Best Asian Epic Of The Year

Red Cliff



In 2008, or late '07 (with wide releases last year) there were really three films that qualified for the list - Red Cliff, Three Kingdoms, and The Warlords. Three Kingdoms was mildly entertaining, but nothing special (sorry Maggie) so in the end, that really left John Woo's Red Cliff (Part 1) and the Jet Li/Andy Lau/Takeshi Kaneshiro Blood Brothers epic The Warlords.

I almost put The Warlords on the top of the list - I think in part simply because of Andy Lau and Jet Li. Compared to Part 1 of Red Cliff, I couldn't help but think that in some ways they had stronger, better acting.

But Red Cliff pulled me in - even if slowly (because I didn't really get into it until the fifteen minute mark). Maybe it was the grand sweeping shots of the landscape, or Tony Leung Chiu-Wai, or Zhao Wei whispering into a horse's ear, or just the fact that it actually made me want to see Part 2 (which isn't always the case for me) - whatever the reasons really were - I guess in the end I had to agree with the rest of Asia.