Recently, I finally got to see the movie, Hero. The movie was touted as the next Crouching Tiger. I must say I didn't exactly agree with that.The scenery and pageantry in the movie are outstanding; though by the nature of the story taking place near the desert rather than the mountains to the north, the powerful images of the clouded temples is missing. However, there are beautiful scenes still, such as the fight that Flying Snow (Maggie Cheung) does with Moon (Ziyi Zhang) in a field of leaves or watching Broken Sword dance across a canvas as arrows assaulted them outside.
However the different imagery isn't why I don't agree to the comparison between the two movies, it's the storyline. In Crouching Tiger, the story settles around two couples and their quest for love. In Hero, the story is more political and, for me, pulled at the heartstring of what it meant to be Chinese and the Martial Arts takes a proper second seat to the plot.
Since I won't give away the plot of the story, what makes this story so impressive to me and critical to review as we speak about Languages on this column is the continual reference to writing and swordplay.
Prior to Emperor Qin Shi Huang, much of China was divided, including the writing systems. Under his rule, for the first time, China had a consolidated form which was applied across all of his empire. This is much akin to declaring a national language today.
In addition, during the movie, the Emperor and the nameless hero make comments about how influential swordplay is to writing. We hear a bit about this in Crouching Tiger, a fleeting moment when Yu Shu Lien (Michelle Yeoh) first figures out that Jen Yu (Ziyi Zhang) is indeed the thief they seek. She is able to do this because she sees the power of her calligraphy, a power that is normally only displayed by men or those who do sword work.
This concept of a trained observer being able to tell a lot about the writer based on how strong they write, was covered briefly in my other article on Basics of Chinese Calligraphy. It is one of the bases of Chinese writing.
If you think about it, writing with a brush, one must hold the brush precisely vertical. The proper form is to have the brush vertical to the paper and the hand parallel. This creates a somewhat awkward position for those unfamiliar with the use of the brush.
As you write, the stroke then comes from the twists of the wrist coupled with the movement of the whole arm, not just the hand. When you do sword play, be it in Martial Arts or Fencing, your movement of the sword, forward and back, is from the arm but the actual strikes come from a twist of your wrist. The concept is further aligned with the position of the elbow. Be it writing or sword-work, the elbow must maintain a linear path for the action to be correct.
Writing on paper, just as it was in olden times in Europe, was a costly practice. Rice paper was delicate and hard to come by but for the very rich or academia. Thus, as in the movie, it was not uncommon for people to use other media to practice their writing before transferring it to the final canvas. In the movie, they used sand. This could have just as easily been replaced by soil if they were located closer to coastal areas.
So while Hero, did do a wonderful job with the Martial Arts, it is really the political and philosophical messages of the movie that struck at my heart and made this movie unique and worth going to see.
