When I saw Cecilia Cheung for the first time in The Legend of Zu (2001), I was immediately struck (if not smitten) by her beauty, and I hurriedly started looking for her in other movies. After a bunch of modern-day dramas (slightly boring, truth be told), she's finally back in a fantasy martial arts epic, looking better than ever.
I was immensely thrilled to find White Dragon, and I was elated as I saw the first twenty minutes of it. There is so much cool action, so many great laughs; so much delightful entertainment.
The rest of the movie is not bad, but it slows down a great deal to focus on building up the love story. It has many of the same plot elements that other Asian movies of this type has; someone is blind (yet a superb kung fu master), the girl is betrothed to another but can't help falling in love with the hero (yes, just like in House of Flying Daggers), and the love story completely takes over the movie after about a half-hour opening of great action and comedy (the great 2002 comedy Chinese Odyssey had the exact same structure). This is a little disappointing; one would really have liked the action and comedy to be sustained throughout the movie.
However, it's still an uproariously entertaining, beautiful and funny movie, and the actors all do an amazing job.
8 out of 10.
I was immensely thrilled to find White Dragon, and I was elated as I saw the first twenty minutes of it. There is so much cool action, so many great laughs; so much delightful entertainment.
The rest of the movie is not bad, but it slows down a great deal to focus on building up the love story. It has many of the same plot elements that other Asian movies of this type has; someone is blind (yet a superb kung fu master), the girl is betrothed to another but can't help falling in love with the hero (yes, just like in House of Flying Daggers), and the love story completely takes over the movie after about a half-hour opening of great action and comedy (the great 2002 comedy Chinese Odyssey had the exact same structure). This is a little disappointing; one would really have liked the action and comedy to be sustained throughout the movie.
However, it's still an uproariously entertaining, beautiful and funny movie, and the actors all do an amazing job.
8 out of 10.