The Grandmaster

I didn't know it at the time, but the opening scene of The Grandmaster is a good indication of what's to come.  Director Wong Kar-wei opens his film with an elaborate martial arts fight that is more interested in the poetry of the movement, than in the brutality of the fighting.  He sets the fight scene (and the others that are to come) up almost like a ballet, using slow motion and wire work to capture the beauty of the battle.  It's a visual spectacle to be sure, but at the same time, the context of the scene is more than a little muddy.  It was an odd experience of being enthralled by what I was seeing, while at the same time, not really knowing where it fit in.

The Grandmaster is lavish and beautiful, but ultimately fractured and uneven.  In telling the true life story of Ip Man, the master of the Chinese martial art Wing Chun, and the man who would eventually go on to train and mentor Bruce Lee, this is a movie that has fantastic production values, costumes, and sets that recreate the era.  Where the movie is less certain is in the telling of the story.  It is muddy, feels like it has entire chunks missing, and is likely to confuse anyone who doesn't already know the story beforehand.  It's also constantly losing focus, concentrating on other people or subjects, while leaving the central one behind.  I am not sure how much of the fault lies with the film itself, and how much lies with the movie's US Distributor, The Weinstein Company, which has reportedly cut nearly a half hour out of the original film for its American release.  Supposedly parts of the story were cut, so the movie could could get to the action scenes faster.  The end result is a fragmented and unsatisfying film.

But then, the film's narrative style doesn't make things much easier to follow.  Kar-wei frequently uses flashbacks, flash-forwards, and lengthy patches where he cuts away from his main character and story, only to focus on somebody completely different.  The film opens with the rivalry between martial artists in the northern and southern regions of China.  Ip Man (played effectively by Tony Leung) is right in the middle of this battle, until the Japanese invade China, where he is forced to leave everyone he knows behind, and head to Hong Kong.  In his new life there, he tries to start a martial arts school of his own, teaching his art which was previously reserved only for wealthy families.  At the same time, he tries to track down someone from his past - a woman from the northern region named Gong Er (Ziyi Zhang), who is currently making a living as a doctor, but still harbors memory of a quest for revenge she once undertook when her father was defeated in battle.

The relationship between Ip and Gong holds a lot of potential, as there is a hint of rivalry, respect, and romance between them.  But, thanks to the confusing storytelling, these characters never come across as being as strong as they could be.  In fact, for a long section of the film, Gong's story of revenge for her father completely takes over the movie, leaving Ip's story behind.  Not only can this movie seem to decide which character or plot it wants to focus on, it also has a hard time making us care about them.  For all the lavish costumes and sets, expertly choreographed fight scenes, and beauty that the movie holds, it never lets us in beneath the surface, and to truly get to know these people who inhabit the story.  It sometimes feels like a series of fragmented vignettes.  Ip will encounter someone, their name and martial arts specialty flashes on the screen, they fight, Ip wins, and he moves on.  Despite how much I admired how the fights were staged and shot, if there's little to no consequence behind them, it's all too easy to lose interest.

Even with a reduced running time from the original Chinese release, The Grandmaster still feels oddly sluggish.  A lot of this has to do with the scattershot storytelling, which jumps and moves around so much, we never get much of a sense of a story being told.  Once the thrill of the visuals subsides, we wait for the plot to grab us, and it never does.  I could easily forgive the lack of plotting if the characters were engaging or compelling, but they are constant enigmas to us, and to the filmmakers.  Even after watching it, I feel like I know as much about Ip Man now as I did before I saw the film, which was practically nothing.  Even worse, the movie ends right about the point we feel like it should actually be starting.  That would be when Ip takes on Bruce Lee as a student.  We don't get to see any kind of teacher and student relationship, and we don't get to see the future great one learn from the master, because the movie runs the credits mere minutes after they're introduced to each other.  Maybe it's a set up for a sequel?

Whether its due to the extensive editing the film went through before hitting American theaters, or if it was a problem from the beginning, this never feels like a complete movie.  There are bits and pieces that raised my interest, and there are some stunning visuals, but they can't carry this leaden and unfocused movie very far.  For all of its expertise in visuals and style, The Grandmaster is ultimately a crashing disappointment.

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