Director: John Woo
In a nutshell, Red cliff is based on ancient china history the Battle of red cliff which happened during the end of the Han Dynasty and immediately prior to the period of the Three Kingdoms in ancient China. However, director John Woo decided to alter the historical basis of the movie using his own feeling and modern feelings in order to make the movie widely accepted by the mainstream audiences and marketing. In spite of this, the gist of the story remained the same as its history that is the fewer and weaker defeating the more and stronger.
Red cliff is the most expensive Asian financed film to date, and this can be shown from the movie’s epic war scene with realistic CGI effects. The filming took place at the real historical site of red cliff, which I feel give the movie a more realise feel rather than having the red cliff being created through computer effect.
In a campaign to eliminate the southern warlord Sun Quan and Liu Bei, Cao Cao brings forth his 80,000 soldiers and succeeded in conquering the southern provinces and lunging forward. Everything seemed lost, but Zhuge liang managed to bridge an alliance between Liu Bei and Sun Quan. Despite still being outnumbered by Cao Cao staggering 80,000 soldiers, the alliance with the wits, knowledge and courage of Zhou Yu, Zhuge Liang, Zhang Fei, and Guan Yu managed to defeat Cao Cao at the red cliff.
I feel that the movie is intelligently thought out, with large emphasis on the Chinese Art of War (Sun Zi Bing Fa). For audiences who know nuts about china history and Art of War, this movie will provide a good insight to it. Director Woo clearly depicts the various Chinese Art of War strategies in the movie such as the Eight Trigrams Formation.
I particularly like the acting of Tony Leung as the quick witted, composed and courageous Zhou Yu. He succeeded in projecting the character of Zhou Yu in his masterful acting and facial expressions, despite the fact that he was burned out after filming Lust, Caution prior to accepting the role of Zhou Yu. Besides, who would've thought that Zhu Ge Liang could be so handsome! Haha. Overall, Red Cliff is a good film to watch, thumbs up!
[1] The Battle of Red Cliffs. Retrieved on 1 May 2011 from http://www.cultural-china.com/chinaWH/html/en/34History359.html
[2] Review of Red Cliff. Retrieved on 1 May 2011 from http://twitchfilm.com/reviews/2008/07/review-of-red-cliff.php
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