A Chinese re-imagining of the 1985 directorial debut of Joel and Ethan Coen, Blood Simple. Transposing the Coen’s mix of dark humor and suspense to China, the film is helmed by Zhang Yimou (Hero, House of Flying Daggers) - "a black comedy thriller, an exposé of how intense desires can consume humanity, and the irony that life never submits to our calculations".
Wang (Honglei Sun) is a miserable yet cunning noodle shop owner in a desert town. Wang’s wife is having an affair with Li (Xiao Shen-Yang), one of his employees. Not a single move they make escapes the boss’s notice, and he decides to bribe patrol officer Zhang to murder the illicit couple. It looks like a perfect plan: the affair will come to a cruel but satisfying end - or so he thinks. But the equally wicked Zhang has an agenda of his own that will lead to more violence…
I apologise, we feel bad, but there's no trailer available. ~Ed.
With Hollywood's practice of remaking foreign films unlikely to stop anytime soon, it's easy to forget that it’s not solely an American-centric phenomenon, but something that occurs across the far-flung corners of the globe (anyone check out the Bollywood remake of Oldboy or the Hong Kong version of the Kim Basinger thriller Cellular?). But in the scheme of high profile – let's call 'em "reverse-remakes" for the sake of argument – few have generated as much eyebrow-raising WTF buzz as A Woman, a Gun and a Noodle Shop, Zhang Yimou’s period re-do of Joel and Ethan Coen’s 1984 debut Blood Simple. I mean, what could this Mainland Chinese director best known for stately costume dramas (Raise the Red Lantern) and wu xia revisionism (Hero) possibly have in common with the Coens?
Swapping the chilly Texas noir-gothic of the original for a warmer, more exotic interpretation, Zhang's vision occasionally evokes Leone spaghetti westerns with its epic-seeming, crimson-hued desert hills of ancient Northern China, but is perhaps more notable for its polarising, cock-eyed irreverence to the source material. The plot's structure – a long-painful-tumble-down-the-stairs through murder, money and misunderstandings – more-or-less remains intact, but Zhang loads it with enough goofy slapstick that it might prove lethal to anyone who isn't so familiar with Chinese opera. But the tone does gradually darken, and Zhang's reliably flamboyant visuals – including a bravura noodle-making set-piece – is never less than pleasing to the eye. A fun, if uneven curiosity.
By Aaron Yap, Flicks.co.nz
Being unfamiliar with Blood Simple, I watched this expecting the unexpected, and that's what I got. It looks fantastic, starts out wacky then slowly gets much darker but even the last line is wacky in context. Great to look at, very different and engrossing, hugely enjoyable fun. See it.
I will say that the attempt to reinterpret the memorable closing shot of "Blood Simple" is so gauche and graceless that I involuntarily moaned in disgust. I docked the film another half-star just for that.
Zhang Yimou is a fabulous manipulator of colour and movement, and his film looks gorgeous from first frame to last.
An interesting interpretation but stick with the original.
Zhang Yimou's remake of the Coen brothers' "Blood Simple" as a Chinese period thriller-farce in a desert setting. A high-rolling but garish production with untranslatable regional ribald humor, it is aimed squarely at the China market.
The director Zhang Yimou honors the unlikely affinity between himself and Joel and Ethan Coen with a remake of their movie "Blood Simple."
We've been told the NZ release date for this flick is Thursday, 2nd Dec 2010.
Release date: December 2nd 2010.
We haven't received times for this movie in this location yet. However these are updated as cinemas announce them, so check back soon. Hopefully the lovely cinemas in your location will choose to play it shortly. ~Ed.
