Mulan
Directed by: Jingle Ma, Wei Dong Starring: Wei Zhou, Jaycee Chan, Yu Rong Guang, Kun Chen Synopsis: Based on the Chinese legend...Hua Mulan (Zhou) spends her days hanging around the old warriors who have retired in her village, learning martial arts and skills of strategy and cunning, much to the chagrin of her father, who feels she should pursue more lady-like pass-times, such as finding a husband and raising a family. When the barbarian armies of the North launch their annual attack on the more fertile lands of the south, the Emperor decrees that every able-bodied man must join the army to protect their lands. In order to protect her ill father, Mulan takes his place, impersonating a man and joins up. Soon Mulan makes close friends amongst the ranks, including Tiger (Chan) and Wentai (Kun Chen), and through her courage and ingenuity, finds herself climbing the ranks, all the while trying to keep her identity a secret. A legend in her own lifetime, Mulan makes an intense enemy out of the son of the Northern clan leaders, as well as enemies closer to home. Review:Hua Mulan joins the many excellent Big Battle epics to come out of Hong Kong in the past few years, delivering decent action scenes, high drama and even a romance of sorts.Director Jingle Ma is already known in these pages for the recent Butterfly Lovers (aka Assassin’s Blade), here given a much bigger budget and, it has to be said, a much better script and actors to work with. There’s no real attempt to conceal Wei Zhou’s femininity, other than the clothes and the way she wears her hair – and I think this is correct, as most people in such a rigid society wouldn’t see past the clothes. Mulan has two allies – Tiger, a childhood friend who is also conscripted, and Wentai, a fellow horse-rider who accidentally discovers her gender but decides to help her when he spots her potential as a leader. 
Events transpire at a brisk pace. Mulan is soon climbing the ranks, alongside Wentai, thanks to her actions during a raid by the enemy on their camp. However the growing feelings between Wentai and Mulan threaten their judgement on the battlefield. Wentai realises this after Mulan comes to his rescue, only to leave their supply train vulnerable to attack. His solution is to harden Mulan to the personal losses faced by soldiers.This period of the film gets a little maudlin, as we find Mulan at a loss, unable to function, leaving her troops to meander in the camp leaderless. It takes her close friend Tiger to shake her out of her funk, spurring her and her men on to even greater victories. There is a nice symmetry to the story of Mulan , which focuses a lot on familial relationships. Mulan is able to bond her army into one big family. Characters who were once bitter antagonists end up sacrificing their lives for one another. The enemy camp is the opposite – the various clans brought together under one flag through fear. Both the enemy warlord’s son and daughter have ambitions to improve the lot of their nomadic tribes, but have almost polar opposite ideas how to achieve it. 
Mulan takes some unexpected turns towards the end of the film, delivering a much more personal and deadly battle than the final suicidal charge one supposes will happen. The fight and battle scenes throughout are shot with flair, the director deciding on sweeping wide shots for the battle scenes rather than too-close-shaky-cam. The production design is of a high standard too, suggesting quite a large budget was thrown at the film.The acting is solid across the board, with Jaycee Chan (son of Jackie, and one of the stars of the soon-to-be-released Invisible Target) showing he can add a little grit to his screen persona. The slightly more-than-platonic relationship between Mulan and Wentai is also very well handled. Verdict: The tone of the film is only slightly darker than the Disney version (minus the songs, for the most part), while the romantic side plot doesn’t get much in the way of a stirring story. 7 out of 10 (MikeOutWest) New! CommentsHave your say about this! Leave me a comment in the box below. |
