Red Cliff

I’m actually dying to see this. First off, I just love movies in this genre—and second, Takeshi Kaneshiro is in it. 😍

Anyway, it's definitely on my watchlist for this weekend. I've been seeing nothing but glowing reviews everywhere. Let's gooooo!

I thought the movie was excellent. Maybe I’m just biased because I have a soft spot for Asian cinema, but honestly, when I sat down to watch this, I was expecting something along the lines of *Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon* or maybe *House of Flying Daggers*. You know, those films packed with dramatic slow-motion sequences and really vivid, saturated colors. That wasn't what we got here, but the filmmaking is still masterful. It’s definitely worth a watch...

Matthew Miller38 said:it was such an incredible movie, I am genuinely looking forward to the next entry🤣

but actually, the sequel is already out

A film worth seeing on the big screen. It's good.

Do yourself a favor and steer clear of this movie in every possible way!! Seriously, the entire theater was in total shock yesterday—just people sitting there, staring at the screen, wondering how they could have possibly wasted their hard-earned cash. I heard people whispering things like, "That’s it, I’m never picking a movie again," or just, "Who's going to give me my two and a half hours back?"

The only thing this film actually offers is a collection of painfully retarded, cliché scenes and massive battle sequences so chaotic you can't even tell which character is shooting or who's paying the price. It’s all just pure, unadulterated chaos. Complete nonsense.
I honestly want to send a massive middle finger to that reviewer over at ESPN because I actually recommended this flick to my crew based on her take. Though, looking back, the only logical explanation is that she's clearly missing half a brain. Never, and I mean never, trust a movie just because some self-proclaimed "expert" claims it’s good.
As for John Woo—never again. NEVER!! That script... honestly, you'd be better off performing amateur surgery on yourself in your theater seat while reading something useful instead. He tries to depict that legendary Eastern prestige we all know and respect, but he manages to (unintentionally!) turn it into a joke. As an audience member, you walk away feeling like you could have done a better job portraying that ancient culture yourself than whatever this guy managed to scrape together. It’s so shallow, so pathetic, and so incredibly thin... God help us.

DON'T THROW YOUR MONEY AWAY!! 😁 And don't waste your precious time either.

So, I caught this movie about two weeks ago. Even though my memory of the actual plot is already starting to fade—which honestly says the story itself wasn't exactly a knockout—the whole thing is still a decent enough watch. What really stuck out to me was that weird, almost surrealist vibe they went for during the massive battle scenes. You’ve got these endless fleets of ships prepping for combat, which I guess was supposed to show off their naval dominance, but it just felt like massive overkill to me. Like, seriously, how is it even possible for a navy from that era to have enough firepower to wipe out every other military on the planet combined? 🙂
It feels more like a project where John Woo was trying to mask some flaws by leaning hard into over-the-top stylization—the costumes were a bit too "Hollywood polished" for the period, if you ask me—and using pure exaggeration, like that ridiculous number of soldiers and weapons, to carry the weight.

I actually found this movie to be quite excellent. To be honest, I was surprised; I went in a massive skeptic, assuming it would just be another generic action flick following the same tired tropes, but you'd be mistaken. This film breaks the mold in so many different ways. It serves as a stark, undeniable piece of evidence that modern warfare is nothing more than pure self-destruction—it lacks both logic and any real purpose.

Jamie Morris91 said:I watched this movie a couple of weeks ago. Even though my memory of the plot was already fading—which suggests the story itself didn't leave much of an impression on me—it’s still a decent enough production. I found the stylized realism during the massive battle scenes quite striking; seeing that endless fleet preparing for combat felt like a blatant attempt to emphasize their military dominance, even if it comes off as extreme exaggeration. Honestly, how could any navy from that era possibly field enough ships to take on every other military on Earth at once? (specifically that shot transitioning from a bird's-eye view in a canyon filled with a sea of warships). It feels more like John Woo trying to compensate for things through heavy stylization (the costumes were perhaps a bit too polished for the period, though they fit the vibe) and sheer scale. 🙂

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Red_Cliffs