Hero

The Story: Forgive me, but I'll have to give you a little historical exposition to explain this story. About 2200 years ago, northern China was divided into six warring kingdoms, including Qin, Yan (present-day Beijing) and Zhao. Qin's king set out to conquer the other five as well as the rest of modern-day China; along the way, he sought to standardize Chinese culture (eliminating non-Qin written language, measurement systems, etc. as a matter of course). Naturally, assassination attempts followed this guy around like starving puppies.

This is where the story starts. A minor county bureaucrat called Nameless comes to the court of Qin with some presents for the king. They are a silver spearhead belonging to an assassin called Sky and swords belonging to two Zhaoian assassins called Flying Snow (whose sword has a white hilt) and Broken Sword (whose sword is, um, broken). Normally, if Nameless got within 100 paces of the king, he would be executed (by who? The throne room's empty, to discourage assassins who want to dress up like guards). However, since Nameless apparently killed the three biggest threats to the king's life, he is allowed to come within 10 paces of the king (I'll just call the king by his Imperial name, Qin Shihuang, from now on).

Nameless explains his story. He killed Sky by catching him at a chess house and running the assassin through with his sword, in full view of some Qin police. Then he went to the capital of Zhao where Flying Snow and Broken Sword worked at a calligraphy school, posing as a peasant from the provinces (arrrgh, awkward alliteration!) who had a special request from his dying father. His "father" wanted him to get a calligraphy master to write "sword".

It's explained that Broken Sword used his calligraphy experience to learn swordmanship; there were nineteen ways to write "sword" at the time, so asking him to find a twentieth way to write "sword" would give Nameless valuable insights into BS' swordmanship style (this is where Qin Shihuang gets creepy and decries the waste of having to deal with so many different cultures and declares his life's mission to standardize the culture of the region, otherwise known as ethnic cleansing). Also, BS and FS were lovers once, but Sky had an affair with FS and now the two hate each other. Nameless uses this to divide and conquer, telling both of them that he killed Sky, that Sky cared only about FS and that he could give a [unwrite] about BS. Nameless tells them that if they want to find him, they know where to look (the camp of the invading Qin soldiers, who shot up the city with arrows earlier in the day).

BS, out of jealousy, taps his servant Moon's ass and yells at FS that he knew she was watching and that he wanted her to see it. This makes FS angry, so she shanks BS in the back. After killing Moon, who wants to avenge her master, she runs to the Qin camp, where she gets stabbed to death by Nameless. The end?

No, in fact not. Qin Shihuang basically tells Nameless that he knows Nameless is bull[unwrite]ting him for two reasons. One, he met BS and FS three years before when they managed to fight their way through his 3000 elite guards and he thought that they were way too professional to be unfaithful to each other. He doubts that they even knew Sky and says that he's pretty sure that Nameless and Sky had a gentleman's agreement whereby Nameless would kill Sky in front of Qin police for a chance to get at Qin. The candles in front of his throne are disturbed by Nameless' evil intentions, so he can guess that Nameless is in fact an assassin.

It turns out that Nameless was a war orphan from Zhao who was adopted by a Qinese family. Ten years ago, he found out who he was and concentrated on a martial art that would let him be able to kill people 10 paces away from him. Nameless fesses up and says that he wanted to kill Qin Shihuang for a long time and that he had a skill whereby he could stab people in certain places and only appear to kill them. Thereby he could fight Sky and FS and only appear to kill them in front of witnesses.

However, BS doesn't want Qin Shihuang to die because of an insight from his calligraphy and he has to fight Nameless. Nameless ends up being swayed by BS's reasoning (killing Qin now would just cause more war between the kingdoms and the people would suffer even more) and doesn't kill Qin Shihuang (I would have, just because that prick would have killed my family and destroyed my country). The film ends with Nameless being shot by 2000 arrows and given a hero's burial, after which Qin Shihuang builds the Great Wall.

I liked the photography which used color in interesting ways (when people were pissed, for example, everybody wore red). I also thought the fight sequences were pretty cool (except when it was clear that the fights on the screen were just two people imagining fighting each other). As well, the battle sequences, particularly when the Qin soldiers shoot arrows into Zhao city, are awesome. And yes, Maggie Cheung and Zhang Ziyi are fricking hot.

