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Ashes of Time Redux Review

As a longtime fan of martial arts movies and Asian cinema in general, I credit myself as having a fairly solid understanding of the stories and styles of filmmakers like Zhang Yimou, Chen Kaige and even Takashi Miike. And yet, when I recently saw Wong Kar Wai's new movie, I admit that I didn't actually know what it was about until after I got saw it - and embarrassingly, even then had to read a synopsis online. But then again, Ashes of Time Redux is only a martial arts adventure or even traditional story at its most basic elements. By rebuilding the film from its existing elements but filtering it through another decade of artistic evolution, Wong has created a film that's at once a primitive version of the lyrical epics that Ang Lee and Zhang Yimou perfected in the early 2000s and a next-level meditation on the hallmarks of the genre –neither of which unfortunately works as a credible drama or even oddball genre entry for diehard fans.
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