Chinese Cinema

I sat through Once Upon a Time in China yesterday. I’m short on time, so I don't waste it on filler. Honestly, I couldn't find anything interesting enough to keep me focused while I was multitasking, so I didn't even finish the damn thing. Now, someone’s going to tell me I could have figured out I hated it in just a few minutes or that I missed something vital, but I disagree. That’s plenty of time for me to get a feel for the vibe, check out some dialogue, see how the action scenes play out, and decide if there are any characters actually worth following.

I did the exact same thing with another Asian film.

I'm officially done with Asian films for the foreseeable future.

Here are my top 3 favorite Chinese films (though I guess the first one isn't strictly Chinese since it was a co-production):

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon 10/10

House of Flying Daggers 9/10

Hero 8/10

To Live (1994) — basically follows one family through the chaos starting from the end of the Japanese invasion of China all the way to the fallout of the Cultural Revolution... unlike that claustrophobic experiment *Raise the Red Lantern*, which is Zhang Yimou's most famous flick, this one goes full epic scale—it actually leans into those typical Hollywood tropes. Which means the whole vibe is super melodramatic and some scenes get this annoying tendency where they over-explain everything verbally—like the director doesn't think the audience is smart enough to just get it. A lukewarm recommendation at best.

Michelle Long6 said:Here are my top 3 favorite Chinese films (though I guess the first one isn't strictly Chinese since it was a co-production):

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon 10/10

House of Flying Daggers 9/10

Hero 8/10

They are quite good. However, our discussion here is strictly limited to Chinese martial arts films. To be fair, those are really the only types of movies I watch; Chinese cinema is truly massive. The Blades Personally, I found the film to be quite good. Moving forward... Reign of AssassinsIn all my years, I have truly never encountered a single soul who actually possesses a deep understanding of Chinese martial arts cinema. It is quite disheartening; every time I attempt to engage someone in a meaningful conversation about this genre, and they inevitably bring up Bruce Lee or, heaven forbid, even Jackie Chan, I find myself feeling rather discouraged. 🤦 😁 It is evident to me that they simply aren't paying attention, nor do they truly understand the situation.

Summer Palace 2006

Really solid. It follows a handful of characters through a massive wave of social upheaval and identity shifts in America (roughly from the late '80s up to the turn of the millennium). That social backdrop mostly sits in the background, but it bleeds through via the lead—Hao Lei is incredible—and her constant "wandering," which takes center stage. Much like the superior >, this is a visual feast that blends hyperrealism with poetic stylization. A few things miss the mark (like those awkward text cards), but the main protagonist is brilliantly written and the ending hits hard.

七

Zhou Yu's Train 2002

It’s basically a romantic drama centered on this love triangle—if you can even call it that. The lead girl travels back and forth twice a week to see her boyfriend, some writer working on a poetry book. It’s a killer example of associative, non-linear, meta-filmic storytelling—the kind of style you just don't see in modern Asian films anymore. The camerawork is wild; it’s simultaneously epileptic and meditative, pulling from both that kinetic Hong Kong editing tradition and European art-house vibes. Those trains? They provide the visual structure and "anchor" the whole thing against scenes that are otherwise totally impressionistic and scattered.

八

If you're looking for something to watch, I’d personally suggest checking out Bodies at Rest by Renny Harlin; it’s a solid action thriller if you have the time.👍

My rating for this one:

Still Life 2006

It’s basically a satire of sci-fi movies—set in this post-apocalyptic vibe along the Yangtze River, where entire villages are underwater because a massive dam project displaced over a million people. The two leads are just trying to track down their families. Beyond that personal stuff, the movie is a huge sociological look at workers from all over China pulling this superhuman shift to "tear down a 2,000-year-old city in just two years."
You've got party officials forced to enforce orders and gangsters tasked with bullying people into evacuating.
Visually? It’s bizarrely faithful to classic Chinese painting styles—lots of group portraits instead of solo shots, and this overwhelming sense of nature just "swallowing" people up, complete with UFOs popping up where you'd expect mountain immortals.

八

The Wild Goose Lake 2019

Great trailer, but honestly? A total failure of a successor to that innovative industrial noir, Black Coal, Thin Ice. They ditched the long takes and pivoted to this flashy, elliptical editing style that only works half the time. The plot is way more banal and linear here—the predecessor had this brilliantly acted, intriguing lead tackling an obscure serial killer case while the director constantly played with us, delaying the payoff through surreal sequences and fun non-sequiturs. That whole movie was basically a masterclass in withholding information. Here, there’s zero mystery at the core. The protagonist—poorly written and even worse acted this time around—is just waiting to turn himself in, while the narrative gaps feel self-conscious and gimmicky (stuff we've seen a million times before). We don't even get those fascinating ideas like the tunnel scene in Black Coal where a decade flies by in a single shot. Even the ending misses the mark—it feels way too much like the end of Exiled, except in that movie, the payoff actually carries weight because it built a morally complex world first. They also blew it on the chance to creatively link the lake motif with the characters' aimless wandering. Liao Fan and Kwai Lun-Mei are great again, though. 👍

Six

If you aren't going to watch anything else, you really ought to check out those early Jet Li films..
They're absolute little masterpieces... especially the ones directed by Zhang Yimou..
It can be a bit of a hunt to track them down, but it's worth the effort—you can usually find something on the torrent sites if you look hard enough..

