarded as feminine while Yeoh and, especially, Zhang (whose story arc takes her from girl to woman) take the reins often reserved for masculine types like Jet Li, Jackie Chan, Bruce Lee and Sonny Chiba.

Unlike their male counterparts, however, there’s no love of competition or glorious victory here. The urge to squash or destroy the bad guy would only serve to corrupt. Even as the villain of this film is inevitably destroyed, something great must also die.

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon has been critically acclaimed. Sometimes, that can be a bad sign. The movie gets overhyped and the expectations grow too high. In this case, don’t let the praise scare you off.

When I think of films which win festivals and awards, my thoughts drift toward bloated examples of ponderous weight and pretension, both long winded and slow going. Like the best of all crowd pleasing classics, thinking of John Ford or Steven Spielberg in their prime, Ang Lee has created a movie which is modest in its desire to entertain and enchant.

Think of a glistening underground pool in which is reflected the golden glow of lightning bugs, or of a forest after a warm summer rain. In counterpoint, think of wind against your skin as you run through the night or of being able to leap high enough to touch the stars.

Those are the sensations of this film. Now imagine feeling those while tucked into the coziness of your bed as you read a tale of high adventure with your flashlight.

The mixture of poetry in motion combined with the hair raising thrill of the cliffhanger are what make Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon one of the best films of the year.

HIGHLIGHTS

* It’s empowering to see women fighting men in hand-to-hand combat and winning. Ang Lee does much more than that, though. He has every major decision in the film, for good or for ill, defined by these women.
* Solid craftsmanship from behind the camera. The patience of director Ang Lee and screenwriter James Schamus is matched by the luminescent beauty of Peter Pau’s cinematography.
* Special credit should go to Yuen Mo Ping, who elevates fight choreography to an art form. Best known for his outstanding work in The Matrix, he surpasses himself here. Whether it be desert combat in the mountains, one solitary martial artist against many, or the combat which takes place upon the treetops, Yuen creates magic.
* The stillness of Chow Yun Fat as he rests on the very tip of a swaying branch after having raced across a lake skimming the surface of the water has to be seen to truly be believed.
* The film features a wonderful original score by composer and conductor Tan Dan. Throughout the film music from the Shanghai Symphony and National Orchestras supplemented by traditional Chinese instruments can be heard, along with perfromances by famed cellist Yo-Yo Ma.

LOWLIGHTS

* It’s difficult to catch all the nuances while reading subtitles
* Some may find the poetic final scene to be too ambivalent

OTHER INFO

* Nudity: None
* Violence: Moderate
* Humor: Some clever antics during a barroom brawl; the would-be love story between the warriors who are too lame to express their sentiment earns a few chuckles.

INTERESTING FACTS

* Ang Lee had the chance to shoot The Tai Chi Master with Michelle Yeoh and Jet Li in 1994, but passed because he didn’t feel confident shooting a martial arts film.
* Lee had never before shot a film in his ancestral homeland of China

By: Jeremiah Kipp - contributing writer