Word: heros
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...think of what you could do, not only in your work but also in your life and in other people's lives. But the Hollywood action picture of the past 20 years takes advantage of a very comfort-addicted audience base and puts them in a kind of hero dream. It says, 'You're the good guy, and the good guy not only shoots the bad guy, but he shoots him through the head, and 20 lbs. of gray matter fly out the back, and hurrah hurrah.' Then the lights come up. And the repercussions of these actions aren...
...points of interest. Despite being weapons-grade gay, he married Liza Minnelli. Despite coming from the Australian outback, he headlined in Vegas, won an Oscar and sold out Radio City Music Hall. But that's not the kind of story arc that would seem fit for a multiplex hero. Recent events have shown that people welcome all sorts of extracurricular ambitions in action stars, but performing 20 songs onstage in loud shirts while dancing may not be one of them...
...movie can create a genre. When Ang Lee's Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon became a worldwide smash, esteemed directors saw the chance to paint their visions on a larger canvas, and producers were happy to bankroll them. Zhang Yimou's Hero was one such honorable spinoff. Now comes He Ping's Warriors of Heaven and Earth, China's official entry for the foreign-language Academy Award...
...This is a real Eastern Western: grizzled heroes enacting blood feuds in a gloriously forlorn landscape?the Taklimakan Desert?where the men ride camels as well as horses. Our outlaw hero has a familiar cohort of misfits: sassy kid, young woman, saintly monk and an old man with one last battle in him. I don't know if you can drawl in Mandarin, but Jiang Wen is sure-as-shootin' John Wayne, the gruff leader who tells his supporting-actor pals, "I don't want to turn your wives into widows," and rides off alone. (Of course they follow...
...Warriors isn't up there with Crouching Tiger and Hero. It meanders in places then rushes through a half-dozen climaxes, including one with weak visual effects (and copped from Raiders of the Lost Ark). But Zhao Fei's cinematography is ravishing, the actors bring heft and glamour to their roles, and the battle scenes have a clanging thrill to them. When the good guys and bad guys wage a group sword fight on horseback, you'll wonder why Hollywood ever thought it could get away with boring old guns...