Red Cliff

It's been a while since "Curse of Golden Flower" and "Lust, Caution" that I really like Chinese-based movie, this will be my next favorite one. Red Cliff is the most expensive movie made in chinese so far, so, of course people will expect a lot of spectacular scenes. With the complexity and depth of the story, this movie is split into two parts. The first part is mainly to introduce the background story and characters of the story and might set for more great things to come in the second part. As overall, the cinematography is simply great, a lot of breath-taking scenes, and the acting from the actors/actresses is good, although Zhu Ge Liang by Takeshi Kaneshiro felt a bit wierd, but actually quite refreshing character, wise with a bit of naughty tone. Although I don't read the novel or watch previous shows or TV Series, I know a bit of the characters through playing the games ROTK (which was still DOS version one). The only thing is the battle scene is dragged too long, until I felt a bit bored of it, and some unnecessary scene like horse giving birth thing, etc.

Although it's too much to put this to LOTR, but I can't help to compare these two movies. Both are based on well-written complex story, epic battle, and with breath-taking scene. So is this asia's answer to LOTR? Well, it's still too soon to tell. I really look forward to the second part of the movie.

Update: Reading through discussion forum, it seems that many are disappointed of the movie because its not that accurate to the history. However, I think if the movie follows too closed to the history, it might become too boring. So, if you somehow follow the story like Romance of Three Kingdoms, my suggestion is to ignore the inaccuracy of the story and just enjoy the movie. I just remember there's one more favorite chinese movie recently, which is "Lust, Caution"