Hero

Starring Jet Li and Maggie Cheung. In Mandarin with English subtitles. Rated PG.

Few recent films have promised as much pleasure as this.

Featuring an all-star martial-arts cast, directed and cowritten by one of China's most skilled cineastes, choreographed by Tony Ching Siu Tung (director of 1987's A Chinese Ghost Story), photographed by Christopher Doyle (the Australian-born lens god of East Asian cinema), with costumes designed by Emi Wada (winner of an Oscar for her work on Akira Kurosawa's brilliantly coloured Ran), and based on a pivotal historical event (the fusing of seven warring kingdoms into the nation now known as China), Zhang Yimou's Hero seemed certain to leave every other summer movie choking in its dust.

And yet, the film's North American release date was pushed back again and again. Surely, the distributors' fears must be groundless? How could something so perfectly appointed be anything other than a joy?

Sadly, although Hero is not a failure in the ordinary sense of the word, it isn't exactly a success, either. Most of its elements work fine, but they somehow fail to cohere. It is a band that only knows how to play solos.

The nameless hero of Zhang's story, played by Jet Li, is an obscure country prefect who has managed to kill a trio of super-assassins sworn to slay the king of Qin (Chen Daoming). Having finally found peace of mind, this shrewd monarch invites his unlikely saviour to a private audience in his palace. In flashback, we see how the prefect defeated his enemies one by one, although these stories soon evolve into a series of Rashomon-like questions.

There's no denying that the three villains (Tony Leung, Donnie Yen, and "two-timing" Maggie Cheung) all do yeoman's service, but the acting honours must surely go to Zhang Ziyi in the role of a sword-savvy servant; she emanates anguished loyalty.

Although the battles are almost completely bloodless--probably a mistake--the camera records the flight of countless arrows in an exhilarating and cheerfully antisocial manner. The wirework, although not great, is still more than acceptable.

That last sentence, incidentally, could also summarize the film. Hero flies, but it doesn't soar.

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