The Grandmaster

When I first started this blog nearly a year ago, my very first post was in reference to really wanting to see this movie.  Wong Kar Wai fans are no strangers to extensively waiting on his cinematic masterpieces to finally emerge and in reference to my last post of feeling very confident in that assertion, I found out that I wasn't wrong.  Where to even begin here is the only real dilemma I have.  First off, a biopic about the life of Bruce Lee's Master from a director known more for his artsy melodramatic films, is a challenging enough prospect.  Adding to that are the other recent and competing series of movies about Yip Man, including the successful Ip Man films of Donnie Yen.  Well, The Grandmaster is all that and then some.  Wong Kar Wai fans should love it, as it is on par or better with the best of his other films.  It is a visual masterpiece in cinematographer Philippe Le Sourd with an equally impressive soundtrack in the recurring collaboration of composer Shigeru Umebayashi of In The Mood For Love fame. The tale of Yip Man's life as viewed in a series of dramatic flashbacks is powerful, albeit I concede, sometimes at the expense of being confusing and getting far away from the prime character (more on that to follow).  Also, there are so many parallels and references to Kar Wai's other films, that at times, it was deja-vu like; especially in the melancholic longing and regret relationship of Tony Leung and Zhang Ziyi's characters already prevalently seen in Kar Wai's  2046.  I'm obviously a bit too biased in favor of Kar Wai films, but I suppose that too much Kar Wai heavy handedness could be a turn off to the average person wanting to just see a typical martial arts movie.  But I would argue that The Grandmaster is more than just a martial arts film or even a  more truer martial arts film than most.  Martial arts is simultaneously a backdrop to the story and the most important point to the narrative. In making this movie, what I really appreciate more than just the aforementioned characteristic style of a Kar Wai movie, is how as the writer he really did the historical research and stayed true to the deeper themes of the martial arts.  That tumultuous time period in the early part of the 20th century in Chinese history caused a lot of shifts that affected the martial arts in permanent ways.  The rivalry of martial artist in the north and south or the battle of internal and external arts, is not always shown so effectively.  That was the "golden age" of Chinese martial arts, prior to changes in the government suppressing and eliminating them.  For me personally, that was indeed one of the best things about watching The Grandmaster.  That authentic look and feel of the period so well displayed with all it's martial diversities being shaken around by the chaotic historical realities of the time, was brewing with martial art stories.  Not many martial art films can authentically showcase a comparatively simple southern style like Wing Chun against more sophisticated, internal styles like Bagua or Hsing-I to help impart the worthy trait of Yip Man.  Sure, the Ip Man movies may have had the martial expertise of  Donnie Yen and choreographer Sammo Hung.  But the extensive training of actor Tony Leung, the always masterful choreography of Yuen Woo-Ping, the cinematography of Le Sourd, and the well invested research of Kar Wai make The Grandmaster more than distinct enough on its own in stylistic aesthetics and authenticity.  Where else could you find such a symbolically relevant and awesome display of Zhan Ziyi's character displaying the bagua circle walk in a northern snowfield?  The texture and atmosphere of all the settings from the rain soaked streets of Foshan to the seedy glamour of the Golden Pavilion, is just as rich as the dialogue throughout. Kar Wai is great at summarizing key parts of the story beautifully through these wonderfully constructed montages of artistic images, subtley framed gestures, and music to emote the passage of events in time. It should also be noted that this movie, arguably for better or worse, does not exclusively celebrate the life of Yip Man.  Kar Wai seems to go out of his way whether intentional or not to pay equal homage to all the old school martial arts masters of that era.  Perhaps, that's also why the movie falls under the title of The Grandmasters. I certainly don't fault him for that, as it could be argued that the film is only guilty of being overly zealous in the themes of higher martial arts.  As I mentioned before, other films have captured moments of authentic martial arts in theme, historical meaning, and display as well, but relatively few martial art films come close to the overall cinematic density that is The Grandmaster.  A Kar Wai film to it's credit usually demands repeated viewings to really see the rich tapestry that is woven throughout and this one is no different.  After reading that the original cut was nearly 4 hours long, I only wish that a longer cut was available instead of being edited down to 120 and 130 minute versions.  After purchasing the Chinese dvd, it looks like I'll still need to view the Weinstein edition whenever it drops, which will more than likely have a richer picture quality, a behind the scenes feature or two, and a more accurate subtitle translation.  With that in brief being said, The Grandmaster(s) is indeed grand.

