CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON

Ang Lee's fanciful martial arts film roars!

By Craig Reid     December 07, 2000

First of all, I'm a big fan of Chow Yun Fat, Michelle Yeoh, and Yuen Woo Ping, and I liked CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON a lot. However, to anyone who has seen the old Shaw Brothers movies or the Fant-Asia films of the 1980s and early '90s, let's be honest: CROUCHING TIGER leave you feeling 'been there, done that, seen it.' It's what knowledgeable Hong Kong film fans said about the action in THE MATRIX, CHARLIE'S ANGELS, BLADE, and X-MEN. But let's face it, to the average American filmgoer or film critic, this stuff is newsomething they've never seen before.

Based on part of a multi-volumed novel of several thousand pages, written by the Beijing-born Wang Du Lu in the early 1930s, CROUCHING TIGER is a tale of defiance, duplicity, righteousness and destinyabout the theft of a sword known as the Green Destiny, as told through the interwoven lives of two women who suffer the torment of undeclared love.

To Western viewers, CROUCHING TIGER has the twang of novelty, because certain aspects of swordsman lore will be unknown. According to Chinese legend, each sword possesses a spirit that sings after it has tasted blood. The over-emphasized resonating 'schwing' of the sword being drawn is an attempt to dramatize the point on film. Yet in this $15-million affair, director Ang Lee (SENSE AND SENSIBILITY, ICE STORM) has effortlessly created a blend of Eastern physical grace and action, with American elements of performance intensity embedded in the behavioral subtleties and nuances of European cinema.

Set in the 19th century, legendary swordsman Li Mu Bai (Chow Yun Fat) and the beautiful warrior Yu Shu Lien (Michelle Yeoh) have forged a partnered loyalty in the pursuit of justice over personal fulfillment. After the tragic death of her fiance, Yu's devotion to his honor prevents her from sharing her secret passion for Li, who we also learn secretly loves her. Li believes that whoever owns the exquisite Green Destiny, a sword filled with ancient powers, will never find peace in life, so he asks Yu to deliver it as a gift to the highly respected Sir Te in Beijing. Meanwhile, the rambunctiously youthful aristocrat Jen (Zhang Zi Yi) and her mysterious governess (Cheng Pei Pei), arrive at Sir's home in preparation for Jen's loveless, arranged marriage, which will solidify her family's position in Beijing. Yu discovers that Jen's governess, who secretly teaches Jen 'wu dung' (wu tang) swordplay, is the notorious fugitive Jade Fox, the woman who killed Li's master (offering the sad justification: 'He'd sleep with me but never teach me'). When the Green Destiny is stolen, things get flying.

The first fight between Yu and Jen is beyond wire gag-ery. We're talking about extended moments of flight, running up and down walls, and aerial ballet during which the characters flailing arms and legs make them look like panicking supermen unaccustomed flying. It's a bit too flighty. (Ching Siu Tung [A Chinse Ghost Story] is still the master of wire stunts.) And just when fight choreographer Yuen Woo Ping pulls off some incredibly interesting camera perspectives that successfully fool you, he does what he's constantly criticized for doing in Hong Kong: undercranking the camera to the point where the fighters look ridiculously cartoonish. Just revisit Donnie Yen's kicking performance in Yuen's IRON MONKEY.

Driven by the sword's loss, Li comes to town. Now here's a piece of inadvertent coherency. Chow is the first to admit that he doesn't know how to use a sword, which is painfully obvious when he does the prescribed sword form. What's so crazy is that on the 'long shot' of the scene, his double looks just as inept. Strangely, it works. We've all seen films where we can tell the star knows nothing, yet suddenly he/she can pop into some amazing piece of PhD movement only to later return to high school.

A curious 20-minute flashback pops up literally from nowhere, from which we learn about the impassioned love between Jen and the renegade bandit Lo. It's not inherently clear in the film, but the story's title CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON (WO HU, TSANG LUNG) is actually referring to the love story between the crouching Lo and the hidden Jen. Jen essentially wants to love a fighter and fight her lover.

Then we have what is really an awesome fight among the tree tops of old Cathay, wherein Li teaches Jen a lot about humility and the spirit of a true swordsman. Literally suspended 60 feet in the air, barely hanging on to the flimsy tree branches, he performs what in martial arts is called 'ching gong,' a technique that allows an individual to run atop reeds, jump over walls or walk on water. These sequences are powerfully reminiscent of King Hu's TOUCH OF ZEN or Ching Siu Tung's bizarrely beautiful, aerial display of ballet in BUTTERFLY AND SWORD, which portrays Michelle Yeoh dispatching her antagonists amidst a canopy of bamboo.

But the coolest thing about the film is Ang Lee's intelligent casting of arguably the most famous and beloved kung-fu lady of the Mandarin sword-films, Cheng Pei Pei as the evil Jade Fox. We are truly speaking about one of the living legends of Hong Kong's silver screen (COME DRINK WITH ME [1965], GOLDEN SWALLOW [1968]), and simply put, she looks great and it was a very classy thing for Lee to feature her. It's also the first time she has ever been a villain, a role she totally enjoys and absorbs.

CROUCHING TIGER is Lee's homage to the old style wu xia pian films, right down to the proverbial tea house in the middle of the forest, chopsticks used as weapons, and the pathetic old guy that runs the place. And although Lee is Western-trained and has done some reputable films, he actually fails to capture the essence of these old style genre classics, the exhibited nihilistic, battle-scarred ambience so evident in the films of Chang Cheh. And funnily enough, Yeoh's Mandarin is as plausible as Kostner's English accent in ROBIN HOOD, PRINCE OF THIEVES.

But Lee's point about romance is tragically clear. If you love someone, don't hold back; tell them and love that person more in life than in death. And to me, that is what is important.