White Vengeance

I was fortunate enough to have caught this film during a long haul flight from Nagoya to Detroit. The English title was nondescript and did not hold much promise in itself. But luckily, I took that chance and witnessed a grand film inspired by an episode of Chinese history with some personal significance.

It is said that our family line extends from Liu Bang, the first emperor of the Han Dynasty. It was very interesting to see him portrayed in a movie for me to get a further idea of who this illustrious ancestor was.

The movie is set in the waning days of the Qin Dynasty. The impulsive Xiang Yu (Feng Shaofeng) and the compassionate Liu Bang (Leon Lai) lead the forces against the last Qin Emperor. But both of them also aspire to become the new Emperor themselves, leading to confrontation of military strategy and wits. There is also the additional gambit of a common love interest in the character of Yu Ji (YiFei Liu) to further spice up the conflicts.

The secondary characters of the respective wise advisers for each camp were as much front and center as the two lead characters. These were the elderly blind Fan Zeng (Anthony Wong) for camp Xiang Yu and the younger but equally masterful Zhang Liang (Hanyu Zhang) for camp Liu Bang. Watching their climactic battle-royale on the Weiqi game board was quite a spectacle to watch as filmed, although admittedly my lack of knowledge about game mechanics detracted from full appreciation. Those vague English subtitles with seemingly random numbers did not help at all.

It took time to get into the story as the story was told in flashbacks and the characters could all look the same until you get to know each one in more detail. The director Daniel Lee helps us by employing some color-coordination in the costumes to distinguish whose forces were whose. Once you get into the groove of the story, it will draw you into its spell.

The contrast of both rivals to the throne was emphasized up the film's conclusion, as one ended with melodramatic romance, and the other ended steeped in political paranoia. It was a well-told story overall, although we know this could not have been how it exactly happened in real life. It does make me want to read more about the actual historical events that inspired this movie.

This is a movie about an event that actually happened in Chinese history, but it takes artistic license and changes what happened in reality. The result is an almost unrecognizable story to what happened with Liu Bang and Xiang Yu during the war of Chu-Han contention.

The story is about one of the most famous war in Chinese history between the two rivals Liu Bang and Xiang Yu for the control of entire China. History is clear about who the winner is and Liu Bang becomes the first emperor of the Han dynasty. But this is one of the most exciting story in Chinese history next to "The Romance of the Three Kingdoms".

Whatever they changed from the historical story actually made the story worse. I have no idea why the producers chose to make the story into the drama that is this movie. The plot of the original story is far better than this story. There is no build up to the conflict that happens in the real story of Liu Bang and Xiang Yu. It also doesn't show why Xiang Yu who was clearly winning at the start, ended up losing his force, and eventually gets surrounded by Liu Bang's army. Feast at the Hong gate was one of the turning point of this war, and Xiang Yu had a once in a life time opportunity to kill Liu Bang, but failed to cash in on this opportunity. He never recovered from this mistake, and his tactics meanders after this meeting until his eventual demise.

There is so much highlight scenes in this war, and the characters were all so interesting, but this movie screwed all of this up. All the good details of the story never made it into this movie. The two hour long movie could easily have been an hour and a half if the useless drama the script writer inserted into the story were edited out.

Failure of script writing is the ultimate downfall of this movie. Compared to "The Red Cliff I and II" where director John Woo carefully inserted his interpretation to the story, which made that story so good, this movie had no such story telling behind it.

Too bad, for the money they put into this movie, it could have been another "Assassin" level production. A better movie about Liu Bang and Xiang Yu is awaited with more spot light on the interesting characters, and build up to the story.

Tells the story of The Banquet at Hongmen, an event that marked the transition from the Qin Dynasty to the Han Dynasty in Chinese history.

Liu Bang and Xiang Yu are leaders of insurgent forces who work together to defeat the last remnants of Qin forces, but then each set their eyes on becoming emperor of the new dynasty. They both turn to their respective strategists, Zhang Liang and Fan Zeng, for advice. The advisors each formulate plans in an attempt to ensure their sponsor's success over the other, and engage in a battle of wits and cunning to achieve victory over their opponent. The opposing forces both put their plans into action starting at a banquet at the Hongmen Gate. Whose cunning will prove to be greater, whose foresight will be longer? Who will emerge victorious in the end? White Vengeance is a gorgeous production of suitably epic proportions, built around a well written script that succeeds in bringing these historical events and characters to life. The battle of wits, cunning and bravado makes for a great story, and the cast have been well chosen to fill their roles. Anthony Wong is particularly good as the aging, blind strategist, but the show is nearly stolen by Jordan Chan in a supporting role that gives the film two of its most memorable scenes. The presence of Liu Yi-Fei, whose face is surely the strongest argument for the existence of God that man has conceived, is of course most welcome.

The film has a number of battle scenes, which are generally very well executed. CGI is obviously used to make the massive armies seem truly massive, but is mostly eschewed for any close-up combat situations, with good old-fashioned people and the occasional wire, and just the occasional bit of CGI when somebody needs a sword, arrow or spear to go through them without alarming the film's insurance company unduly. This makes for some highly satisfying scenes of combat and carnage.

It's the dialogue and the characters that make the film though. Unfortunately, things do get a bit derailed towards the end with some scenes that are simply overcooked, and performances that lose their subtlety and break the illusion that we really are witnessing events as they unfurled. It's a shame, but the flaws aren't sufficient to undo the good work that comes before them.

Recommended.

This movie reminds me the classics by Akira Kurosawa. It contains a big surprise at the end. White Vengeance is about two Qin dynasty military strategists trying to trick opponents by using human weakness(..and more). Though it's not truthfully based on the well-known Qin dynasty story, the action moves on smoothly and maintains the suspense quite well. See it to believe and see it to appreciate the old Chinese wisdom.

Quote from Sun Tze's The Art of War:

Thus the highest form of generalship is to balk the enemy's plans; the next best is to prevent the junction of the enemy's forces; the next in order is to attack the enemy's army in the field; and the worst policy of all is to besiege walled cities.

Therefore the skillful leader subdues the enemy's troops without any fighting; he captures their cities without laying siege to them; he overthrows their kingdom without lengthy operations in the field.

Zhang Hanyu and Huang Qiusheng gave us excellent performance.I love the strategies and ending.