This year's annual martial-arts epic with Ziyi Zhang and choreography by Yuen Wo-Ping gets a fancy new title for its DVD release here in the states, 'Legend of the Black Scorpion' - formerly known as the less pompous 'The Banquet.'
Well, folks, be forewarned - I'm in one of those moods and I can't be held responsible for my superfluous sarcasm. Every once in a while a film comes along that rubs me the wrong way and 'Legend of the Black Scorpion' or 'The Banquet' or 'Hamlet vs. Wire-fu' has done just that.
Heck, I'm even a fan of these type of films - I sobbed during 'Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon', I gaped in wonder at Jet Li and Donnie Yen in 'Hero', I sobbed again during 'House of Flying Daggers', I cringed in horror at the Looney Tunes f/x in 'The Promise', I snored through 'Curse of the Golden Flower' only to wake up again during the closing credits where I promptly fell back asleep...err, wait, strike those last two from the record.
Anyway, I digress - I'm a big fan of martial arts and 'Crouching Tiger' made me a believer again but for the love of all that's Buddha, I can't take any more beautifully filmed, well acted, martial-arts epics!
I miss my severed heads and dismembered limbs of the 'Wuxia' films of yore - 'Duel to the Death'-type films, oh how I've missed ye....sigh...I guess I can step off my rant box now and continue with the review proper - but I won't like it dammitt!
Now that Dr. Jekyll has foregone the keyboard, Mr. Hyde has to concede that 'Legend of the Black Scorpion' is actually a pretty dang good film - it just caught us at the wrong time.
From director Feng Xiaogang ('World Without Thieves'), a consistently viable and commercial director in China who hasn't quite had the “art house” crossover success of his contemporaries, comes this adaptation of 'Hamlet' set just after the fall of the Tang Dynasty - a period rife with possibilities for Shakespearean theatrics.
Daniel Wu plays Lu Wan, reigning prince of China during the period of Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms, who abandons his place at the royal court when his father marries his one true love, Little Wan (Ziyi Zhang). A self-exile to a remote theater, Lu Wan’s life is sought after when his father is killed by a scorpion bite and the emperor’s brother Li (Ge You) has his sights on both the throne and Little Wan.
As Shakespeare aficionado’s can probably guess by now, yes, this version of Hamlet made some loose transformations. Turning Hamlet’s mother into a stepmother he’s in love with actually works quite well and proves an intriguing twist on the Oedipus complex and the swordplay, of course, makes a natural transition to the Wuxia style with all the balletic leaps and jumps and thrusts of the sword you can shake a skull at.
Ziyi Zhang does keep getting better and better (when she’s not playing blue-eyed Japanese Geisha’s that is) with age and this is probably her most mature work to date. Always a better physical actress than an emotional one, this role makes that crucial step towards Michelle Yeoh territory i.e. impressive handling of both.
To find fault with the broad strokes of the story would be silly, but what I can find fault with (and it’s one of the reasons why I’ve almost had my fill of the recent handling of these types of films in general) is the strict weightiness of it all. These films that are so somber and dispassionate they need to come packaged with a stick in their keepcase crack.
While I don’t expect comic relief in the form of a wise-cracking skull, I do expect some sort of exaggerated emotion – anything to get the blood pumping both literally and figuratively – this should be a bloody revenge story after all…
This two-disc ultimate edition includes a super clean anamorphic widescreen transfer along with original Mandarin Dolby 5.1 and DTS tracks along with an English 5.1 track and English and Spanish subtitles. On Disc 1, the sole special feature is a feature length Audio Commentary by Hong Kong Expert Bey Logan.
I spot-checked it and Logan sounds like he’ll be an informative listen for fans – I’ll probably give it a full listen at some point.
Disc 2 features ‘Master of Ceremonies: An Exclusive Interview With Director Feng Xiaogang’, ‘Warrior Prince: An Exclusive Interview With Leading Man Daniel Wu’, ‘The Making of Legend of the Black Scorpion’, ‘A Dynasty Uncovered: Behind The Scenes on Legend Of The Black Scorpion’ and a Trailer Gallery featuring other titles under the Dragon Dynasty Banner.
A formidable amount of extras to dig through, there’s a lot of good stuff here and props to Genius and Weinstein for not just shoveling these out without any effort.
Was I a bit too hard on the film before? Possibly, but I’m dangerously close to reaching my apex for the humorless, heavy, martial-arts epic that seem to always have Yuen Wo-Ping involved in at least some aspect (does this guy ever stop working? – take a freaking night off Ping!).
It’s hard to fault the source material and with solid performances and a top notch technical treatment, ‘Legend of the Black Scorpion’ comes recommended for fans that can handle an extreme sense of déjà vu.
Legend of the Black Scorpion: Two-Disc Ultimate Edition is now available at Amazon . As of yet, there is not a release date for this version of the DVD in the UK. Visit the DVD database for more information.
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