The Film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon by Ang Lee - Movie Review Example

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000 Freedom through sacrifice Introduction The film Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000), directed by Ang Lee, is a sweeping melodrama, wrapped in compelling and intricate action. While there are many relationships throughout the film, different configurations competing for the core storyline, the central stories are about two women and how they cope with the tragedies of their life. The primary conflict is between traditional values and modern values, representing the universal struggle of women as they try to meet the expectations of society while trying to determine their own destiny. The time period allows for an exaggerated exploration of modern society, revealing the struggle through poignant stories of love and loss. The central themes come from an admission by Ang Lee that he is obsessed with the theme of female repression (Mainon and Ursini 247). Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon (2000) was made for about 15 million dollars, making 60% of its revenue during its United States release. Within the U.S., the film made 61, 231,307 dollars, while making only about 40 million through international markets. The total revenue for the film by 2001 was just slightly over 100 million dollars (Burgoyne 121). The film opened a door to the genre of the heroic epic Asian film, pulling the genre into the mainstream U.S. American markets. The film was nominated for ten academy awards, its dreamlike quality appealing to critics as well as fans, capturing the attention of the market through elements of fantasy combined with a trueness of the heart. In a conflict between seclusion and freedom, the characters of the story struggle to find honor and righteousness within the hold of strong desires and passions. Through the development of a complexity of themes, Ang Lee searches for the answer to the cultural questions about the obligations of society when set against the alternative seclusion that results from wresting hold of freedom. The connectivity of tradition is set against the unfulfilled desires of Yu Shu Lien and Li Mu Bai, and then contrasted against the escapism that Jen has made towards fulfilling her desires with Lo. The cinematography and the narrative tools help to create a film that questions tradition, but is clear that there are consequences for daring to ask. Theme According to Chin, Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000), “draws on Chinese legend and symbols to provide meaning for life’s journey in today’s terms”(38). Through creating a historic fantastical setting, Ang Lee was able to set up a dialogue about the repression of the female spirit. The name of the film evokes an “impression of female power” with the sense of the underestimation that exists about the strength of women (Mainon and Ursini 247). One of the doors that the film opened was to the female action star. While the expectation of the film was that it would highlight action sequences starting Chow Yun-Fat as he was a very famous Asian action star, the movie actually focuses on action sequences that star Michelle Yeoh and Zhang Ziyi (Mainon and Ursini 247), thus extending its central theme into reality. The film celebrates and dramatizes the strength of the female spirit through a fantastical story, but by using its female actors as the core and center of the action scenes, a transformative point of view on the value of female physical action was promoted. Chin goes on to discuss how the film is able to capture a deeper sense of the Asian aesthetics, the complex values and belief systems that frame Asiatic cultures that is not usually captured by Western writers who attempt to write about Asian themes. Examples of poorly written works that used Western myths about Asian culture and women are Madame Butterfly and The World of Suzie Wong (39). These films do not reflect the true cultural foundation of the Asian culture. The Chinese idiom that is used for the title is actually ‘hidden dragon, crouching tiger’, which is intended to speak of hidden talents that may not be obvious or well known. The idiom is reflective a cultural valuation of humility where one does not beat their own drum so that others know their skills (Selections). The nature of the film in reflecting this idiom is that the female strength and power may not seem obvious, but what lies under the surface can be skilled and dangerous. The screenplay was based on an example of a Chinese cultural form of story called wuxia (Oriental Outpost). The wuxia is a form of story that is based on the journey of a hero. Heroes from these novels are usually not of high birth and have no loyalty to a specific lord or leader. They live by a sense of chivalry, highlighted by the Code of Xia. The Code of Xia is a code of chivalry that intends for the hero to come to the aid of those who are being treated unfairly. There is a certain sense of the Robin Hood complex that is central to