HERO Review

Rating: Five Stars (out of five)

Written by Peter Nilsson in Swedish and translated to English by Peter Nilsson, PASSAGEN

A true visual masterpiece is what the viewers take part of. Without exaggerating I must say that this is something of the most beautiful I ever seen. It is truly astonishing, what an unbelievable piece of work they must put down on the every detail, the lighting, the  surroundings, the colors and the costumes, everything is perfect. The whole movie is dazzling and I cannot see any reason of not loving it.

Jet Li is familiarly well-known by most people right now and I suppose that it was because of his face that draws most of audiences from outside Asia. Did the audiences get what they wanted of him then? Absolutely. I even dare to say that the role he plays here is one of his best. Here he has the opportunity to act as an actor and not just to fight in a regular basis as in many of his other movies. His dark and silent feature impressed me a lot. He was really great.

Zhang Ziyi has most recently become one of my personal favorites. Since I saw her in Zhang Yimou's "The Road Home", she has got a huge impact on me when it comes to know of really qualitative acting. In Hero she goes under the name "Moon" and she remains as a sort of mystic person that you get to know fairly little about. I really liked her part here and anything else would is totally wrong to state. But has she done better in the past? Yes. From my point of view she has done better roles before - she is still my favorite in "The Road Home".

The always charming Maggie Cheung, as usually, looks like an unbreakable doll of glass and her charisma is immense. She was superb from the beginning to the end and I cannot find a single flaw in her acting. She definitely gets high acting skills.

Donnie Yen's character "Sky" was given a bit too small space which was kind of sad and a bit disappointing. I knew by the way that he should just appear in a small role but I had really expected a bigger one. But there is nothing to fret about; instead we should appreciate the part he had, which in my eyes was an amazing one. The duel between him and Jet Li was truly one of the finest fights I have ever seen.

Tony Leung does not need any bigger presentation. He is one of Hong Kong's hottest names right now and he has been around for quite a while. It was a magnificent role he had here, one of his best ones in recent years. On one way I was constantly reminded of his part in Wong Kar-Wais "Ashes Of Time" while watching Hero. The look was almost the same and also the way he acted makes me felt familiar.

The story was very interesting and giving and the movie is to a certain level based on actual events that occurred during that time. Something that was slowing the tempo through was all the flashbacks and the different versions of how the story really happened. It is certainly a very good idea but it did not work all the time. But I cannot say that I lost my interest of the movie for one moment. Everything was so beautiful and delightful that it felt like a dream you never wanted it to end. The world is like taken from a fairytale with mighty and grand palaces, peaceful and colorful forests, glitzy lakes and barren deserts.

To a movie like this the soundtrack is invaluable. Dun Tun that made the glorious melodies to Ang Lees "Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon" has done it in Hero to. Many people have stated that the music lacks of originality. Yes you can hear the similarity to "CTHD" here but it still has very good and touching tones. Another thing that gave the movie a nice feeling was the language which was in mandarin. It is in every way much more beautiful than Cantonese that I thought was going to be spoken first.

One of Hero’s leading moments was the fight scenes. I do not think anyone could mention a bad thing about them and the choreography. Ching Siu-Tung seldom disappoints us. He is truly one of the best choreographers of our times. The fights can be resembled to a dance, flawless performed and enchantingly beautiful. The duel between Zhang Ziyi and Maggie Cheung must be one of the most beautiful scenes ever made, so colorful and filled with passion. Unbelievable! As what I have already mentioned, Donnie Yen and Jet Li offered us one of the biggest highlights in cinema. The fight was very intense and fast, in which both of the actors definitely showed their best. There is another duel that stands above the others too and I am talking about the one when Jet Li and Tony Leung fight with each other in their minds. The whole scenario takes place on a lake, and the feeling of it really touched me. A more beautiful place to film is probably impossible to find.

Hero is like a beautiful painting you never wanted to stop watching. It is art performed from beginning to end and a true piece of art that nobody would want to miss. See it and be seduced!