Swords and Kisses

When I first heard of the film House of Flying Daggers, I knew at once I'd love it. I mean, how could I NOT like it? It was a period martial arts drama starring Zhang Ziyi, one of the most gorgeous faces in Asian cinema these days. Zhang Ziyi + martial arts = one kick-butt movie. Well, we've been waiting months and months for this film to finally hit theaters locally, and this week it debuted. I managed to take the time to slip into a theater after work today, to see this Zhang Yimou film and see if it would blow me away.

To put it bluntly... It didn't.

I really wanted to love this movie, to come in, watch it, and exit the theater gushing about how incredibly cool the story was, how great the fights were, how epic the adventure was and which of the scenes was my favorite. But in the end... I just came out feeling nothing really. No gushing, no imagining kung fu or fantasizing about Zhang Ziyi. It came and went.

To be fair, the film is gorgeous to look at. Many scenes show off awesome vistas of lush forests, fields and mountainsides in vibrant, lively colors. The martial arts are cool and stylized to their Wuxia Chinese sword drama roots- though you will have to enter the film accepting that people in this movie CAN do superhuman feats of acrobatics and weapon skill. You accept that Zhang Ziyi, despite being a petite charmer, is a deadly warrior and assassin. You just accept that the House of Flying Daggers somehow have the ability to turn simple blades into guided missiles of DOOM. In fact, this film would probably have rocked my world if it did center on the titular rebel group, and their apparent war against the corrupt government.

But really, all the epic elements of the film are mere backdrops to the love triangle between Daggers assassin Mei (played by Ziyi), Constable Jin (played by Andy Lau) and Constable Leo (played by Takeshi Kaneshiro). A good portion of the film has Lao and Ziyi eyeing each other hungrily, expressing sweet nothings and rolling in the grass. These slow scenes are broken by encounters with persistent soldiers, who are well-trained enough to turn into bamboo spear-throwing spidermen during the film's best fight scene. And while Zhang Ziyi is pretty awesome as a fighter, her character is diluted a bit by the fact that she is inferior ultimately to either of the two leads, and seems to lose her powers when in the arms of either guy.

The finale is the conclusion of the trio's triangular relationship, and everything else blots out, including an implied battle between the government troops and the Flying Daggers. This climax, as dramatic as it should have been, was pretty sloppy in terms of martial arts and actually elicited laughter due to the Terminator-like resilience of one of the players. Sad, but true. As for the resolution, pretty Asian. Think Crouching Tiger and Hero, and you know there won't be a happy "riding off into the sunset" ending. Oh well.
All in all, the film isn't really horrible or bad, by any length. The story's really not that deep or intriguing, but the performances were good overall, and the CG of the flying daggers was pretty cool. However, the marketing of this film gave an idea that the film was an epic, in the vein of Hero. But it really isn't... it's a love story, very asian and very dramatic. The film's original title I believe was The Lovers, and if this was what they used instead of 'House of Flying Daggers', I may have entered the theater expecting what I saw (but then again, I may not have entered AT ALL).

Well, Zhang Ziyi is still a feast for the eyes, and the bamboo forest scene was pretty cool. I don't regret taking the time to see HOFD, but I probably won't be wanting to see it again anytime soon. Sigh. Well, I hope Sky Captain satisfies me more when we see it tomorrow...