>>REVIEW
THE PROMISE
STARRING Hiroyuki Sanada, Jan Dong-Gun, Nicholas Tse and Cecilia Cheung
DIRECTED BY Chen Kaige
Opens Friday, May 5
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Sometimes when an acclaimed director leaves too much to chance, an enchanting idea can end up strangely impotent. Chen Kaige’s highly anticipated film, The Promise, promises much, but is an overly-romanticized production plagued with inconsistency.
China’s official 2005 entry for the foreign language film Oscar, The Promise is set in the martial arts fantasy genre and follows the fates of three men who fall for a princess cursed by destiny and forbidden to experience true love.
In a world 3,000 years past, goddess and man intertwine in bargains enslaved beyond life and death. Here, destiny plays a key role in the plot line and reaches past the inked concepts of script and actor, and the film itself appears to have been hexed.
Boasting a budget of more than $35 million, the most ever spent on a Chinese film, the special effects are, for lack of a better word, cheap. Cartoonish and rushed, these sequences might have been forgivable, but editing of headless horsemen proportions, under-punctuated action sequences and the film’s overly charmed presentation leave special effects as just another element of its failures.
In the editing, the movie flops thanks to transition sequences so bad that it lacks any cinematic flow. Action sequences are disappointingly immature compared to the dazzling displays seen in Crouching Tiger or House of Flying Daggers and, the film fails to convey any sense of reality. In fantasy, however absurd the premise, an element of reality must exist to connect the audiences to what motivates the characters – The Promise forgets this rule.
However, actors Hiroyuki Sanada (General), Jan Dong-Gun (Slave), Nicholas Tse (Duke of the North) and Cecilia Cheung (Princess) are each strong in their performances and well-cast, delivering what depth was available in a script void of inspired dialogue.
Interruption from production houses and studio entanglements has caused Chen to state that this newly released version of the film didn’t reflect his original vision. The Promise is a tortuous example of what can occur when too many minds disturb one man’s humble creative process. |
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