reviews are very positive...

Exhilarating martial arts film "Wu Xia" modernizes genre
Maggie Lee Reuters
May 15, 2011, 3:35 p.m.

CANNES (Hollywood Reporter) - Bursting with light and color, and a torrent of martial arts action both swift and savage (arguably the best that lead actor Donnie Yen has choreographed for years), "Wu Xia" is coherently developed and stylishly directed by Peter Ho-Sun Chan to provide unashamedly pleasurable popular entertainment.

"Wu Xia" created buzz before its premiere with acquisition by The Weinstein Company, which will release the title stateside as "Dragon." Almost as picturesque as "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon," the film, showing out of competition at Cannes, has a chance of expanding overseas audience base beyond Asian genre ghettos.

Set in 1917, on the cusp of China's transition from monarchy to republic, "Wu Xia" depicts the internal moral struggles of a detective and a paper-maker who may be a renegade mass murderer. Unfolding like a noir mystery in which "Colombo" meets "CSI." It represents Chan's ambition to bridge the gap between Chinese and international tastes by giving a modern spin to the genre, while paying homage to the golden age of Hong Kong martial arts films through the special appearances of legendary action star Jimmy Wang Yu and Kara Hui.

Donnie Yen plays the said paper-maker Liu Jinxi, who has settled in an idyllic, hospitable village in Yunnan for 10 years after marrying single mother Ayu (Tang Wei). The peaceful life of his family of four is disturbed when he accidentally kills two robbers who threaten his paper workshop. The incident has detective Xu Baijiu (Takeshi Kaneshiro) sniffing in his backyard. Xu is convinced that Liu's real identity is Tang Long, a runaway member of the 72 Demons, a dwindling clan of Tanguts (former rulers of China's neighboring Xixia kingdom) for whom rape, pillage and massacre are a way of life.

What makes the exposition novel in the genre is the attempt to peel away layers of oriental mystique surrounding martial arts through Xu's quasi-scientific or homeopathic theories of investigation, such as forensic science, physics, acupuncture and qigong, which also adds an endearingly nerdy side to his character. However, the CG-rendered charts of human anatomy are used too frequently until they interfere with the flow of action.

As a self-conscious homage to the brawny, starkly violent martial arts films of which Chang Cheh's classic "One Armed Swordsman" series (starring Jimmy Wang Yu) is exemplary, Yen's devises close-contact combats with a graphic, muscular, vicious style that aims to kill with a single strike. The three-act structure each showcases a climactic combat in distinctly different styles. Liu's fight with a female Tangut (Kara Hui) is the most inventive, as it takes place in an ox pen where they have to skirt nimbly, yet dangerously around a stampede of buffalo.

After going through the motions in a recent string of dramatically unsatisfactory works, Yen and Tang both return to acting form, emoting in a quietly stirring manner. Aubrey Lam's subtle and understated script not only affectingly depict the pure but steadfast bonds of a simple family, but capture the neurosis of both Liu and Ayu, who separately grapple with their scarred pasts and fear that happiness is transient. The most fascinating character, however, turns out to be Xu, for whom the investigation becomes a personal moral and intellectual quest, in which he weighs the impartial efficacy of law against natural human compunctions of remorse and compassion. He too has to exorcise demons from the past, thus deepening the theme of redemption, which applies to Xu as well as to Liu.

Jake Pollock's luscious widescreen cinematography adds a dash of fairytale color to the moist, glossy rolling hills, meadows and bamboo bushes of the ethnically rich Yunnan countryside. While hard rock score of Peter Kam and Chan Kwong Wing (the composing duo of "Bodyguards and Assassins," produced by Chan) tends to be too relentlessly energetic at times, sound is used expertly for maximum threatening effect, especially in the presence of the chief of the 13 Demons (Jimmy Wang Yu).
Cannes 2011 Review: Peter Chan's Awesome Martial Arts Film 'Wu Xia'
May 15, 2011
by Alex Billington
Peter Chan's Wu Xia

I love most martial arts movies, but there are a few in particular that stand out above others, like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (which premiered in Cannes in 2000), and Wu Xia is one of those exceptional films. Now I know why Cannes chose to feature it. Wu Xia (being titled either Swordsmen and/or Dragon in English) is the latest film from Chinese director Peter Ho-Sun Chan, also of The Warlords a few years ago, and it's awesome. While it does have a few fantastic fight scenes, he never sacrifices story for spectacle, which pays off as it's a film that I enjoyed from start to finish and will definitely be revisiting in the future.

The easiest - and honestly best - way to describe Wu Xia would be to say it's A History of Violence but set in early 1900s China, about a paper maker named Liu Jinxi (played exceptionally by Donnie Yen) living peacefully with his family in a small rural Chinese town. Obviously that description hints at the fact that he has a rather intriguing past, and he may just be a martial arts expert even though he's hiding it now. When two thugs attempt to rob the town's general store, Jinxi miraculously defeats them, making it look like it was all just an accident. But when an investigator comes to town and starts to look closer at the incident, he begins to notice that Jinxi may not be the peaceful family man he claims, stirring up his sordid past again.

The one word that kept coming to mind watching this film was indeed "awesome". It's much more of a drama than a martial arts epic like True Legend, but it has a strong enough story to make up for that. And while there aren't a lot of fight scenes, the few we do get are awesome. When the investigator comes to town, he "revisits" the general store crime scene and watches (by putting himself "into the scene") the action take place, trying to discover how Jinxi was able to defeat them. Chan uses slow motion and beautiful cinematography which, unlike with Zack Snyder, is actually integral to the story because it's used to show how every tiny inflection, every last millisecond, is important in martial arts/kung fu. It's exciting to watch.

Donnie Yen is unquestionably the driving force in Wu Xia and carries the weight of the entire film on his shoulders, delivering a fantastic performance that has made him one of my favorite international actors. The rest of the cast, including Wei Tang as Jinxi's wife, is great as well. While I could complain about the lack of fights, that would be unnecessary for this film, and if anything would suggest that they trim about 10 minutes from some of the drama in the middle to tighten it up. But besides that, this is a film that I totally loved. It's exceptionally entertaining, even comical at times, and totally awesome in every sense of the word.