the overall actions of the hero. Just like Robin Hood, the hero is often outside of the law. The two central virtues that comprise the code are righteousness (Yi) and honor (Xin) (Kaleidoscope). The setting for the wuxia genre is the jianghu, translated literally to mean rivers and lakes, but intended to provide a reference for the historic alternate world within which the wuxia take place. It is also known as a metaphor for the modern world, suggestive of the difficulty of navigating life. Within this world the line between what is right and what is wrong is a clearly defined boundary. The female heroine of such tales often lives both in the social world and in a remote, isolated realm in which she is her true self. When she has accomplished her task, whether it be revenge or some other type of intervention, she retreats to the isolated realm, suggesting that in showing her strength she is no longer acceptable within the social world (Altenburger 34). The themes of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000) are revealed through the use of the traditional genre in order to peel back the emotional context in which these types of heroes and heroines are burdened. Themes of conflict including; middle aged against being young; conservatism versus passion; traditional against modern; and reflective versus the impetuous. In (Yeh and Davis 197). The original story from the writing of Wang Dulu had a very different ending. The female character, who is the Dragon of the title, reunites for one night only after having faked her suicide, after which she disappeared without living up to the expectations of anyone, neither her parents or her lover. She freed herself, but the cost of her freedom was isolation. The isolation was the penalty for having defied her parents and indulged her desire. In the film, Jen Yu commits a dreamlike suicide for her sins which were much greater than only having been a disobedient daughter (Yeh and Davis 198). Her greatest sin had been one of impetuous pride. In this departure, Jen fulfills one of the signifying themes in jianghu: separating herself and going into isolation, her suicide described as a floating into the clouds rather than as an actual plunge to her death. There is a central conflict between the ideas of self-discipline and a lack of self-discipline. Jen represents the costs of giving into desires over the discipline of having been true to the values and traditions of her heritage. While Yu Shu Lien and Li Mu Bai did not give into the desires of their youth, Jen and Lo are swept up in theirs, Jen’s lack of discipline extending to her trust and loyalty. The villain, Jade Fox, exploits Jen’s weaknesses and the result is the death of Li Mu Bai. One of the traditional wuxia symbols of the evil woman is the use of poison which Jade Fox uses on the darts that are her weapons (Dancyger 203). As well as self-discipline and a lack of self-discipline, Yu Shu Lein and Jen represent tradition and modernity. Yu Shu Lien had denied herself, thus honoring traditions and having lived a moral life, while Jen has felt burdened by traditions and has sought her freedom as would be a more modern way of thinking. In the end, by jumping into the clouds, she rejects are tethers and has chosen externalized freedom above all else (Yeh and Davis 197). However, she ironically gives into tradition as well, denying herself over her guilt for having defied male domination as Li Mu Bai has instructed her to kneel before her master, with her refusal having eventually cost him her life. Therefore, she both externalizes her freedom and sacrifices her own desires through the influence of a maturation that develops through guilt, exemplifying the struggle between seclusion and freedom. Cinematography Isolation is reflected in the way in which close-up and medium shots are used to reflect the emotional context of seclusion. In the initial meeting between Yu Shu Lien and Li Mu Bai, the shots are defined through cuts between close-ups of the two characters, their emotions revealed through their expressions and highlighted by their aloneness within the frame. Jen’s isolation is emphasized in the same way in regard to her meeting with Yu Shu Lien, but when their unified interest in the sword is made clear, the two of them are shown together in a medium shot. However, when Yu Shu Lien speaks of Li Mu Bai, the camera once again is on her alone, revealing the sense of loss coupled with the privacy with which her feelings for him are experienced. Boom shots were used to create establishing shots, providing powerful visions of the setting and creating the feeling of the epic nature of the environment. The chaoses of the action scenes were subtly stilled by the use of dollies in order to inject the cultural sense of tranquility within the movement. The quality of the editing is also defined through a sense of subtly, the chaotic quick cuts of Western action sequences exchanged for a less chaotic overall nature to the action. As an example, the flight scene with Li Mu Bai and Jen in the woods is representative