Characters: Li Mu Bai - Chow Yun-Fat Shu Lien - Michelle Yeoh Lo - Chen Chang Jen Yu - Ziyi Zhang
Features: Audio: English (5.1), Mandarin (5.1), Thai and Cantonese (Surround) Subtitles: English, Chinese, Korean, Thai Trailer Featurette: Interview with NMichelle Yeoh Commentary: Ang Lee and James Schamus (English) Costumes Gallery Music/video clip: Coco Lee, 'A Love Before Time' (English and Mandarin) Talent Files Weblink Animated Menus
Review: This is a Region 3 DVD, marketed to Singapore, Malaysia, Taiwan and other points East. But the very English packaging and label design suggests that this Columbia Pictures release will look almost identical when it gains Region 1 release.
The transfer is very fine – a sharp widescreen anamorphic transfer, and with the two main languages (Mandarin and English) given Dolby 5.1 tracks, with Surround Sound for Cantonese and Thai. The film was shot in Mandarin, and it’s best viewed with that; the English subtitles carry the story along very well.
And it’s a great story. Director Ang Lee (The Wedding Banquet, Sense and Sensibility) has produced a very human martial arts movie which never subdues the human stories of individual quests for strength and meaning in life. The martial arts scenes, choreographed by Yuen Wo Ping (The Matrix), are spectacular, full of energy and a surreal beauty. But they complement perfectly the story of human change and development.
The film communicates directly to a Western audience, but you sense that here are film-makers who are attempting to return to the roots of their own culture – and that feeling hits you most dramatically by the film’s ending, which can only be explained and understood with reference to that culture. Luckily, the optional director/writer audio soundtrack gives us a small cultural reference point to cling to.
Western audiences will know two of the leads, Chow Yun-Fat (Anna and the King) and Michelle Yeoh (Tomorrow Never Dies). Michelle Yeoh gives the performance of a lifetime. This beautiful martial-arts star acts with a deepness and richness she had never given before – and she was asked to age at least 15 years for the camera. The feature interview on the DVD with her is a revelation – is this the same person? Also revelatory is the fact that before making this film, she couldn’t speak Mandarin, and had to be coached through every line!
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Production Year: 2003 - Martial Arts - Director: Paul Hunter - Original Language: English - Classification: 12 years and over - Starring: Chow Yun-Fat, Seann William Scott, James King, Karel Roden
Production Year: 1972 - Martial Arts - Director: Bruce Lee - Original Language: English\Cantonese\Chinese - Classification: 18 years and over - Starring: Bruce Lee, Nora Miao, Chuck Norris, Robert Wall, Jon T. Benn
Production Year: 1991 - Martial Arts - Director: Tsui Hark - Original Language: Cantonese - Classification: 18 years and over - Starring: Donnie Yen, Jet Lee, Rosamund Kwan, Yuen Biao, Mok Sui Chung
Production Year: 1981 - Martial Arts - Director: Kenji Misumi, Robert Houston - Original Language: English - Classification: 18 years and over - Starring: Kayo Matsuo, Minoru Ohki, Akiji Kobayashi, Shin Kishida, Masahiro Tomikawa, Tomisaburo Wakayama
Martial Arts - Original Language: English - Classification: 18 years and over - Starring: Bruce Lee, Sho Kosugi, James Ryan, Jim Kelly, Jimmy Wang Yu, Bolo Yeung, Christopher Lee
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