House Of Flying Daggers [Special Edition]

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Following the critical and commercial success of his first martial-arts epic, "Ying Xiong" ("Hero"), Chinese director Zhang Yimou decided to indulge his action sensibilities again by making "Shi Mian Mai Fu". "Shi Mian Mai Fu"--known as "House of Flying Daggers" in the United States--takes place during the Tang Dynasty, a period apparently filled with a rich sense of style and artistic achievement. The costumes look too pretty to wear for fear of getting sweat and dirt stains on them, and the sets are so ornate that they look like museum displays rather than places in which people might´ve lived.

The lush look seems to be the movie´s primary raison d´etre, and there are sequences that are breathtakingly beautiful. For the most part, "Ying Xiong" was monochromatic because its visuals were dominated by one color from segment to segment. However, "Shi Mian Mai Fu" is a riot of colors. At times, only the bright-red lipstick on actress Zhang Ziyi´s lips reminds you that there is sensuous humanity beneath many layers of silk.

In "Shi Mian Mai Fu", the corrupt Tang government´s activities create civil unrest. A secret society comprised of people skilled in throwing daggers poses a serious threat to the regime. Two police captains (played by the Cantonese movie-singing star Andy Lau and the half-Japanese/half-Taiwanese Takeshi Kaneshiro) seek to undermine the rebels by following a blind girl (Beijing ingénue Zhang Ziyi of "Wo Hu Cang Long" ["Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon"] and "Ying Xiong") to the secret society´s hideouts. Andy Lau basically plays the character that he did in "Infernal Affairs", and Zhang Ziyi plays a variation on her character in "Wo Hu Cang Long" (a pretty doll of a girl hides her martial-arts skills and wears men´s clothing). After some expository scenes and a dazzling display of the blind girl´s dancing and fighting abilities, the movie becomes an extended chase sequence that lasts for about an hour and a half.

I want to cover the bad news first. These are the problems that I had with "Shi Mian Mai Fu":
1) "House of Flying Daggers", the title used for its theatrical release in the United States, is not a translation of "Shi Mian Mai Fu" at all. A literal translation of "Shi Mian Mai Fu" would be "Buried From Ten Sides", but "Shi Mian" (or "Ten Sides") means "every direction", so "Ambush" or "Completely Surrounded" are better titles than "House of Flying Daggers".

"House of Flying Daggers" refers to the secret society--the "Fei Dao Men"--that is trying to topple the Tang government. However, even this translation is problematic. "Fei Dao" literally means "flying dagger", and "Men" literally means "door". "Door" figuratively refers to school, group, discipline, philosophy, society, etc. In previous martial-arts flicks, "Men" has been translated as "sect" (such as the "Sun Moon Sect" of the "Asia the Invincible" series). "Men" can also refer to house, but house in the Chinese sense usually refers to a familial clan. Given this information, "Flying Daggers Sect" is a better translation than "House of Flying Daggers", even if people call Zhang Ziyi´s character Xiao Mei (Little Sister) (which is a term of endearment rather than a denotation of actual blood ties).

2) The music score includes Japanese melodies. Yes, the music composer is Japanese, one of the male leads is half-Japanese, and the costume designer is Japanese. However, "Shi Mian Mai Fu" is a Chinese movie. The half-Japanese actor speaks Mandarin Chinese. The Japanese costume designer crafted Chinese clothes. Why does the music have Japanese tunes? (Granted the music score is largely conveyed with Western instruments, but as Western instruments are the de rigueur choice for movie-music scoring, instrumentation is not as big of a problem as the use of music that does not exist in the cultural space of a movie´s narrative.) "Shi Mian Mai Fu" isn´t a movie that uses music from a variety of sources (like "Kill Bill"), so the sudden shift to Japanese music is jarring and unwarranted.

3) Despite the fact that Zhang Yimou began his career as a cinematographer and his reputation for being a master visual stylist, there are some action sequences that are poorly-staged, badly-shot, or confusingly-edited. It is possible that Zhang is still learning how to stage action sequences since "Shi Mian Mai Fu" is only his second martial-arts venture.

4) The movie is longer than it needs to be. Unlike the fights in "Ying Xiong", the fights in "Shi Mian Mai Fu" don´t express philosophical ideas or art. Therefore, it becomes numbing to see the actors bash at each other for lengthy stretches of time. The action choreography in the best martial-arts movies express joy in movement, but the fighting in this movie felt tedious after a while. Before you tell me that that is the point, let me remind you that the Echo Game played by Xiao Mei at the beginning of the movie does express the joy in movement that is supposed to be a standard convention in martial-arts cinema (particularly the wuxia strain). The other action sequences were drawn out beyond my point of caring.

Now, the good news.

Takeshi Kaneshiro and Zhang Ziyi both deliver very good performances in "Shi Mian Mai Fu". Early in the movie, Kaneshiro is hilarious as a self-indulgent Tang-Dynasty frat boy. However, as his character begins to develop feelings for Xiao Mei, his face registers the necessary anxiety and worry to convey the depths of emotion one would have for a girl like Xiao Mei. Zhang Ziyi is credible as a blind girl--her eyes never betray any sense of responding to visual stimuli even as swords and bamboo sticks fly within millimeters of her face. Zhang Ziyi, who attended dance school as a youth, finally gets to demonstrate her amazing dancing skills. Zhang Ziyi even sings commendably during a passage in which Xiao Mei masquerades as a "female entertainer". (Andy Lau, the third lead, doesn´t have much screen time compared to Kaneshiro and Zhang Ziyi.)

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