RETRO REVIEW: "CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON"

In two words: Martial Artistry.

Looking back six years, soon to be seven, from this point, one can still say director Ang Lee is a world class auteur who isn’t afraid to take a chance.

Before helming "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon," Lee worked on a variety of projects from the Taiwanese family dramas "The Wedding Banquet" and "Eat Drink Man Woman" to the slice of '70s Americana "The Ice Storm" and the Jane Austen adaptation "Sense and Sensibility." More recent credits include a film adaptation of everyone’s fave raging green monster comic hero, "The Hulk," and "Brokeback Mountain’s" romance between two cowboys in ‘60s God-fearing Texas. Director Ang Lee appeared an unlikely person to direct a kung fu flick; such a film seems beneath him.

As it turns out, Lee is not only a lifelong fan of the genre, his greatest filmmaking goal was to make a lavish martial arts epic.

Director Ang Lee: "The film is a kind of a dream of China, a China that probably never existed, except in my boyhood fantasies in Taiwan. Of course my childhood imagination was mainly fired by the martial arts movies I grew up with and by the novels of romance and derring-do I read instead of doing my homework. That these two kinds of dreaming should come together now, in a film I was able to make in China, is a happy irony for me."

Watching "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon," it's clear that all of Lee's work has been a mere warm-up to this staggering accomplishment. "Crouching Tiger" is even more than an exhilarating reinvigoration of the martial arts movie--it's a thrilling testament to the transporting power of film.

Note the term "reinvigoration" as opposed to "reinvention," for in keeping with being a reverential fan, Lee doesn't tamper with time-worn convention in adapting Wang Du Lu's 18th Century Qing dynasty-set novel (the fourth in a series of five). Basic plot strands ring familiar. After many years of legend-building combat, famous and feared warrior Li Mu Bai (Chow Yun-Fat) is ready to give up his violent ways--that is, after completing one last mission: avenging the murder of his master at the hands of the notorious criminal known as Jade Fox (Cheng Pei Pei). But Li is ready to make one major gesture toward a different life, and that is giving up his fabled sword, the Green Destiny. He asks his longtime friend and swordswoman ally Yu Shu Lien (Michelle Yeoh) to give the sword to their mutual benefactor, Sir Te (Lung Sihung), for safekeeping. When she does, Shu Lien meets the young lady Jiao Long Yu, or Jen (Zhang Ziyi), who expresses her fascination with the sword. Soon after it is placed in Sir Te’s trophy case, the Green Destiny is stolen, Mu Bai and Shu Lien leap into a quest to recover the sword, which is the mere jumping-off point for a sweeping tale of action, intrigue, and romance.

In "Crouching Tiger," that motion has its own poetry, for these semi-gods and demi-devils possess a buoyancy to match their gravity. The film's first action scene, with Shu Lien chasing the sword's thief (who, we soon learn, is Jen), sets the tone and the rules. The two fight hand-to-hand and foot-to-foot. Jen suddenly floats up, as if on the helium of her young arrogance, and canters up and down the courtyard walls as if they were velvet carpets, with Shu Lien in urgent pursuit.

The script by James Schamus, Wang Huiling and Tsai Kuojung unfolds like a comic book, with the characters and their circumstances being painted using wide brush stokes. Lee’s protagonists are bigger than life and their quest is the kind of epic endeavor that pits good against evil, with an innocent caught in between. Yet, despite the film's grandiose feel, there are enough intimate moments for us to get to know the characters. One of the primary elements of "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" is the way it contrasts Shu Lien with Jen. Each is a prisoner of her lifestyle, yearning for what the other has. Shu Lien, a warrior and wanderer all her life, would like nothing more than to settle down and end her loneliness. Jen, the pampered daughter of a powerful official, craves the freedom that she believes comes with Shu Lien's single status.

One of the film's most noteworthy elements was the first-ever screen pairing of two of Hong Kong cinema's biggest stars, Yeoh and Chow. Surprisingly, these icons actually take secondary positions to beautiful young newcomer Zhang Ziyi. As Jen, the seemingly innocent and innocuous daughter of prominent political figure Governor Yu (Li Fa Zeng), Zhang is a real find, holding her own in all aspects and carrying the picture with ease once the focus settles squarely on her. The conflicting forces battling for influence over Jen's soul is "Crouching Tiger's" main concern, and without an actress as gifted and captivating as Zhang in the pivotal role, it's difficult to imagine the story being quite as involving as it is.

But there's no denying the enormous contribution Yeoh and Chow make to the film. The two formed a dynamic duo, even displaying sides of their ability that they've never had an opportunity to reveal before. The ever-charismatic and commanding Chow (the T'ang emperor in the upcoming "Curse of the Golden Flower"), making his bow in this type of action film, proves to be as natural with a sword as he is with a gun (his usual cinematic weapon of choice); but his stunts aren't as heavy duty as those of Yeoh, who is given ample opportunity to show off and even elevate her well-established athleticism and grace in the spectacular fights staged by the renowned martial arts choreographer Yuen Wo-Ping ("Fist of Legend," "Matrix," and "Hero"). But the two are even more impressive in the dramatic scenes. They have a nicely understated chemistry that lends heartrending pathos to their characters' relationship. Li and Shu Lien have long been in love, but they've denied their passion in honor of the memory of Shu Lien's late fiancé, a brother by oath to Li. Their tortured longing is subtly, wrenchingly conveyed in Yeoh and Chow's vividly expressive eyes.

