Introduction

I have been a fan of Yimoh Zhang’s films for some time and I had been chomping at the bit to see Hero, which has sat on the US shelves since 2002.  My wife had a VCD from China that she watched, but as it had no subtitles and I do not speak enough Chinese to matter, I decided to wait till it was finally released in the US.  Don’t pay any attention to the Quentin Tarantino presents or producer moniker for Hero, he has about as much to do with the making of this film as he would, say, Citizen Kane.

For fans of Asian cinema in America Hero was billed as something even better than Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.  There are many similarities to both films but also some significant differences….however both are great in their own rights.

The Plot

The plot revolves around a nameless character who by all initial accounts is a stalwart minor official the Qin.  He has killed three of the greatest enemies of the warlord of Qin, who themselves are the most fearsome assassins in the days before China’s warring factions became China proper.  The nameless one, played by Jet Li, is summoned to see the King of Qin to tell his story and be given a reward. 

Yet gold, prestige and social advancement are not what the nameless one seeks.  Truths, motives and resolution play out in a series of recreations leading up to the visit to the palace.  The story plays itself out from several perspectives of the main plot and then also subplots.  Primarily the viewer is taken through the nameless one’s story, the king’s theory, then the truth.  All bring to focus what the nameless one wants to do and the conflict on what he should do.  Being a hero is sometimes not what you think.

For viewers who like linear stories, Hero might be a bit frustrating.  I personally liked the iterations of the story and how they eventually led to the truth and resolution.  Like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon there are flashback sequences within the flashback sequences.  Unlike the earlier film Hero’s flashbacks are far more pertinent on the larger plot at hand.

Acting/Action/Direction

The quality of acting in Hero is top notch.  Jet Li may not be a great actor of our time, but he did a good job as the stoic swordsman with a cause.  The other notoable actress in the cast that might be recognized by US audiences is Maggie Chung who does a good job not only with some very complex fighting sequences also brings some serious acting to an martial arts movie.  In a very minor role is Zhang Zi Yi, who was also a principal actress in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.  She has been in a number of Yimoh Zhang films now and has definitely increased her acting range.  The delivery of dialog was also well done, though most US audiences probably would not notice the difference as Hero is in Mandarin and is shown with subtitles.  Crouching Tiger by ways of example had very stiff dialog and oddly pronounced as Michelle Yeoh does not speak Mandarin and had to do her lines by route.

Where Hero had superior dialogue and acting, it did not have as good of action sequences.  They were still very well done and entertaining on a broader scale, but they were just a little less awesome than Crouching Tiger.  Some of the fight scenes were a little less smooth on the wire work was the primary difference.  Despite much action and violence there is very little gore in Hero’s action.

Yimoh Zhang is a great director few on this side of the Pacific Ocean have heard of.  That is too bad as Hero perfects many of his trademark styles as seen in previous films.  Zhang has used different visual styles to represent different perspectives in Hero using color and light.  As another example, in Zhang’s earlier film Road Home, he used black and white for current events and color for the past.  It was a stark way of portraying the mood of the perspective and Hero adds several layers of complexity to this style. 

Zhang’s visual style is brilliant and his use of sets, cities and landscapes is impeccable.  The viewer gets the feeling that they are submerged into pre-imperial China.  Where the visuals sometimes broke down in Hero was the use of CGI, particularly for the arrows.  The CGI was a little rough even for 2002 and had a couple more years of technology been applied it might have made a difference.

Final Thoughts

Hero is a Chinese film that applied modern story telling, production values and direction to a classic feeling Chinese tale.   Some American cinema goes might be turned off by the use of subtitles, but I feel a serious film in the original language only enhances its feel and emotion.  After watching a dubbed version of Crouchign Tiger did I come to this conclusion, I had never thought about it before.  There are many Asian films that fall into the action genre that have a repetitive feel to them (e.g. Jacky Chan’s HK films), but Zhang’s direction style in Hero matches up with much of his prior film work as something different and serious.

Yimoh Zhang’s direction is top notch and anyone who enjoyed Hero should watch his other works.  A few good films to start with would be: Shanghai Triad, The Road Home and Raise the Red Lantern.  Hero film has certainly motivated me to seek out the few films of his I have not seen.