{image1}Chinese director Yimou Zhang is no newcomer to the American silver screen. His films, "To Live," "Hero," "Happy Times" and "Raise the Red Lantern," to name just a few, were roundly lauded here for their epic beauty and their charming, earthy stories.
His latest work, "House of Flying Daggers," combines those qualities with the sort of magical swordsmanship that made Ang Lee's "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" so popular on these shores.
It is the waning of the Tang Dynasty and the government is barely in control and under attack from a ferocious band of rebels called the House of the Flying Daggers (thanks to their warriors' astonishing deftness with a trio of airborne knives).
A pair of regional policemen, Jin (Takeshi Kaneshiro) and Leo (Andy Lau), successfully assassinated the previous leader of the rebels, spending nearly a year getting the job done. Now their superiors want them to kill the successor and is giving them little more than a week to do it.
They hear that a new girl at the local men's club called Mei (Zhang Ziyi) could lead them to the new leader. Mei is blind and beautiful and an exquisite, athletic dancer. Soon the two men discover she's also an able swordswoman.
After arresting her, the two policemen hatch a plot to trick her into leading them to the boss. But will Jin fall in love with her and screw up the plot? Will she fall in love with him and, as a result, fall into the trap? Will Jin's own men kill them both before he can succeed on his mission?
What Jin fails to realize is that enemies are everywhere, even in places where he least expects them.
A sweet love story and a great adventure tale, "House of Flying Daggers" will, in the end, please marital arts fans more than anyone, with its astonishing battle scenes amid open fields, in the sky and in dense bamboo forests.
But, luckily, like "Crouching Tiger," to which it will certainly be oft-compared, "House of Flying Daggers" has depth, with a good story and photography so luminous and beautiful that the film feels as artistic as a Chinese landscape painting.
"House of Flying Dagger" opens Friday, Jan. 14 at Landmark's Oriental Theatre.
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
