Ben Straits

Period 2

Ms. Lyons

Hero Movement Film Critique

Hero is one of the best movies to study for the element of movement. The outstanding use of lyrical movement is abundant in this movie. Hero, directed by Yimou Zhang, is one of those movies that specialize in movement of the characters. Though during times the movements seem cheesy, or fake, it seems to work perfectly for this movie. During the intense sword fighting scenes, the actors would twist and turn about the screen, representing the effortless fighting styles of pre-modern battle. This movie is definitely for a more mature audience, merely for the violence. I believe this movie lives up to what it meant to do, a dramatic Asian inspired warrior fighting that uses lyrical movement to show the style of the fighters. Overall this movie wasn’t exactly for me, nevertheless this movie came out with what it meant too, and I would watch it strictly for that.

In Hero, the main actor is a pre-modern warfare Chinese warrior, who shows through flashbacks how he fought through three assassins who sought to defeat the most powerful war-lord in pre-unified China. Through his stories it shows how he fought the assassins, which uses the element of lyrical movement to show simplicity. One of the most apparent moving shots that I noticed throughout the film was the Dolly shot (The use of camera moving on a track). During almost all the fighting scenes, especially the one versus Sky, the use of a dolly was very noticeable. The dolly shot helped the scene move flawlessly to add extra finesse to the warriors fight.

Another shot used in this film to help show the outstanding surroundings that help the movie seem even more graceful, was the crane shot. This shot is used by suspending a camera from a height to show the actor/actors as well as a lot of the surrounding area. One scene that reminded me of a crane shot was when they were fighting in the water. Almost ever clip in that scene was from a high height, either in the open or through the trees, to help show the fighters and where exactly they are fighting.

One of the movement elements used in this film is the Hand-held shot. This shot is used whenever the photographer isn’t using a device to steady the camera. The one scene that I thought of was the scene when Snow was chasing Broken Sword through the home. The camera man was holding the camera as he followed Snow, and when she eventually stabbed him in the back through the door out of jealousy. This shot helps the viewer feel as though they are in the movie and are right there with the actors.

This movie is for sure a great film to view in order to study the habits of lyrical effortless movement. I personally am not a fan of the movie. I don’t enjoy the fake fighting and use of “flying”. To say I don’t like a film for this reason is unfair but I don’t think I would rate it that highly. It reminds me of every other Asian mythical fighting schemed movies, intense sword fights with very strong fighters, and the use of magical abilities, especially in this movie being the power to float around will fighting. I did enjoy the fighting scenes for what they were. Putting my dislikes aside, it was fun to watch the intense fighting scenes. It is hard for me to critique the dialogue only because it was all in subtitles and sometimes I was captivated by the fighting and battles. Overall I would say that this movie gets about a three out of five stars on my scale, only because I would say it really isn’t my type of film. If you enjoy this movie I would suggest many of the other mystical Chinese fighting styled movies.