Stills from Gao Xixi’s ‘Three Kingdoms’

This is how I learned about The Three Kingdoms, this was taken from the Humane Society website.
The highly publicized drama, The Three Kingdoms, features events which took place 2,000 years ago during a time of bloody conquest and mass slaughter. To reproduce the battlefields where thousands of soldiers and horses engaged in close-range fighting, director Gao Xixi employed a large number of horses in the many combat scenes. Filming of the 150 million yuan ($16 million) series took a heavy physical and mental toll on the horse actors. In a statement published in the Chinese Commercial News, Gao said:


“There were more than 100 battles fought in The Three Kingdoms. In our treatment of the battles, say our use of the horses, all the horses used were imported from New Zealand. Chinese breeds of horses are like donkeys, too small in stature. We bought 50 purebred New Zealand horses and replenished the losses any time we saw the need to do it. In our shooting of the battlefield fights, we sacrificed six horses. Eight horses were mentally traumatized. You know even the horses could not stand the hardship of the production process. You tell me what kind of a battlefield we have produced."¹

The reported treatment of these animals has electrified the Chinese public, and led to widespread condemnation of Gao Xixi and his production.

http://www.hsus.org/hsi/about_us/offices_and_st...

Hopefully this is better than the existing 64 part television series based on the Three Kingdoms that was done in the 90's. It was an intriguing effort, but ultimately a bore.

Image 11 shows exactly the kind of horse tripping stunt (wires attached to horse's legs) which is illegal to attempt in many countries. The British censors would cut such a shot out of a UK release. Stunt horses can be trained to fall safely (and dramaticaly). It's a shame that some filmmakers are still using methods which can result in sending a poor animal to the glue factory.

@ Jude
I don't know why that wire didn't catch my eye. I've been critical of such practices in past Chinese martial arts films that are not too old. But I suppose we have to consider that China is going through the same phase that Hollywood did during the Western craze of the first half of the 20th century when horse tripping was common. I actually think that the Chinese government would be embarrassed of such practices, knowing that it would cause China to lose face internationally.

Mark, when I read the last three sentences, I thought I was mistakenly reading something that I wrote. It echos my sentiments exactly!

This is the film that I have been waiting for because I know it is one of the most treasured historical sagas in Chinese history. 80 episodes--OMG, I just wet myself. FYI, neither RED CLIFF nor THREE KINGDOMS is available from Netflix or Blockbuster.

Because I can't help myself, I just have to turn everybody onto a film that I watched last night--MASTER OF THE FLYING GUILLOTINE (subtitled ONE-ARMED BOXER VS. THE FLYING GUILLOTINE in the opening credits). Also during the opening credits, I noticed that the film was written AND directed by Jimmy Wang Yu and cynical me thought "OK, here we go. Enough with the one-armed fighters and the flying guillotines, Shaw Brothers already produced multiple films with those themes. How could it be any better? Ho-hum." However, what a surprise! Aside from flaky dubbing which kept switching between Mandarin and English (I don't want English dubbing in my foreign films), it was BIG fun to watch and features an awesome Kung-Fu tournament, a blind-monk, a Muy Thai specialist, a Yogi fighter with extendable arms, a Javanese, a whole slew of Chinese fighters, a Japanese fighter named "No-Knife" Yakatana, extensive fighting scenes and the requisite revenge-based theme. The final battle between the One-armed boxer (Yu), the evil Thai, and finally the blind monk (complete with Zatoichi-like wiggling ears) with the flying guillotine (the coolest collapsible flying guillotine that I've seen [made by Totes perhaps?]) was well worth the price of admission all in itself! I didn't know that Jimmy Wang Yu had it in him!

I didn't send the film back to Netflix because I'm going to watch it again tonight (after the wife retires of course) and then watch the special features. Highly recommended!

@ Mo Kraak
I recently agreed to sit through the three-hour season finale of CELEBRITY APPRENTICE in the act of engaging in "quality" family time. This, in addition to being subjected to a parade of reality TV and generic drama advertising during commercial breaks was reminder of why I gave up on television years ago. American TV is a barren wasteland.

Congrats on discovering Wang Yu's best movie. It's not quite as good but you might want to check out RETURN OF THE CHINESE BOXER too.