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Re: Sight and Sound (2002) Greatest Films Club
#316 - A Touch of Zen
I'm not a big fan of wuxia films. They're okay, but I'm not much of a martial arts guy. And at the risk of losing some film snob cred, I'd rather see the newer entries in the genre, where modern techniques make all the qinggong and so forth look so much cooler. The obvious trampolines here kind of ruin the effect. But this is a clearly influential film, and I appreciate it for that. The lightning-quick editing helps cover the cheapness of the effects, and keeps the battles exciting, although occasionally confusing. For my money, the best thing here is not the fight scenes (which are pretty sweet) but some of gorgeous images throughout. Lots of beautiful scenery and dramatic low angles. The story is reasonably engaging for most of the three hours... a little slow to get going, perhaps, but not intolerably so. Major buzzkill: a cruddy non-anamorphic DVD with some scenes too dark to see what was happening. Rating: 7
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