handsome, endless

Another triumph for Lee, who delivers an intense story about womanhood and patriotism. The theme is quite heavy, with analogies about sexual identity and altruistic set of mind. The plot is simplistic yet elegant and the art direction is exceptional. Acting is top notch as well, Wei Tang is an incredibly talented actress with the rare ability of conveying sensuality with subtlety. She's being blackballed in China for her role in this film, and all I can say is that China can suck it.

A few missteps (having all the students there at the end, come on), but overall a marvelous film. Tang Wei is a revelation, thankfully she's finally been unblacklisted by the Chinese government apparently.

Harrowing. There's this quiet yet relentless undercurrent of melancholy that flows throughout the film, stealthily eating away at your insides until you've got that hollow feeling in the pit of your stomach. Ang Lee has a gift for making even the simplest of stories completely mesmerizing.

wow

Sensual

Easily one of Ang Lee's best. Beautifully shot and performed, it only suffers from it's pacing, as it's a little too long.

This was a solid film. The acting was great. Wai especially, but Tang was fantastic too. Lovely cinematography, but it never blew me away. I was never convinced of the drama club's motivations, to be honest. I believed Kuang, but the others were so dedicated with seemingly so little I couldn't believe they'd stick to it through so much. The film never really cleared that up either and in the end, it never elevated itself beyond "just a spy movie". At least it's a good spy movie though.

Lust, Caution, set in Shanghai during the WWII occupation by Japan, revolves around a woman infiltrating in the life of a hated collaborator. Though very well acted by Tony Leung Chiu Wai and Wei Tang, Lust, Caution fails to captivate as much as I thought it would, despite some good direction, nice imagery, and some very revealing sex scenes. The screenplay just doesn't deliver what it could have.

A fairly conventional and somewhat thin story. There just wasn't enough substance to fill 2 hours and 38 minutes. If the movie was 45 minutes shorter, the pacing wouldn't have felt so stretched and it would have been much better. However, Ang Lee's top notch direction and the beautiful settings and costumes nearly redeem the entire movie and make it very watchable. The sex scenes don't hurt either.

"Se, jie" is another elegant and suave film from the versatile Ang Lee, skillfully made as always, well-written and sharply acted. But the fact that it's unoriginal and overlong prevents it from being fully satisfying. Still, Lee's craft, impressive production design and several powerful performances trigger off plenty of emotionally potent or suspenseful scenes. As a result, this is a taut as well as sensual espionage drama that unfortunately misses greatness due to dragging on for too long.

I will admit, I had a little bit of difficulty keeping track of what was going on. Keeping up with the characters, especially with their strange (to an English speaker) and similar names. It was a pretty decent thriller though. A fair bit of graphic sexual content. The cinematography was absolutely gorgeous, as were the costumes and set design.

"Ang Lee seems to want to butt-**** Paul Verhoeven's Black Book, slightly amending that film's sketchy sexual politics but flattening its stirring socio-cultural purview, ending up similarly half-cocked." - Ed Gonzalez

This is pretty much perfect, although the most crucial plot-point towards the end had me baffled. Apart from that, perfect. My god, the camera.