House of Flying Daggers

How the same talented director (Zhang Yimou of The Road Home and Raise the Red Lantern), working with the same gifted actress (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon's lovely Zhang Ziyi), could turn out one of the year's best movies and one of its biggest disappointments--in the same genre no less--is a complete mystery. But that's exactly what has happened with a pair of handsomely grandiose martial arts films set in ancient China. Hero (VL-11/04), an imaginatively allegorical, action-packed but understated, brilliant historical epic, starred Jet Li as an assassin locked in unblinking intellectual combat with the king he's meant to kill. But House of Flying Daggers is the polar opposite: an outsized, endlessly pretentious romantic melodrama--also about assassins--in which the director has lost any sense of moderation or self-discipline. Every overly polished moment of visual refinement is dragged out to the point of absurdity, every hint of emotion becomes an excuse for floodgate histrionics, and every swordfight (or combat of any kind) slowly, slowly, s-l-o-w-l-y builds past an initial stage of breathtaking stylishness into a protracted mockery of itself. In short, this is the snooty, art-house equivalent of a Jerry Bruckheimer action movie. Not a necessary purchase. [Note: DVD extras include audio commentary by director Zhang Yimou and actress Ziyi Zhang, a “making-of” featurette (45 min.), six storyboard comparisons (17 min.), a featurette on creating the visual effects (5 min.), two montage photo galleries (6 min. total), a “Lovers” music video, and trailers. Bottom line: a fine extras package for a disappointing follow-up to the director's Hero.] (R. Blackwelder)