REVIEW: ‘Hero’ (2002)

9/10 – The King of Qin, soon to be China’s first Emperor is threatened by three assassins. Nameless (Jet Li), a master swordsman is chosen to stop them, but conflicting accounts of how he does so paints a different picture.

The most talked about Chinese martial arts film of 2002 and 2003 is Zhang Yimou’s Hero. It presents a bold visual statement with stunning photography from Christopher Doyle, vivid art direction, and meticulously staged swordplay that possesses more dazzling, theatrical dance than screen combat. The story is seductively simple yet peels away in colorful layers of complex tapestries woven by the threads of trust, revenge, and ultimately sacrifices.

The story begins with Jet Li recounting to the King how he defeated the three assassins as played by Donnie Yen, Tony Leung, and Maggie Cheung. The events that lead to Li sitting before the King are actually recounted three seperate times, with the circumstances changing depending on whether Li or Chen Daoming, who plays the King, is speaking. The film’s success depends on Yimou’s ability to reveal new aspects of the characters and plot without being repetitive. He does so with great skill and gives us the chance to see fights between the lead characters unfold with different outcomes. In a couple of cases, the fights depicted never even take place. One particularly stunning confrontation between Leung and Li takes place on the surface of a placid lake with each combatant thrusting his sword tip into the water to propel his body into the air again. What is really happening is that the characters are fighting in their heads, a representation of the psychological war two warriors engage in that may determine the fate of a battle before it even begins.

When it comes to the film’s combat scenes, veteran action director Ching Siu-tung delivers fine wirework that emphasizes flowery movements. He is well-suited for this style of combat with classics like Duel to the Death (1983) and Dragon Inn (1992) on his resume. The more esoteric internal arts are depicted and those who enjoyed Yuen Wo-ping’s The Tai Chi Master will appreciate the scene where Maggie Cheung kicks up a storm of leaves against Zhang Ziyi. The flashbacks, both real and imagined allow for match-ups between just about everyone including the Emperor, but the stunning encounter between Jet Li and Donnie Yen is the film’s first and finest. These two wushu experts are perfectly matched and have never been as beautifully filmed doing what they do best. This fight does not represent the best of their careers in terms of movement or form, but the scene is so crisp and clear in its execution, that one cannot but be in awe of the spectacle.

Hero is Zhang Yimou’s first foray into the martial arts genre, it having been a project he had loosely conceived of well before Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon made martial arts film a legitimate modern art form. Like Japanese film legend Akira Kurosawa, Yimou has an artist’s eye for the screen and treats it as his canvas. Few filmmakers have taken this more literally. The film’s single greatest asset is the rich and wonderful imagery where entire sets, costumes, and even horses are coated in color. (Many of the soldiers’ horses had to be painted black to match their armor.) For spectacle and epic proportion, nothing looms larger than the massive army assembled, all clad in black. Their training is such that they move as a single entity and when they loose a storm of arrows on two different occasions, the sight is extreme. In fact, Yimou goes overboard here when hundreds of bowmen expend thousands of arrows in order to kill a few people in scenes reminiscent of Kurosawa’s famous finale to Throne of Blood. Another extreme scene has Maggie and Tony wading through the mass of men as they storm the King’s fortress, leaving a long trail of dead behind them.

Hero is the sort of film that could be easily misinterpreted. The king’s “hero” defending his lord against three assassins sounds like the plot of a bloody Cheh Chang actioner from Shaw Brothers’ heyday. The swordplay may be just as fanciful, if significantly more artistic, but the jaw-dropping wirework mixed with minor CGI enhancements does not define the film. Like Wong Kar-wai’s equally poetic, if more confusing Ashes of Time, what drives this film are the complexities of its characters who struggle with their own passions. The film depicts the King as an idealist, when many Chinese historians will tell you the real King of Qin who became China’s first Emperor, was very much a tyrant responsible for many deaths. This could lead to concerns over the film’s apparent pro-Communist message that sacrificing your life and more importantly, your ideals for a government that only purportedly represents the people is noble. I can see why the Chinese government may have given Yimou their blessing, but the film could also be looked at from another angle. On a personal level apart from historical context, Hero contains no real villains and the only antagonistic factor is the desire for revenge on the part of the assassins. Yet, a case could be made that the ideal swordsman who upheld justice would do what’s right for the majority and not to satisfy his or her own desire for blood. In this case, where this fictionalized King of Qin was a leader who had the interests of the people in mind, perhaps this action really is noble.

Successive viewings of Hero are recommended. It’s not the greatest martial arts film, but it brings so much to the table in terms of visual flair, plus any chance to see Yen versus Li is worth it. The narrative is presented in a thought provoking manner and fine acting by everyone is welcome. This is especially true for Jet Li who returns to the stoic, intense persona within a historical period that made him a star in Hong Kong. Tan Dun’s musical score is not quite as distinctive as his work on Crouching Tiger, but is nevertheless an effective and sometimes haunting accompaniment. As cinematic art, Zhang Yimou has outdone himself in what I daresay is the best looking martial arts film ever and one of the most resplendent productions period.

Related Topics: Ching Siu-Tung, Hero (2002), Jet Li, Maggie Cheung, swordplay, Wuxia, Zhang Yimou