Movie Review: THE TAKING OF TIGER MOUNTAIN

[youtube url=”http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gtrelJcbFQQ” hd=”1″]

With the first action sequence in the opening minutes of Tsui Hark’s The Taking of Tiger Mountain, you realize that this isn’t going to be a dull affair — and why should it be?  Hark has been the producer and director of countless, genuinely classic action films.  He’s one of the most well known, respected, and prolific artists in the Hong Kong film industry.  He’s had a career for roughly 30 years directing some of China’s most talented actors and martial artists.  Given all of this, Tiger Mountain was bound to thrill.  The uncertainty for me was that this is his first time straying from fantasy to reality, a historical epic based on more than legend and folk heroes.  Those opening moments put my mind at ease though, as this may be a historical piece but it’s hyper stylized and crazy at the same time.

The story takes place during the Chinese Civil war in the late 40’s where a small force of unit 203 fight against the strength and numbers of Lord Hawk.  Hawk has a rebel force and a strategic advantage of holding the mountain, and it’s up to Shao Jianbo and his small troop to triumph against the odds by infiltrating the rebels and locating a weakness.  As I don’t have a lot of knowledge of this period in China it’s difficult to discover where Hark and his numerous co-writers have developed the fantastic rather than used what history has provided.  The feeling of the movie is an all around fun one with Tony Leung having a blast as Lord Hawk and Zhang Hanyu’s infiltrating Yang Zirong as a commanding, compelling soldier are performance highlights.  For me the spectacle over genuine substance lean worked well, but it’s difficult to understand the history of another country and respect it while having so much fun.  Tone is very different between our countries, and something like Fury last year fully demonstrates how serious American films are regarding war history.  Tiger Mountain just wouldn’t work if we had made it, but Hark pulls it together for my tastes.

The film looks beautiful, and I’m sad I didn’t get to see it on a big screen.  Hark’s become fascinated with CGI, which in China is still not quite up to American standards of excellence, and often there’s an over reliance on digital effects that become horribly distracting.  He’s got a grasp of fantasy so much that he seems to get lost in trying to digitally create grand ideas instead of doing them practically.  Both of his Detective Dee films in the past few years suffer due to such a digital reliance.  A good comparison of his old spirit and a the new one could be displayed between 1983’s Zu Warriors From the Magic Mountain, a Chinese Star Wars of sorts, and his 2001 follow up Zu Warriors, which is practically a cartoon.  Having said that, the CGI in Tiger Mountain is quite strong.  Slow motion zoom and trailing of bullets are dazzling, and a large effects sequence involving a hungry tiger and a man in a tree is fairly effective.

Tiger Mountain is incredibly solid given the missteps.  It makes light on the subject matter without feeling insincere or clueless, and every action set piece is ultra-violent, cinematic gold.  It looks uncertain that it’s going to get a 3D release, which means it looks like I’ll have to import the foreign release when it becomes available later this year.  Having seen the film in a regular format there are so many moments that look like they’ll explode off the screen in a grand fashion, and others who have seen the 3D release speak incredibly highly.  Even without the added dimension, Tiger Mountain is well worth your time.