Two swell ones out this weekend: Wong Kar Wai's The Grandmaster and Edgar Wright's The World's End, the latter featuring Simon Pegg, who's seen above as his character in the film experiences deep denial over the prospect of the evening's festivities coming to a close. Reviewed for MSN Movies.
Many thanks for pointing out that the U.S. version of The Grandmaster is its own entity (and a version supervised by Wong himself), not just a shortened-for-the-U.S. job. I’m getting annoyed at hearing friends who are WKW fans say they’re going to skip this “cut” version in the theater.
Just because WKW personally supervised the edit doesn’t mean it isn’t occasionally insulting, printing character names on the screen right after they’ve been mentioned in dialogue or narration. We can connect the dots, thanks. And while I understand the reasons behind giving a bit more historical markers, it could have been edited a little more smoothly.
Having said that, a very enjoyable and beautiful film. The action is superb. But it’s at its best in the most WKW-like sections: Gong Er’s long flashback, and the quieter moments between her and Ip Man.
Very much looking forward to “The World’s End.” The progression from “Shaun…” to “Hot Fuzz” is readily apparent, and it sounds as if they’ve made a similar leap from HF to TWE. “It’s A Disaster” was a pleasant comedic surprise earlier this year, so getting another fresh and rewarding comedy like TWE seems like hitting the jackpot.
I expected “World’s End” to be funny. I didn’t expected it to have the most exciting action scenes I’ve seen in quite a while — much more impressive than the endless, repetitive punch-outs in “Man of Steel.” I wish Edgar Wright was directing the next Superman movie instead of Zack Snyder.