of the theories of Qi-gong. Qi is the essence of the blending of the individual with the environment (Wu 5). The camera is smooth and expansively utilized, rather than the high energy impact that is more often associated with flying within Western films. Editing is used in the scene between Li Mu Bai and Yu Shu Lien to denote the tension. As the two discussed the delivery of the sword, the scene is done with quick cuts, creating a sense of the tension between them. As the conversation moves on to a less tense portion of the subject matter, the shot is uncut for a longer time period which is then married to a long shot that pulls the scene back to the sense of jianghu, creating a dichotomy of the tension as the sense of survival within the setting is underscored. The editing style shifts between scenes of the environment and of the tranquility of moments to a shifting style with quicker cuts that represent the passions of a moment. Narrative Ang Lee intended to create a film that would cross cultural barriers and appeal to an international audience. The traditional wuxia settings, the concept that the historically set film was definitively fictional, allowed Lee to bring out the externalized setting of jianghu as well as the internalized emotional environment that defines jianghu. According to Deppman, the use of narrative by Lee creates an effective exposition that allows for Western viewers to become comfortable with the characterizations that exemplified the Chinese genre. The typical characters that can be seen in wuxia are not relevant to the average Westerner. Therefore, the expository narrative had to successfully acquaint Western viewers with these concepts without alienating them from the film (22). The female action narrative is integrated through the use of the romance heroine who is set against the “explosive historical conflict” (Gallagher 77). For an audience to accept the female role of an action hero, it is most often necessary to create a romantic relationship within the narrative in order to create an acceptance. Thus, the melodrama of the isolation/freedom conflict is set against the emotional context of passionate attraction. The female lead, Jen, would not be near as interesting if she had only sought her freedom. That she is then complicated by the entrance of a male for whom she contemplates giving up her freedom makes the story far more compelling. This creates the conflict that the heroine must resolve, whether to truly seek her freedom or to give over her sense of freedom to her passions. Conclusion The themes of seclusion and freedom are developed through a complexity of themes that are founded within the principles of the wuxia jianghu form of Chinese literature. While the Western audience had no concept of this style of fiction, Ang Lee used innovative cinematography and an integrated narrative in order to convey the essence of the emotional context of the jianghu setting. The themes of the work are defined by traditional wuxia values, but are modernized through a discussion of the repression of women and the desire to seek freedom from that repression. Because the traditional wuxia heroine will seek isolation over desire in order to fully express her freedom, the end of this film is sorrowful and poignant as Jen goes over the edge of the mountain, either symbolically committing suicide by flying into the clouds or by slipping into the other realm of jianghu, depending on the viewer’s interpretation of the end. Regardless, she finds both freedom and isolation by letting go of what she desires. Works Cited Altenburger, Roland. The Sword or the Needle: The Female Knight Errant (xia) in Traditional Chinese Narrative. Bern: Lang, 2009. Print. Barsanti, Chris. Filmology: A Movie-a-Day Guide to a Complete Film Education. Avon, Mass: Adams Media, 2010. Print. Burgoyne, Robert. The Epic Film. New York: Taylor & Francis, Inc. Chin, Jean L. Learning from My Mothers Voice: Family Legend and the Chinese American Experience. New York [u.a.: Teachers College Press, 2005. Print. Chung, Michael. “Looking into Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon from perspective of Chi, Tao, Chan & Compassion“. Chi Kung Culture Society of Taipai. n.d. Web. 15 October 2010. Dancyger, Ken. The Technique of Film and Video Editing: History, Theory, and Practice. Burlington, MA, USA: Focal Press, 2007. Print. Deppman, Hsiu-Chuang. Adapted for the Screen: The Cultural Politics of Adaptation in Modern Chinese Fiction & Film. Honolulu: University of Hawai?i Press, 2010. Print. “Kaleidoscope: Chinese Kung Fu”. Cultural China. n.d. Web 15 October 2010. Mainon, Dominique, and James Ursini. Modern Amazons: Warrior Women on Screen. New York: Limelight Ed, 2006. Print. “Selections for Ching in Chinese and Japanese.” Oriental Outpost. n.d. Web. 15 October 2010. Wu, Shelly. Chinese Astrology: Exploring the Eastern Zodiac. Franklin Lakes, NJ: New Page Books, 2005. Print. Yeh, Emilie Y, and Darrell W. Davis. Taiwan Film Directors: A Treasure Island. New York [u.a.: Columbia Univ. Press, 2005. Print. Read More