Red Cliff (Parts I and II)

The Los Angeles County Museum of Art will screen John Woo's Red Cliff as a part of their Hard Boiled Hong Kong Weekend Series.

Woo's glorious Hong Kong homecoming reunites him with Hard Boiled star Tony Leung for the director's grandest production. This staggering epic is based on a legendary 3rd century battle as the tyrannical, power-hungry Han Dynasty clashes with fearless warlords. Alluding to Woo's gritty policiers—at one point a swordsman skirmishes with a baby strapped to his back—Red Cliff also returns him to the wuxia entertainments of his 1970s apprenticeship; albeit on a colossal scale brimming with intricately staged combat and breathtaking vistas. Cut down to nearly half its original running time for a limited US release, the complete version of Red Cliff which LACMA will screen has broken box-office records throughout Asia. "The director's magnum opus…the sweeping narrative is now replete with elaborate animal metaphors and additional meteorological incidents, not to mention excised subplots, stratagems, and saccharine sentimental interludes. There's also a wonderfully convoluted ambush-cum-battle-sequence lasting half an hour and featuring baroque tactics to rival the flaming finale (this, too, is longer by half). Bottom line: Red Cliff is now 288 minutes, not one of them dull."—J. Hoberman.
2009/color/144 min./Scope | Scr: John Woo, Chan Khan, Kuo Cheng, Sheng Heyu, dir: John Woo; w/ Tony Leung, Takeshi Kaneshiro, Zhang Fengyi, Chang Chen, Zhao Wei
Bing Theater | $10 general admission. $7 museum members, seniors (62+), students with valid ID.