Zhang Yimou's House of Flying Daggers does not feature Teri Hatcher, anyone from the show Nip/Tuck or any other winners from Sunday night's Golden Globe Awards. Moviegoers are better off for it.
The film and the awards show, an annual exercise in poor cinematic and small-screen taste, are not completely dissimilar -both featured a lot more sizzle than steak, except in the place of gaudy dresses draped on anorexic movie stars, the film overkills on the beauty of ninth century China, which is a much more pleasant and civil kind of excess.
Gorgeously shot and directed, the film moves through lush foliage, full fields and bamboo forests. Yimou, a fairly notable Chinese director, known most recently for the Quentin Tarantino-produced Hero
fills the screen with the finest natural splendor since Peter Jackson's expansive Lord of the Rings films.
At times the film has the scope of the aforementioned fantasy trilogy, with sweeping shots and overriding themes of duty and honor. But mostly it eschews the sometimes overwhelming and oftentimes clichéd virtuous world in favor of the time-tested romantic one. Specifically, the film explores the relationship between Mei (Ziyi Zhang), a blind woman reputed to be the daughter of the recently slain leader of the House of Flying Daggers, a rebel group, and Jin (Takeshi Kaneshiro), a sweet-talking Imperial swindler who excels at death-defying martial arts.
The ultimate success of the film is rooted primarily in the simple wow factor of the special effects and action sequences. From close-up shots of spinning daggers to magnificent feats of swordplay and daring-do, Yimou puts on a stylistic clinic. While many scenes stand out, one near the beginning where Mei must perform the echo dance which involves her mimicking sounds made on a giant circle of upright drums with her flowing robes.
In many ways the film is a triumph of style over substance, as it thrives on interludes of slow-motion, camera tricks, action, sound design, music and scenery supplemented by simple dialogue and a number of skillful plot twists. But, as with genre copycats like Kill Bill it has amazing style to display, and enough story to keep the film from becoming merely an attempt at stylistic excess.
While House of Flying Daggers is violent, exhilarating, intimate and yet, detached, its most notable attribute is that it is beautiful. And in that, it is more vibrant and sparkling than much of the talent on display at Sunday night's ceremony.
17
Archives
Kyle Kondik
