The Banquet (China 2006 original title “Yeyan”)

If you have seen Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon and/or Hero - you’ve seen this before.

Of the three Hero in my opinion is the best of the three.  This film was in fact produced by the same production team as Crouching Tiger.   I kept having the sensation of “haven’t I seen this before.” To those who have not seen either of the above films this will be a novel experience for you.    This is the new age of Chinese cinema.   Big, bold, beautiful and full of outlandishly incredible martial arts moves.    It is visually stunning as all in this genre are.
They try to woo audiences with the claim of this being akin to loose interpretation of Hamlet.  loose is the operative word.   At 131 minutes at least 30 minutes could have been removed without damaging the film.   I was surprised to find that this was the final edit and has been in release for over a year.

Film: +++ (3/5) too long, been there done that cinemagraphically
Movie: +++ (3/5) too long, non hollywood ending (but neither is hamlet), been there done that