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Author Topic: 1990s Far East Bracket: Verdicts  (Read 561820 times)

1SO

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Re: 1990s Far East Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #2310 on: December 08, 2016, 09:31:54 PM »
Resurrection Standings (the top three films will earn resurrection)
  • Audition
  • Hard Boiled
  • Wing Chun
  • Ringu
  • Pom Poko

Up next: To Live

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Really not a good round for my favorites.
Pom Poko
Hard Boiled

Audition
Ringu
To Live
Wing Chun

MartinTeller

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Re: 1990s Far East Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #2311 on: December 08, 2016, 10:48:11 PM »
Audition  (Miike Takashi, 1999)
Lost to Audition (verdict by Teproc)


How'd that happen?

pixote

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Re: 1990s Far East Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #2312 on: December 08, 2016, 11:15:31 PM »
Audition  (Miike Takashi, 1999)
Lost to Audition (verdict by Teproc)

How'd that happen?

Oops, thanks! Glad I made that mistake with Audition and not Wing Chun. Wouldn't have wanted to jeopardize that one-word opponent stat. That shit was gold.

pixote
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1SO

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Re: 1990s Far East Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #2313 on: December 09, 2016, 12:28:52 AM »
The Cherry Orchard vs. Comrades, Almost a Love Story

What's most interesting about pairing these two films is the ways each of them is theatrical/artificial and the ways they are truthful. The Cherry Orchard takes place in real time with limited locations and a lot of verbal drama. I read it being described as a filmed play, but the performances and dialogue are so natural it's more like a documentary with dynamic camerawork. It's the type of film where you can compliment it by saying it's a lot like real life, but I use that as a criticism because real life is boring and if you put me in a room with a bunch of students I'm not going to be very interested in many of their dramas. (Never has so much of a mountain ever been made about worrying if a girl caught smoking was going to put the performance of a play in jeopardy.)

Comrades opens with the peril of a stranger in a strange land, and I was immediately hooked. The first 10 minutes was more interesting than any scene in The Cherry Orchard, and that's before Maggie Cheung enters with a performance worthy of Awards. So what we have here is a more cinematic portrayal of relationships, with two characters who constantly and improbably continue to cross paths over many years, as if the heavens keep pushing them together. What begins as more standard sit-com fare quickly passes through a Before Sunrise filter, emerging out the other side as something with real emotional weight. Even with quirky sidebars involving the likes of William Holden and Mickey Mouse, the characters come through stronger and stronger as the film plays on.

VERDICT: Comrades, Almost a Love Story is a Discovery and I am happy to recommend it to someone else for the next round.

smirnoff

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Re: 1990s Far East Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #2314 on: December 09, 2016, 12:32:07 AM »
Yay!

Bondo

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Re: 1990s Far East Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #2315 on: December 09, 2016, 12:39:53 AM »
Jesus, almost lost both the films this bracket added to my top-100 list in one week, having already lost all my other bracket discoveries in the last round.

pixote

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Re: 1990s Far East Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #2316 on: December 09, 2016, 09:24:38 AM »
Round Four Resurrection Review



To Live  (Zhang Yimou, 1994)
Won over Good Men, Good Women (verdict by Sam the Cinema Snob)
Won over Legend of the Galactic Heroes: Overture to a New War (verdict by smirnoff)
Won over Hakuchi (verdict by Bondo)
Lost to Rebels of the Neon God (verdict by Jared)