When production first kicked off, the film seemed cursed, though.

"We started shooting in the Gobi Desert," said Ang Lee. "That night the crew got lost in the desert until 7 a.m. We finally got going, and after the second shot, a sandstorm came in." Could things get worse?

"The Gobi is the hottest, dryest place on earth," said producer Bill Kong. "So each morning we lit incense for good luck. Well, we had dreadful luck--it rained sheets, nonstop, ruining our schedule. After a while one of the local people came around and said the gods must be smiling on us. We asked why. 'Because you burned the incense,' he said. 'We burn the incense when we want it to rain.'"

With good or bad luck, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon offered a rough challenge to say the least. A few difficulties were: a $15 million action movie that was also to be a poignant, tragic romance; a fight choreographer, Yuen Wo-ping, who had won international acclaim for his work on "The Matrix" and was bound to clash with the soft-spoken, hard-to-budge Lee; a top-flight all-Asian cast featuring Chow Yun Fat (Hong Kong), Michelle Yeoh (Malaysia), Zhang Ziyi (Beijing) and Chang Chen (Taiwan). Only one of the stars--Zhang, then a 19-year-old ingenue--spoke anything like the classical mainland Mandarin that Lee demanded. On top of these speed bumps, Yeoh injured her knee and needed a month's rehab in the U.S. and the whole ordeal was pretty damned exhausting by all accounts.

"We shot around the clock with two teams," says Lee. "I didn't take one break in eight months, not even for half a day. I was miserable--I just didn't have the extra energy to be happy. Near the end, I could hardly breathe. I thought I was about to have a stroke."

As one sage (whose name I forget) said, "Dying is easy, filmmaking is hard."

But through his agony Lee produced exactly what he hoped to create--a blending of Eastern physical dexterity and Western storytelling and intensity of performance. High art meets high spirits on the trampoline of an elaborate plot. "Crouching Tiger" is contemplative, and it kicks ass.

"Crouching Tiger" combines incredible action sequences with elements of romantic melodrama and superhero derring-do, as visually stunning as it is inventive like no other Chinese period film before or since. It has a reserved slot on many critics' Top Ten lists and made a splash both at the US box office and when the 2000 Academy Award nominations were announced. Paradoxically, the film hasn’t been as well received in China and the rest of the Far East as the slew of imitators it spawned in following years. More on that later.

The film's hallmark is its standout action sequences, of which there are five or six, depending on how you count. All of them are eye-popping and spectacularly choreographed by Yuen with special effects being used to enhance the natural athleticism of the participants. The best of these sequences is Shu Lien’s jaw dropping rooftop chase of Jen from one side of Beijing to the other, using a Peter Pan-like ability to almost fly. It's beautifully filmed, perfectly composed, and thrilling from start to finish. Another segment worth mentioning is a battle in the treetops, where Mu Bai and Jen leap from branch to branch as they do battle. These sequences are the kind of action that haven’t been equaled before or since--even by Yuen.

Lee and cinematographer Peter Pau make "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" a stunning visual experience even when the action is static. From a glorious matte shot of ancient Beijing to the verdant splendor of the surrounding forest to the majesty of Wudan Mountain, the film never ceases to dazzle our eyes and arrest our attention. Tan Dun's gentle, occasionally haunting score provides the perfect musical backdrop for the story, never calling undue attention to itself.

Lee is a visionary and a perfectionist; he demands more than his colleagues can freely give. For the dapper, amiable Chow the experience was often "awful. The first day I had to do 28 takes just because of the language. That's never happened before in my life."

Lee drove Yeoh, whose family's language is English, nearly to tears with his insistence on precise speech. But the beautiful action star thinks it was worth the trouble. "I've been waiting 15 years to work with this guy," she says. "He's gentle and very emotional. During a sad scene at the end of the film, he kept telling me to do different things, and when he'd come over I'd see he was red-eyed, teary. He gets so completely involved. And when he says, 'Good take' after a shot, he really means it."

For all its pan-Asian star power, "Crouching Tiger" depends on Zhang, in only her second film at the time. The actress says she labored under "a pressure not to disappoint the director. I felt I was a mouse and Ang Lee a lion." When first seen, Jen seems lovely but unformed, a dreamy adventuress, a spoiled rich girl with a skill to match her will. Gradually, though, Jen (or, rather, Zhang) reveals a more toxic, intoxicating beauty. Will she become a fearless heroine or a ferocious killer? Zhang, surely, is guilty of one crime: she steals the film. "She allows the audience to pour themselves into her imagination," Lee says. "It's not really her in the movie, it's you. That's beyond acting. It's cinematic charisma."

