The next installment in my Zhang Yimou retrospective requires actually going back in time to fill in a gap in the series. Better late than never… Earlier in my tour through Zhang Yimou’s movies, I had to skip Keep Cool (1997), because I could not then find a copy. I have since been able watch …
Author Archives: Cameraman_21C
Announcing a New (Gear! Fab!) Cameraman Retrospective
Along with my love for movies, my enthusiasms include a no-less-intense love for the greatest rock band of all time, the one and only Fab Four, the Beatles. For Beatles fans, the past few years have been something of a new golden age. In 2021, Peter Jackson’s epic Get Back documentary gave us a fascinating, …
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Murder Most Foul: Blood Simple and A Woman, a Gun, and a Noodle Shop Review
The next installment in my Zhang Yimou retrospective also involves looking back at the inaugural work of the Coen brothers. For his sixteenth feature, Zhang Yimou did something new: remaking another movie. Zhang’s movie A Woman, a Gun, and a Noodle Shop (2009) is a transplant to a Chinese milieu of Blood Simple (1984), the …
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Life, Death, and Life: The Boy and the Heron Review
Here I review the long-awaited new movie from Hayao Miyazaki, The Boy and the Heron. Returning from the longest of his many pseudo-retirements, Hayao Miyazaki has made his first movie in 10 years, The Boy and the Heron (2023). The much-anticipated movie is a lovely work, boasting all the beauty, grotesqueness, and poignancy we have …
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Domestic Disharmony: Curse of the Golden Flower Review
Returning to reviewing after a little hiatus, I look at the next movie in my Zhang Yimou retrospective, Curse of the Golden Flower. Curse of the Golden Flower (2006) is Zhang Yimou’s third foray into the wuxia genre. The movie differs from its predecessors in two notable respects, though. First, it reunites Zhang, for the …
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Starting under One’s Feet: Riding Alone for Thousands of Miles Review
I continue my Zhang Yimou retrospective with Riding Alone for Thousands of Miles. Following his two wuxia movies of the early 2000s, Zhang Yimou returned to contemporary China and more naturalistic filmmaking with Riding Alone for Thousands of Miles (2005). The basic story is the stuff of tear-jerking melodrama, but the movie is subtler and …
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A Doomed Romantic: Oppenheimer Review
Here I look at one of the most talked-about movies of the year, Christopher Nolan’s Oppenheimer. The life and career of J. Robert Oppenheimer seem tailor-made for dramatization. A brilliant theoretical physicist who taught at the University of California-Berkeley (he helped infer the existence of black holes decades before they were discovered), Oppenheimer is best …
Stabbed in the Back: House of Flying Daggers Review
Next in my Zhang Yimou retrospective, I look at House of Flying Daggers. House of Flying Daggers (2004) is Zhang Yimou’s second wuxia movie, and it raises the pressing question: “Does the movie live up to that title?” The answer is no, not quite (could any movie?). It comes close, though. Co-written by Zhang with …
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Riding to the End of the Line: Night on the Galactic Railroad and Giovanni’s Island Review
Two movies, made almost 30 years apart, offer two different interpretations of the same fanciful, melancholy book. In this review, I look at Night on the Galactic Railroad and Giovanni’s Island. Night on the Galactic Railroad, sometimes also translated as Milky Way Railroad, is a book by schoolteacher, poet, and children’s author Kenji Miyazawa (1896-1933). …
Beautiful Tragedy: Hero Review
Continuing my Zhang Yimou retrospective, I look at Hero. Hero (2002) is Zhang Yimou’s first entry in the wuxia genre, and it is a cracker: a fast-paced, visually sumptuous action movie that offers viewers all the duels, beautiful locations, and dramatic poses they could desire. Co-written by Zhang, Li Feng, and Wang Bin, Hero is …
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