Honestly, it would be great if a major network like ABC did a marathon of them..

so long, my son 2019

It’s a three-hour intimate epic following one family from the tail end of the Cultural Revolution straight up to the present day—with a heavy focus on that recent "one-child policy" era. The whole premise involving this double tragedy—part natural disaster, part bureaucratic nightmare—is actually pretty interesting. But honestly? The movie loses all its momentum because of this unnecessarily non-linear structure. It feels like they only did that to hide the big central secret, which isn't even that much of a secret anyway. The historical stuff also feels like a collection of tropes we've seen a million times before, save for maybe one standout scene where workers are protesting mass layoffs during the shift to a market economy. Great acting across the board, but overall, the movie is a letdown.

六

Nanjing! Nanjing!...
It truly stands out as one of the most powerful war dramas I've ever had the chance to watch...

Mulan...
I remember seeing it on an American network a few years back, and honestly, you're much better off watching the original Chinese masterpiece than that Disney's trash...

In a world of wolves, this is a killer Asian film.

I wasn't sure where this belonged or if there was already a thread about this movie.



Big Fish & Begonia

An Asian animated film. In short—it blew me away (didn't expect much, given the 7.1 on IMDb and 91/72 on Rotten Tomatoes).

The story is just this beautiful, fairy-tale rollercoaster. It’s like an emotional gamble with everything you’ve lived through, dealing with the ache of platonic love and questioning the bond between the divine and the human realm. You follow the timelines of a young girl and a boy searching for what it means to truly exist, where being loved is subversively tied to the act of loving—actively and sincerely. This film is a gem, I guess.

silentfalcon3 said:Nanjing! Nanjing!...
It truly stands out as one of the most powerful war dramas I've ever had the chance to watch...

Mulan...
I remember seeing it on an American network a few years back, and honestly, you're much better off watching the original Chinese masterpiece than that Disney's trash...

I haven't had the chance to sit down with this particular war drama yet, though I believe I’ve seen two or three of their other war films, which I quite enjoyed. Regarding Hua Mulan, I have watched the version you mentioned, but I am eagerly anticipating when the local independent cinemas start screening the latest Hua Mulan. I wouldn't dare label Disney's version as complete trash before I've actually sat through it myself. 😁

I just watched Ip Man 4 in the theater here, and I have to say, it was absolutely epic. I honestly feel a sense of melancholy knowing that this marks the final installment in the Ip Man series starring Donnie Yen.

I subsequently watched Birth of the Dragon. The plot of this film is based on one version—of perhaps three—suggesting that Bruce Lee lost a match to another martial arts master, Wong Jack Man. In reality, Wong Jack Man did indeed have a match with Bruce Lee, which is precisely how he became famous. I once spent quite a bit of time researching this historical bout, which took place back in 1964 in San Francisco. While several different accounts exist, the version presented in the film seems to be the most plausible to me. I wouldn't say I could perfectly reconcile the entire cinematic portrayal with everything I know about Bruce Lee, but personally, I found it to be an absolutely wonderful film. I have actually gone back and watched it a few more times on my computer.

Master Z: Ip Man Legacy is also an absolute masterpiece. It seems like Max Zhang is always cast as the villain—he lost to Ip Man in Ip Man 3, naturally—but in this particular film, he truly impressed me. In fact, I’ve watched it several times now. To be honest, I mostly find myself rewinding to the martial arts sequences, as that is what fascinates me most. When it comes to Asian cinema, I have developed a profound affection for these specific genres. I have explored dozens of films within this category, including many lesser-known titles. I could speak at length about this subject. I find myself happily revisiting certain films over and over again, which is something that absolutely never happens with any other type of production. I don't sit through a James Bond movie twice, nor do I rewatch Fast & Furious, but I found myself watching The Blades again just a few weeks ago—it might have been my fifth or sixth time seeing it. 😁 It is quite enough for me to simply mention one of those films on a forum or in a live conversation; by that very same evening, I find myself absolutely compelled to sit down and watch one. 😁 The choreography and sheer artistry found in those films are truly unparalleled; I honestly don't believe anyone else could execute them with such precision and grace.