I had a passing thought — which would have been equal parts funny and cruel — to conceal my feelings about this round's resurrection candidates and secretly rank the films in reverse order of worthiness. Then, at the close of the round, I'd reveal in a big dramatic twist that it was actually the bottom three film that were my favorites and earning another shot in this bracket. In that alternate universe, fans of To Live would have been happy today to see it leap to the top of the standings. That would have been a very tricky review to write, however. I suppose I'd have focused on my honest enthusiasm for Ge You's movie star qualities and for the scenes of operatic puppetry contained in the film, but after that I'd have really struggled to disguise just how bored I was with this Chinese history lesson. I don't know if it's just Far East fatigue on my part, having seen too many similar stories earlier in this bracket, or the fact that I tend not to like these family-through-the-decades type period pieces. To Live kept reminding me subconsciously of some other film that disappointed me fairly recently, but I couldn't put a finger on which one until I read this line in Leonard Maltin's Movie Guide's 3½-star review: "[The] only flaw is that episodic story eventually develops Edna Ferber-ish soap opera quality." That's when I realized I was thinking of George Stevens' Giant, which bores me in very similar fashion. The melodramatic qualities of Zhang's film also hurt my experience, particularly the huge coincidence involving a tragedy at the center of the film. With Ju Dou, I complained about Zhang's occasional tendency to let theme drive the narrative rather than derive from the narrative, and there's definitely some of that going on in To Live. The editing is a big weakness of the film, and the visuals, at times, are a bit more rote than I've come to expect from Zhang. I'm being overcritical now, though, for it's a very respectable production that presents an appealing human story against an epic backdrop, all anchored by some strong performances. It's just not for me.


Resurrection Standings (the top three films will earn resurrection)

Up next: Fist of Legend

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« Last Edit: December 09, 2016, 09:44:21 AM by pixote »
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Sam the Cinema Snob

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Re: 1990s Far East Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #2317 on: December 09, 2016, 09:28:42 AM »
Aww, that stinks. I really like this film and was hoping it would make it farther in the brackets.

pixote

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Re: 1990s Far East Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #2318 on: December 09, 2016, 10:29:10 AM »
Aww, that stinks. I really like this film and was hoping it would make it farther in the brackets.

Yeah, I know. :-/

I'm surprised just how many people really like To Live. I feel like if it were a 1994 Hollywood film with Holly Hunter and Kevin Costner, it'd be quickly dismissed as Oscar-bait.

Granted, 1994 saw a different history-through-one-man's-eyes movie take home the Best Picture statuette.

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pixote

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Re: 1990s Far East Bracket: Verdicts
« Reply #2319 on: December 11, 2016, 12:36:31 AM »
Round Four Resurrection Review



Fist of Legend  (Gordon Chan, 1994)
Won over Justice, My Foot! (verdict by edgar00)
Won over Your Place or Mine (verdict by ProperCharlie)
Won over Tokyo Fist (verdict by smirnoff)
Lost to Fist of Legend (verdict by PeacefulAnarchy)

I didn't hand-pick the screenshot above, but it's perfect. It captures all I really want from these films: Jet Li just looking cool and being a pure badass. And yet apparently that's easier said then done. Too many of these films — Fist of Legend included — clutter themselves up with overly complex and disappointingly silly plots that often only serve to distract from Li's star presence. This particular movie opens solidly, with the bone-warping introduction of Li's character, but it wasn't until the 95-minute mark that anything really made me cheer — a bad sign in a movie that runs only ten more minutes past that point. The editing is a big culpit here. There are too many inserts of the points of contact within the fight — e.g., fists and feet hitting their targets — creating a distraction from the lovely fluidity of Li's leg work and the intricacies of Yuen Woo-Ping's fight choreography. Li's physicality is the film's greatest asset, and I would have preferred seeing him do one-handed push-ups for five minutes to watching any of the scenes without him (of which there are too many). There's also a deliberate corniness to Fist of Legend that I don't really understand — the embarrassing musical score is of no help — but then I start to wonder how different, in quality and tone, this is to a movie like Van Damme's Bloodsport. I tend to approach these Hong Kong action films expecting Fred Astaire-caliber kung fu beauty, whereas with Bloodsport I'm just hungering for B-movie popcorn fun. I suppose that's unfair, but I come away disappointed from Fist of Legend regardless. Still, it bothers me that the final bracket of 32 films might lack a representative Hong Kong action film. If a full three undeniable resurrection candidates fail to present themselves, I might throw Hard Boiled back in there on reputation alone, somewhat disregarding my own experience with it.


Resurrection Standings (the top three films will earn resurrection)

Up next: Eagle Shooting Heroes. Hopefully BlueVoid has sufficiently lowered my expectation to the point where I can be pleasantly surprised by this one — because I confess that I've been rather dreading it.

pixote
« Last Edit: December 11, 2016, 12:38:54 AM by pixote »
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