In Anticipation of "The Grandmaster"

One thing about director Wong Kar Wai, is that he makes you wait and wait as he delays and delays his brilliantly poetic films.  Well, the wait is over, as I just had to order my dvd copy of The Grandmaster yesterday, as soon as I knew it was available.  Harvey Weinstein and his American distribution will take their time about releasing it directly in the States and may do some unnecessary choppy chop on this art piece.  I say "art piece" with great confidence, not just because I'm a huge fan of China's equivalent to the team Scorsese and Deniro in director  Kar Wai and lead actor Tony Leung, but because the trailer variations and opening 30 minutes that I couldn't help but take a peak at online, are instant marvels of cinematography on par with classic visual martial art works of art like Kar Wai's classic Ashes of Time and nodding to Zhang Yimou's  Hero.  In addition, the higher internal level and historical elements of the various southern and northern martial, seemed to be justly represented and explored; which to me is exquisitely interesting in any martial arts film.

In the meantime, check out Tony Leung who's been training for the role since 2007 in this clip.

Silver Linings Playbook

This was an awesome and compelling movie with a great cast. Bradley Cooper was very good and Jennifer Lawrence was outstanding, especially considering how young she is.  It's a film about mental illness told with great warmth, humor, and humanity.  More importantly for me, it's a film that really speaks about the restorative power of love for those struggling with it.  

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey is Peter Jackson's first in a series of  three part prequels to the LOR movies.  Of course there are a lot of expectations to this film and for the most part, it is delivered.  In addition to having a great director, an excellent story, cinematography, and a talented cast in newcomers Martin Freeman and Richard Armistice,  viewing the beautiful and scenic backdrop of New Zealand alone, is worth the nearly three hour running time. So let me get to the main detractors.  If anything, it takes a while to get the story really going, which is understandable considering the LOR sequels were/are very much, the successful shadows to resurrecting its orgin story.  Once it does get going though, Jackson is obviously back at the helm in brilliantly moving the adventure along to a point where it becomes rather hard to distinguish this earlier adventure from being mistaken for just another LOR film.  Another similar point I would makes, though not as strongly, would be that the main ensemble of characters especially the protagonist were slightly lacking in the kind of diverse cohesion that successfully help drive the plots of the LOR series.   So my main criticism would be that despite or because of the nearly predictable nature of this film, that simultaneously helps in audience familiarity (though I grew up watching the Hobbit as a kid) and hurts in so far as originality; what ends up suffering the most is the overall momentum slightly lagging to take the audience to the second film.  However, all in all, this was the start of a great movie trilogy that generally only and perhaps unfairly suffers from ironically being judged by it's already successful sequel in LOR.  Nonetheless, Peter Jackson has done it again in carefully covering the main bases and holding to the integrity of the story. 