As for the other things, well, I have some issues. First of all, Zhang Yimou has made what appears to be a somewhat pro-Communist movie what with its central message of "Rebelling against authority is bad, since that will cause problems for the country" (which is ironic because his previous films have been banned within China). The second half of the movie makes Qin Shihuang out to be not such a bad guy, really. This is disturbing, given that he was engaging in ethnic cleansing in the name of cultural efficiency. Of course, this was the standard historical treatment of the guy, written by his usurpers in the Han dynasty, so it's highly possible that I am operating from faulty premises on this one. Still, he did wall up people alive in the Great Wall in the hopes that their spirits would strengthen it (I think other dynasties did that as well). Finally, in the words of my American friend who saw this with me in Taichung (thir

Jet Li was Nameless. Donnie Yen (for the 20 minutes that he was in the movie) was Sky. You might remember him from Iron Monkey or Blade II. He really looks a lot like Lou Diamond Phillips with his hair long. Maggie Cheung was Flying Snow. She was in The Heroic Trio as Mercy. Tony Leung was Broken Sword. Zhang Ziyi was Moon. According to the IMDB, she's a spokesmodel for about 20 different companies spokes model (yowza, I can see why; God, I'm such a sexist pig). I don't need to tell anybody what movie she was in, do I? Finally, Zhen Daoming was Qin Shihuang.

Best Lines

"Tian Xia (All under Heaven)". The calligraphy quote that BS uses to convince Nameless not to kill Qin Shihuang.

"Everything my master does has a good reason". Moon trying to convince Nameless to read the calligraphy quote BS has written in the sand. I would have added, "Frigg, man! The [unwrite]ing sand's blowing away. Don't just stand there looking at my tits, read the damn thing!"

Are You Kidding Me?

1). When Sky and Nameless fight, they stop for a while and visualize fighting each other. Now if I were a Qin cop, I would have made a move then and there. But they just stand there like slack-jawed yokels, which is understandable because Sky earlier kicked their asses. But what is not understandable is why they stopped fighting him after he humiliated them. I'm not Chinese, but it seems to me that being humiliated is the only time to kick ass. I mean, sure their swords are bent, but if they rushed him all at once, they could probably take him.

2). Now I know that using my twenty-first century morality to analyze Qin Shihuang's actions is a fool's game. But come on. Even by the standards of the day, he was demonized for being a paranoid jerk (he burnt the scholars in his court alive). And did I mention that the only resistance Zhao seemed to offer was a calligraphy school? Charming man. But he's really a good guy because he united China or something. Funk dat, as our esteemed host would say.

3). I know it's your trademark, Broken Sword, but could you perhaps fix your damn sword? I mean, if you're such an unholy ass-kicker right now, imagine how tough you would be with a working sword (the blade's snapped in half). Even that procrastinator Aragorn fixed his after a few thousand years.

4). For such a powerful monarch, Qin Shihuang sure has some [unwrite]ty security procedures. For example, no guards in the throneroom. Also, his patented Evil-Detectin' Candles are probably too close to him to be of much use.

5). The head of the Zhaoian calligraphy school forces his students to study calligraphy in the midst of heavy arrow fire because they will learn what Zhao's culture is all about that way. "But sir, if we get arrows in our heads, there will be no Zhaoian culture! Why can't we learn this elsewhere?" "Uh . . . shut up, that's why!"

Sex/Nudity

No titties, unfortunately, but Broken Sword and Moon do get it on, as mentioned above.

Huh?

I still don't understand why Nameless didn't kill the guy who destroyed his family and country. I mean, obviously, it's a good thing to avoid violent revolution, but isn't anyone better suited to running China than Qin Shihuang?

When BS and FS lay siege to Qin's palace, it's covered in green. Wouldn't it be more suitable to have heavy yellow drapes as opposed to green, since yellow was the Imperial color? Or is that a later innovation?

After the assassination attempt and fight with Qin, BS realizes the error of his ways and stands still in contemplation. With Qin Shihuang still in the throne room, mind you. You can probably guess what I would do if I were Qin Shihuang.

When the Qin archers lay siege to Zhao City, some of them sit down on the ground and use their feet to pull the bowstrings back. Would that practice have been actually used in Qin Shihuang's army? Perhaps you can E-mail Dante about that.

The Final Judgment

This movie appears to a collage of CTHD's kung fu, LOTR-style battle sequences and Communist propaganda. I'm giving 3 devil heads for the good stuff, but subtracting one for the whole Communist propaganda thing. However, I'm also adding one devil head for the hotness-of-Maggie-Cheung-and-Zhang-Ziyi factor, for a total of three devil heads.

*I'm using mainland-style pinyin Romanization instead of Wade-Giles for reasons of personal preference (forgive me, but to my admittedly non-Chinese eyes, pinyin just looks nicer), except for the names of some of the actors who were born in Hong Kong/Guangdong province and thus use Wade-Giles Romanization to spell their names.