The Crossing

The previous episode, as a foreshadowing story, focuses on depicting several groups of characters whose fate is entangled in the context of the great era. The story still makes sense, but the texture of the epic has not been made.

It is said to be the Chinese version of Titanic. Well, grossly overstated. Even though I have only watched the first part of this saga and the characters have yet boarded the fatal vessel Tai Ping, I do not think I would miss much not seeing the second part.

The crossing is quite disappointing from inside out on all aspects. The historic background is forever fascinating: at the end of the Sino-Japan War in the early 1940s, the Chinese Nationalists (Kuomintang) was fighting the Japanese fiercely by collaborating with the communists and the Russians. Then after the Japanese were gone, the Nationalists had to fight the Communists in a civil war amid their own corrupted administration. In the end they had to retreat to Taiwan which had already been governed by Japan for 50 years.

It is under this backdrop the movie attempts to depict three tragic romances in a turbulent era: a marriage between a Kuomintang general Lei Yifang (Huang Xiaoming) and wealthy young woman Zhou Yufen (Korean actress Song Hye-kyo) who plays the piano very well; a Taiwanese army doctor Yan Zekun (Takeshi Kaneshiro) for the Japanese army and his Japanese girlfriend Masako (Japanese actress Nagami Nagasawa) in Taiwan; and a pseudo relationship for convenience between a Kuomintang soldier Tong Daqing (Tong Dawei) and a country woman Yu Zhen (Zhang Ziyi) looking for her lost lover in the army. Looking at the background and the complexity of each relationship, perhaps each could have been developed into an independent story, thus exploring the themes of social class, national identity, political ideology versus practical survival, cultural differences, loyalty in the army versus morality etc. Instead, producers have squeezed these romances together and packed with tons of visually impressive battle and explosion scenes, later to be converted into 3-D. It just does not work very well.

The worst part is how the plot is crafted: there is very little character development/interaction or relationship depiction that path the way to convince the audience that the relationships help the characters to get through their tough lives which seems to be one main theme of the movie. Most of their longing for each other are based on narration either through letters or reading from a diary where audience cannot see how and why they miss/love each other so much. Then the editing is so abrupt that it feels very choppy: the audience are always led to other scenes and emotions when one scene is not even fully developed.

As for the acting, the poor plot and script development inhibits the actors from portraying complex emotions. Thus it is very hard for the audience to feel moved. Among the cast, Zhang Ziyi has done the best among others but we still have limited feelings for her. On that point, if including a Korean and Japanese cast is for marketing consideration, I begin to feel the political considerations for portraying the Nationalists in a negative light to cater for the Chinese market would really hinder the movie's artistic development.

Whenever there are three subplots in a movie, there should be some relationships between them – a good example is Disconnect - but in The Crossing the connection is quite weak, not to mention the three romances are quite superficial in themselves and could have been heavily reworked.

Even the make up/camera angle is poor which fail to bring out the radiant youth of the characters. Too many close ups exposing the aged faces when the actors are supposed to be teenagers. These could have been easily fixed by after production but obviously not taken care of.

All in all, I feel quite a waste of huge budget on the explosion scenes and historic background. In terms of depicting ordinary lives during wartime, Little House is much much better. I think The Crossing aims too high, overextends itself too much to hit a too wide spectrum of audience. Thus it has compromised its literal, historical and artistic value.

Lastly, even the preview of part II is done tactlessly which cannot entice the audience to crave for more. One probably does not miss much not watching this, let alone part II. Too bad.

This is an epic drama of the conflict between the Nationalists and Communists post WW2 in China and subsequent escape to Taiwan.

The good points. The story is engrossing. It doesn't try to cram too many characters in like some other epic Chinese historical dramas. There are several distinct stories that that involve the viewer. A Taiwanese doctor (Takeshi Kaneshiro) and his Japanese girlfriend (Masami Nagasawa), a Nationalist general (Huang Xiao Ming) and his upper class wife (Song Hye Kyo), and a humble soldier (Tong Dawei) and the nurse turned prostitute he loves (Zhang Ziyi). The production values are high and cinematography is good. Zhang Ziyi as the nurse acts convincingly. The movie shows the senseless tragedy in fighting a civil war just after WW2.

The bad points The battle scenes are way too exaggerated and this hurts the story. The explosions and fireballs are just too Tarantino huge for the 1940s. The romances are a too coy and cutesy and the some of the romantic dialog is painfully bad that it's comical. Zhang Ziyi and Takeshi Kaneshiro act well enough but some of the other acting is below par. Huang Xiao Ming Song is too preening that it is comical especially with the aviator sunglasses. Song Hye Kyo has this wistful look that belongs in Korean soap operas. The subtitles are small and in white so they can't be clearly read sometimes.

Overall it's worth a watch for the epic sweep that covers a tumultuous time in Chinese history not often shown on film. Have to wait till next year for the conclusion and ship sinking.

Not my kind of movie, but this one didn't bored me as hell as Titanic did. I've read people complaining about complexity of the trama, I only can say that way is the american public: they want all fast and easy, they don't want to think too much. But if you like a bit more complex tramas, give The Crossing a try.

I can only say that the director thinks too much. Multi-line narrative, but the whole story was cut apart. There are too many roles involved, too many complicated plots, too many side details to be cut off, and the result is that the slow pace makes people fall asleep. The camera language tends to be exquisite, trying to show rich feelings, and actually more procrastinating.