Fridae

Is it fair to say that Chen Kaige has lost his touch? Along with
Zhang Yimou and Tian Zhuangzhuang, he was one of the most important
Chinese directors of his generation. His earlier films in the 1980s
like Yellow Earth and King of the Children were
potent and truthful, and changed the way the world looked at Chinese
cinema.

In the 1990s, he began to make big-budget epics like Farewell
to My Concubine and The Emperor & The Assassin. He
claimed that film should be used as a medium for legend?—
a snobbish claim that made younger, poorer Chinese filmmakers dislike
him intensely. He then went to Hollywood and made Killing Me
Softly, a trashy sex thriller that bombed legendarily at the
box-office.

Now he's back with another epic titled The Promise, a
US$35-million picture that's the most expensive in China's history.
It tells a potentially enchanting tale of a beautiful concubine
(Cecilia Cheung) who is simultaneously loved by a general (Hiroyuki
Sanada) and a slave (Jang Dang-gun). However, she herself is destined
never to love anyone until time flows backwards and the dead rise
again.

Chen boasts that The Promise is a "film that people
haven't seen before, in many senses", but the evidence shows
otherwise. The Promise is filled with embarrassingly cheesy
and outdated special effects that would have done the film good
by not being there at all. Though the actors acquit themselves with
good performances, Chen's weak direction and draggy pacing leave
much to be desired. Opening head-to-head with King Kong
this week, The Promise doesn't stand a chance.