Before shooting, Zhang and her desert outlaw paramour Chang (Lo in the film) worked with an acting coach. Chow and Yeoh crammed to speak Mandarin. And throughout, Lee was learning the limitations in the laws of stunt physics from the martial master Yuen. Movies are an education on the fly, with pop quizzes every moment. How apt, then, that the theme of "Crouching Tiger" should be teaching. In this war of the generations, the adults are as eager to instruct the young as the kids are to rebel against authority. In life as in martial arts, knowledge is power. And only the most powerful, like Chow's Mu Bai, can share it. He hopes to share it with Jen. Teaching this bright, willful girl is as close as he will come to fatherhood--even if the job carries fatal risks.

In addition to paying careful attention to Chinese legends and metaphysical beliefs, Lee has injected many other elements into "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon." He presents the martial arts sequences with a degree of reverence that does not call to mind the chopsocky campiness the average viewer might associate with the genre. This is not Bruce Lee or Jackie Chan; it's something entirely different and, in its own way, more wonderful. Lee also draws upon the work of other filmmakers like John Ford and Akira Kurosawa in putting the finishing touches on the film.

The movie hearkens to Asian action movies of around 30 years ago. It mirrors famous fight scenes from two films by the action master King Hu: "Come Drink with Me," in which the young, fierce Cheng Peipei defeats an inn full of martial studs, and "A Touch of Zen," with two knights doing battle in a grove of bamboo trees. Lee had the inspired--or crackpot--idea of staging the fight between Mu Bai and Jen on the trees' branches, 60 ft. in the air.

"I'd fantasized about this since boyhood," Lee says, "but a lot of my ideas weren't feasible or didn't look good. Nobody, including Yuen, wanted to do the tree scene, for a simple reason: it's almost impossible. The first three days of shooting were a complete waste. There were 20 or 30 guys below the actors trying to make them float. It was just chaotic." Finally it worked--a scene so buoyant that the audience soars along with the stars.

Humor plays as important a part as the romance and adventure. Lee includes secondary characters for comic relief. The story is serious, but the film has a healthy, self-aware sense of humor about itself, best shown by the parallel romance between Jen and Lo. The circumstances behind their meeting are wholly comic; she chases after him for an insane distance after he steals... her comb. The light touch is beguiling and completely convincing, befitting the playfulness of a young, impetuous love.

One rock ‘em, sock ‘em smack down takes place in a teahouse (the ancient Chinese equivalent of an old Western bar). Newly run off from her husband and reveling in her freedom, Jen talks trash to a whole troop of kung fu masters come to ask for a friendly match and brings the place crashing down on them in a battle where the laughs cone as fast as the punches and weapon strikes. Lee is constantly winking at the audience, reminding viewers not to take anything too seriously.

Though the film ends in a question mark instead of a period, there's hardly a criticism to make. Paced with the rich flavor and patience of maple syrup, this tiger/dragon drama takes flight during intermittent scuffles--therein lies the real magic.

If the movie has one weakness, though, it may be its dialogue, or, more accurately, the delivery of the dialogue. This was the gripe that many Chinese viewers had with it: except for Zhang Ziyi, the accents of the non-Mandarin speaking principal actors are less than authentic, putting it politely. In America, the dialogue suffers from an unfortunate translation problem. The lines are meant to be spoken in a kind of classic way, with little or no modern slang. Sadly, these lines translate to such trite statements like, "I have not yet avenged my master." It seems corny, and weakens the film's impact.

Fortunately, the movie transcends dialogue. Also, as I understand it, many Chinese don’t understand heroes who break the rules and rebel against authority. They tend to favor stories that uphold familial piety and Chinese nationalism. Themes that the film apparently didn’t focus on enough for Chinese viewers when we see that subsequent epic martial arts films grossed higher in the Far East than did "Crouching Tiger."

In my opinion, "Crouching Tiger" is a hybrid that goes beyond its mold. It's like a calligraphic scroll and Taoist painting brought to life. The screenplay delivers with several story lines intermingled, all evoking the full spectrum of human emotion. You can feel physically empowered, yet your spirit is seduced by something more subtle. What leaves an impression even more enduring than the spectacular action, breathtaking images, and lovely melodies are the people--their personalities, their emotions, their struggles, the hard lessons that they learn.

Thematically, "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" has a rich underlying foundation. It ruminates on the true nature of freedom and how everyone, regardless of their circumstances, is a prisoner of one sort or another. Of equal importance is the way it balances the timeless equation of love, honor, and sacrifice. It succeeds as a great pulp yarn, a historical drama, an epic love story, a humorous action tale, and a modern feminist fable. "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" has something for everyone.

However much the middle-aged Ang Lee suffered in making this exquisite film, he should take a little pleasure in knowing that he helped realize the young Ang Lee's dream and given the world a mythic tale that soars across cultures.