Crouching Tiger and the asses in the theater

[Jasper Sharp]

I had the same problem with "reading no writing" the other day when I
managed to drag an English colleague out to see CTHD here in Amsterdam,
rather forgetting of course that I am living in a foreign country, and
therefore the subtitles would be in Dutch. This not a problem for me, as
"Nederlands Ondertitels" was the main reason I decided to learn to read
Dutch as quickly as possible when I first moved here - so I wasn't limited
to English language films only. Anyway, I'm glad to say that my friend loved
the film, despite not understanding a word of it, and is now eager to catch
up on the rest of my Asian cinema recommendations.

People in the UK and the US may blench at the thought of watching films in
other languages, but for the rest of the world, its just a fact of life. So
the message is that if people would rather watch dross like THE MATRIX, then
let them, but if by watching films like CDHT (which incidentally, I liked
but ultimately have seen far better films recently and couldn't see anything
so special about it) just a couple of people come to realise that there are
films being made elsewhere in the world other than California, then this can
only be a good thing. 

Incidentally, for all its good points, if CTHD hadn't been directed by the
same director who did SENSE AND SENSABILITY and THE ICE STORM, it probably
would never have got distributed in the US. Lets hope its success means a
lot more films from Asia finally get shown over this side of the world.

Regards
Jasper Sharp




-----Original Message-----
From: JERRY TURNER [mailto:dr_pluto at yahoo.com]
Sent: 21 February 2001 20:07
To: KineJapan at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu
Subject: Re: Crouching Tiger and the asses in the theater


Thought I would jump on the wagon here. First let me
state I think CTHD is one of the most beautiful movies
I have ever seen. I also noticed quite a bit of
laughter during the film. The first 15 minutes of the
film 20 people walked out. "Don't nobody want to read
no writing." The thing is CTHD was not mentioned as a
subtitled movie. I didn't even know until about two
days before I went. Most Americans don't respond well
to subtitles. Everything should be catered to us
right?

The laughing: 

Number one it pissed me off to no end. The part where
the young girl beats ass is funny, that I will admit.
I just didn't find the part with Chow and the girl
fighting in the trees funny. I really enjoyed the
quietness of it. 

What people don't understand, including that lame dick
on the today show is the story is based on an almost
supernatural tale. A TALL tale. That's what I think
the flying represented. 

I think as the result of the film's success more
martial arts films will probably be released in the
states with small popularity except among us Asian
film buffs. CTHD kinda had the Blair Witch syndrome.
Billed as the super scary movie, Blair Witch was
praised by the critics but 90 percent of the American
population didn't know what to make of it. 

Bottom line, most people will continue to watch (I'm
gonna get blasted for this) marginally good martial
arts films like the Matrix (yes I know the same guy
did the fight scenes) because they "don't want to read
no pictures."

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