QT and CTHD financials
First off – Gene, here are some links to box office numbers for CTHD:
http://www.the-numbers.com/movies/2000/DRAGN.html
http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/crouching_tiger_hidden_dragon/numbers.php
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0190332/business
Also, Box Office Mojo has a neat little chart called the “Wire Fu Index” which has a list of the all-time top grossing movies that have “wire kungfu”
http://www.boxofficemojo.com/genres/chart/?id=wirefu.htm
Regarding QT’s involvement with Hero – in general, I think it is a positive thing. Obviously, he is a huge fan as we are of Hong Kong cinema and kung fu movies, so while some argue that he is only doing it for a buck, I think the exposure helps the genre as a whole.
A few years back, QT “presented” a movie in the states under his Rolling Thunder company called Chungking Express, by director Wong Kar Wai. I was unfamiliar with this director, but picked it up out of curiosity and ended up being mesmerized. Since that initial exposure, I have collected all of director Wong Kar Wai’s movies and he has become my favorite director of any genre. Had QT not released this picture in the states, it is likely I may have never had the fortune of discovering this genius director.
(Note to Hero fans: the director of cinematography on Hero, Christopher Doyle, is also the cinematographer on all of Wong Kar Wai’s movies, which is one of the main reasons Wai’s movies are so visually entrancing. Also, if you want to see some more of Tony Leung (Broken Sword) or Maggie Cheung (Flying Snow) in dramatic roles, there is no better place than Wai’s films – either one or both of them appear in almost all of his movies! They are both in Days of Being Wild, Ashes of Time, and In the Mood For Love. Tony is in Chungking Express, Happy Together, and Chinese Odyssey, while Michelle has a great role in As Tears Go By. These are all fantastic dramatic movies which I highly recommend! If you need more motivation – Zhang Yimou’s next film after Hero – House of Daggers – features Canto-pop star Andy Lau, who is also in Wong Kar Wai’s As Years Go By and Days of Being Wild)
Getting back to Hero – I am glad they kept the subtitles – dubbing would have been corny, although I wasn’t happy with some of the changes, at least from the DVD version I have. In the version of the DVD I have, the words that Broken Sword writes in the sand are “All Under Heaven” and in the cinematic version this is changed to “Our Land” – which seems to lose some of the relevance. I thought “All Under Heaven” was more appropriate as the Chinese emperors were known as the “Son of Heaven”. “Our Land” is a little more generic and bland if you ask me … ah well, a minor complaint I suppose.