Broken City

It was very refreshing to see an old-fashioned, film-noir crime drama done solidly.   That about summarizes what I can say about this movie, which may have not done as great at the box office but is certainly in my eyes, a sleeper hit.  Mark Wahlberg stars as an ex-cop turned private investigator entangled up in the politics of New York's mayor, played by Russel Crowe.  Rounding out the excellent cast of this thriller are Catherine Zeta Jones, Jeffrey Wright, and Barry Peppers.  Broken City is certainly a well done updated homage to the great film noir of the 40's and 50's detective-crime dramas.  Seeing this movie, reminded me so much of those movies that I loved and grew up on, which had that good snappy dialogue, great twist and turns, and great characters of duality inhabiting a seedy urban city.  Mark Wahlberg may not be Humphrey Bogart, but he fits the bill of the flawed everyman just as well as his co-stars fit in to their parts.  The ode to that genre is further balanced by a modern day relevant plot and character driven complications as diverse as redemption, love, and power.  In fact, it's all the more amazing for director Allen Payne and his production team along with the amount of talent and star power in this film, that they don't erode the stylistic integrity of film-noir and the straight-no chaser attribute that it comes with, by easily  deviating or exploiting into one of the usual Hollywood formulas that tend to weaken the story or make it just a star vehicle.  It's just very good shared film-making from all aspects. 

Dragon/Wu Xia

Dragon/Wu Xia, despite the very generic title, is one of the freshest and most unique of martial art films I've seen in quite a while.  Notably, because it fuses the detective/mystery genre with the martial arts, using a nice sort of modern day CSI type of special effects infused storytelling.  In equal measure of the film's effectiveness, Donnie Yen as the outlaw killer turned simple country papermaker, brings actual real heartfelt acting without his usual pretension, for an even  more progressive change that he quite effectively capitalized on in the Ip Man movies recently, that is quite on equal par with Takeshi  Kaneshiro's performance of the detective in pursuit of him.   Add to that, a great charismatic performance by martial arts legion Jimmy Wang (The One Armed Swordsman and The Chinese Boxer) and actress Tang Wei (Lust, Caution).  Wu Xia is a beautifully shot movie in the tradition of A History Of Violence, that doesn't disappoint and is very engaging with layers of intrigue, mystery, and depth. It's a very nice and almost seemless blending of art and action.  I reiterate the great performance of Yen and I think that is easily his best and most mature in acting I've seen to date. This movie more than lived up to the hype and easily should be a great sleeper, unfortunately only suffering from the lack of promotional exposure that it justly deserves. 

Iron Man 3

I was pretty eager to see this movie, as most people would expect after a successful run and buildup culminating with The Avengers.  It's was good and decent enough, but I think without giving too much of the plot away, falls a bit short of my own expectations.  This time around, we're taking a closer look at the flaws and vulnerabilities of Tony Stark in the aftermath of his most challenging life altering experience with The Avengers and going back into Stark's past to see the origins of his current villain - The Mandarin.  It's a challenging and logical premise that is very relevant to all that went on in the previous movies with his character while simultaneously speaking to the ways in which warfare/terrorism, the military industrial complex, and the media are all used.  So in this juncture, I think it inevitably loses much of the steam throughout at least half the film.  Flashbacks to the past are done throughout to help explain the storyline and witness the arc of Stark's character evolving and re-inventing himself in the face of mortality and guilt.  How is all that done while defeating the bad guys and pulling out all the obligatory coolness of all that is Iron Man? Well, rather good by Downey of course, and somewhat and understandably mediocre by director Shane Black.  This Iron Man does very well at examining itself and I found it similar in many ways to the movie Watchmen, which I also liked.  Indeed at this point in the franchise, it seems rather obligatory especially when you look at the inward character journeys in other movies like Spiderman 3 or The Dark Knight Rises.  Ok, so juxtapose that with the other half of Stark pulling out all the very cool upgrades to his suit in fighting a let's just say, shadowy enemy who falls somewhat short of being really interesting or that intriguing.  The Iron Man soup we usually order hasn't exactly marinated long enough to absorb all the flavors well this time around.  If it sounds like I hated this movie, far from it.  I just know it could have been done better with less going on in the story, because it seemed to divide the movie into too many pieces of an ambitious pie, at the expense of an even enough momentum and urgency that is usually customary in propelling the audience to the next part of the marvel story.  Spoiler alert - instead, I waited for all the long ass credits to roll through, only to find Dr. Bruce Banner falling asleep on Stark's narrative.  I found that pretty telling indeed.