House of Flying Daggers

aka: Shi mian mai fu
Hong Kong 2004, 118 minutes
Dir. Zhang Yimou
In Mandarin with English subtitles
Rating: [M]
Genres: Foreign Cinema, Action/Adventure / Martial Arts, Fantasy

Feat. Zhang Ziyi, Takeshi Kaneshiro, Andy Lau

Aroview: The dir. of HERO follows up with an equally watchable oriental spectacle, inserting the same cartwheeling martial arts action, complete with torrents of airborne daggers and other missiles, into a epic tale of the Tang dynasty.

Ziyi plays a blind dancer who is abducted by two policemen, Kineshiro and Lau, and tricked into leading them to the lair of a secret assassins cult somewhere in the wilds of remote China. Although the characterisations are rather slight this time round, dir. Yimou is triumphant in airbrushing a bizarrely ornate world of uncanny, colourful beauty, into a near-abstract ballet for the eyes.

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4 stars (Very Good) Another Zhang Yimou film, with a number of the same elements as Hero, but with a more love-oriented storyline and some unique characters (including a blind dancer), and some visual marvels to behold. ~Tom H