Jie Mi

The long-awaited comeback of filmmaker Chen Sicheng presents a well-crafted, delicately performed period drama centered around an autistic young code-breaker and his American tutor, who also serves as his rival.

"Decoded," directed by Chen Sicheng, is a 2024 Chinese film that explores the complex realms of cryptography and espionage. The story centers on a talented cryptographer who finds himself caught in a high-stakes pursuit, striving to unravel a series of enigmatic messages with potentially significant consequences.

The film boasts impressive visuals, featuring cinematography that effectively conveys both the tension of the storyline and the allure of its locations. Chen Sicheng's direction skillfully balances suspenseful moments with character development. The cast delivers strong performances, especially the lead Haoran Liu, who adds depth to a multifaceted character grappling with ethical challenges in a secretive environment.

Despite its captivating premise, some viewers might perceive the pacing as inconsistent, particularly during the second act, where the narrative occasionally loses focus. Additionally, certain aspects of the plot may seem familiar to genre enthusiasts, lacking the fresh twists that could enhance the experience... and all that extended to over 2.5 hours!

In summary, "Decoded" presents a compelling examination of its themes, bolstered by solid performances and high production quality. It is likely to attract thriller aficionados and those intrigued by the subtleties of cryptography, although it may not completely fulfill the expectations of those in search of an innovative storyline.

From a Western perspective this was an odd one, Chinese protagonist with the West portrayed as the bad guys(or at least the opposition) for the bulk of the movie.

Yet as an autistic individual, the protagonist was at least autistic-coded and relatable, missing a lot of social cues but honourable.

The main Western character wasn't portrayed as evil per se though the portrayal was still a bit odd. Exile fleeing occupied Poland, winds up in China having picked up native-level US-English along the way. OK, right fine.

And er...major goof..."I am the Walrus" had not been released in 1964 yet it still gets referenced heavilly.

Still, what felt like a "scraping the bottom of the barrel" cinema trip still worked out with the main conflict portrayed as a brutal chess match between friends turned rivals.

I went into the movie thinking it's the Chinese Oppenheimer. It is that, but it's also influenced by Cloud Atlas, Inception and A Beautiful Mind.

The film is visually beautiful. The dream sequences were the most visually interesting and reminded me of the epic scenes in Cloud Atlas.

The acting was well done. This is a Chinese film, a Chinese story, a love letter to China. The theme of love runs throughout, juxtaposed against the backdrop of war. Love of family, love of a mentor/student, romantic love, and all culminating in a love of country.

The reason I felt A Beautiful Mind and Inception were more influential is the main character's struggle to know what is real and what is the dream world.

What could have been better:

Pacing. Some parts were slower, followed by a fast paced scene. Seemed like a piece of classical music with adagio movements leading up to crescendo parts. While it works in music, for me, it doesn't work as well in film.

I would have liked more references to when things were taking place. There are a few, but at a point they stop and maybe it's to make the audience feel as lost as the main character, but it didn't help the story.

Also, more cross language scenes. The film is predominantly in Chinese with English/Chinese subtitles, but when John Cusack is on screen he predominantly speaks English.

John Cusack's character at the beginning is a Polish math professor in China teaching to all Chinese students and there wasn't even an interpreter.

Logically, I was looking for some demonstration that the students knew English or the presence of an interpreter.

I could say more but I don't want to give out spoilers.

Overall, a good solid movie.

The movie is really long ... a total of 2 hours and 40ish minutes... going in I thought i was going to fall asleep and miss out a few scenes but the story actually kept me up.

Think of this movie as what Oppenheimer SHOULD have been... Oppenheimer being so long drawout, boring, slow, and way too political correct... This movie hits the sweet spot between being insightful/intelligent vs story telling/fiction. The flow of the plot is just very well thoughtout that it keeps a consistant pace yet kept the contents interesting without trying to display political correctness and at the same time, kept the story mostly true to the past history in China. If you don't know much about the war in China, you'll learn alot about it. If you already know what had happened, you'll see it from a different yet very realistic perspective.

Highly recommeneded.

John cusack did an absolutely Oscar worth acting in the movie.

With a broken narrative, an abrupt and booming soundtrack, and a montage of interspersed dreams and realities, it's clear that the director is trying to tell the story of The Imitation Game and Oppenheimer in the same way that Inception did, with a disastrous ending.

The first half of the movie is a self-referential narrative of the hero's life, with random stuffing about the Sino-Japanese War, the Communist Civil War, and his sister's forbidden feelings for him (which part of the plot that I couldn't understand the most). The second half of the film is all about him having maniacal dreams inside the base and figuring out the math from them. Science is portrayed by the director as a joke, as rediculous as a Chinese dress-up Ferris wheels and merry-go-rounds imagined by a kid born in a rural area and sent to a closed base immediately after college.

The movie always depicts an enemy, be it the Japanese, the Nationalists, the Americans or his teacher, who is driven from a pure mathematician to a madman, and these pressures fall on the audience in equal proportions, while he himself suddenly figures everything out at the last second and then the movie comes to a screeching halt, leaving behind a bunch of pathetic viewers who have had a bellyful of vomitus and nowhere to vomit, and finally have to watch a bonus scene of the director's extreme narcissism.