House of Flying Daggers
28 January 2005, terribly early in the morning
After going to Jane Bond with Shima, the both of us headed to the new Princess Cinema to watch House of Flying Daggers. The movie is set in ancient China, and follows how two cops use a rebel girl they have captured as bait in a trap to ensnare the group she works for, the group the movie is named after. House of Flying Daggers features plenty of exciting martial arts sequences, and is in many ways a pretty typical martial arts film. What makes it better then most is the superb cinematography. Unfortunately, the film just can’t compete with its predecessor Hero. Hero was an exceptional film. House of Flying Daggers was good. I can’t fault House of Flying Daggers for not being as good as Hero, plenty of films aren’t. However, with the cast and director this film had, I was expecting much more. The movie is still worth watching; it is much more entertaining then a lot of the stuff Hollywood churns out.
I made sure I knew nothing about the movie before I watched it and during the first scene I had hopes that HoFD would turn out to be an ancient Chinese police procedural. I was disappointed in that sense.
I also preferred Hero, I felt HoFD was too concentrated on too few characters, which made it less interesting. However, it’s still a good movie and worth watching.
by mk on January 28 2005, 4:20 am #
I agree, I expected a lot more from HofD, but it wasn’t as good as Hero.
Hero also had very few characters involved, however the story had some interesting twists and the grand theme behind it was quiet powerful and thought-provoking. Whereas in HofD everything is “just a love story”, although those can be powerful too, in the movie the apparently deep relationships just weren’t believably conveyed (in story terms), they were arbitrary. And there was no other theme that could have rescued the plot.
by Sencer on January 28 2005, 6:57 am #
I’ll check out the movie, so many pirated versions of it floating around…Didn’t realize it was still in theaters….Ram get the new Stereophonics track…”dakota”..it reminds me of “a thousand trees”..and I know you dug that track…
by ahilan on January 28 2005, 9:04 am #
I felt the movie wasn’t that great. I was expecting something great.
by Krishna on January 29 2005, 4:47 pm #
Couldn’t stand the ending to HoFD – this was a much more gimmicky film than Hero. Still an entertaining movie, but Hero was superior.
by Erik on February 2 2005, 12:45 am #
I haven’t seen flying daggers yet, but I thought Hero was ok. It is a nice story, but not too much an action movie. I was expecting one.
How is life Ram? Are you still in school or done?
by Dan on February 2 2005, 11:12 pm #
I’ve been done for a while; I’m working now. Hero was excellent; it’s probably one of the best looking movies ever. The story is great too. There are so many lame martial arts films; Hero was thoroughly exceptional.
by ramanan on February 3 2005, 1:35 am #