Movie Talk

SSLau
12/30/00

" Crouching tiger, hidden dragon"...a minor master piece directed by Ang Lee of " Sense and sensibility " fame. The plot is based loosely ,very loosely, on Wang Du-Lu's novel written in the 30/40s. When we were at PC, I am sure most of us had read his books. " CH" is part  four of a five part series. I picked up a reprint ( three volumes) of " CH" in Hong Kong a week ago in a bookstore named " Cosmo". This is the only bookstore in HK I know where they provide chairs for you to sit and read, much like Borders ( and others) in the US. "Cosmo" dose not have a coffee shop inside, too bad.

The problem with " CH" is the script, it is too jumpy and  disconnected. It is kind of expected since they made a very  complicated plot into a simple story, something even Ang Lee could not manage to fix. The other problem is the Mandarin spoken in the movie. I had to read the English subtitle to understand what they said, normally I did not have to do that. The English translation of the conversation is also very " odd". Let me give you an example, they mentioned ( in the subtitle) the term " Qing Hu " a lot in the movie. I had a hard time figuring out what that meant. It turned out  to be " river lake" or something akin to " the worldly and adventurous battle field or playground ". Well, good luck to the "foreign devils".

Never mind what the actors said , it is the action that makes this movie a master piece. The same special effect team made " matrix", but "CH" is much more fun to watch. The young Chinese actress is very charming. Cheng Pei Pei was in the movie too as a villain. She is no longer the same CPP as she once was in " the drunken swordsman" back in the 60s, perhaps due to the makeup and skillful acting. Time and tide wait for no man ( or person). She still has the presence though, time enhances that character. There is hope for all of us.