Truth be told, I was skeptical going in to The Grandmaster, Wong Kar-wai’s long-gestating biopic about famed martial arts teacher Ip Man (1893-1972). The movie had been described as a kung fu picture and a historical epic—genres that Wong, for all his filmmaking genius, didn’t seem particularly suited to. As demonstrated by such touchstones as Chungking Express (1994) and In the Mood for Love (2000), the Hong Kong director’s greatness lies in his ability to capture moments and sensations that most filmmakers overlook. His movies proceed through the accumulation of details that are emotionally rich but difficult to describe, giving his work the quality of extended reminiscences or daydreams. Wong achieves this effect through a unique improvisatory process, in which he begins each film with only a rough idea of its story, writes and shoots as many scenes as he can during production, then assembles the narrative in editing. “He shoots enough for about 20 movies,” Tony Leung, his frequent leading man, jokingly told the audience at the preview screening of Grandmaster I attended. “No one knows what the movie will look like until it’s finished.”
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This method seems at odds with the nature of most historical epics, which rest upon a concrete set of facts, and with martial arts movies, which proceed through fluid, straight-ahead action. Indeed, I was underwhelmed by most of the action sequences in The Grandmaster, as Wong edits them just like his scenes of introspective drama. They feel rhythmless, bogged down with close-ups of feet and pretentious slow-motion shots. Wong treats the various kung fu poses like fetish objects, evoking a sense of fluid motion only rarely. This is especially disappointing seeing as the great Yuen Woo-ping (whose credits include Drunken Master, Once Upon a Time in China, and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) served as the movie’s action coordinator. Much of his contribution seems to have been lost in the shuffle.
It wasn’t until I watched The Grandmaster for a third time that I was able to make sense of the plot—on the first two viewings, I struggled just to find my bearings. This may be because the movie flirts with being a history lesson and an unrequited love story, but doesn’t really follow through with either. It’s full of red herrings, so to speak, leading the viewer to expect something epic when it’s really focused on the internal desires of a few people. While I find this narrative structure fascinating in theory, I’m not sure if Wong pulls it off. Maybe it’s because he didn’t shoot the movie according to any organizing design that none of the scenes, barring the martial arts fights, feels more significant than any other. Everything is sumptuous and suggestive, minor and major details alike. When I finally figured out what was going on, I found much of the stylization superfluous.
Directed and written by Wong Kar-Wai
