Matcollis This Movie Can Only Be Described With One Word.

Colibel Terrible acting, screenplay and direction.

Nonureva Really Surprised!

Lumsdal Good , But It Is Overrated By Some

annuskavdpol The Promise was a Chinese movie. It had side-effects that were similar to The Matrix - with flipping over in mid-air and then landing on their feet. There were lots of vibrant colours - and beautiful scenes. However this movie was nothing compared to Japanese samurai movies. The storyline of The Promise was very weak. I watched the English version and found the voice-over annoying. The voices did not match the faces of the actors. It did not seem natural.I watched this movie to learn more about the Chinese art culture and cinematic culture - but did not come out any the wiser. To me, this movie seemed to be a Hollywood copycat - with all the special effects and superficial story. I found the movie to be without truth and void mysticism.

platewurm A few years ago, when I was sitting in a bus on my trip from Taipei to Kaohsiung (for those who do not live in Taiwan, it's a 5-hour trip), I turned on the LCD screen in front of me (Yes, that's right, some buses in Taiwan have LCD screens and movies for passengers to chose during the trip) and chose "The Promise" on the select screen. I watched it for 15 minutes, went back to the movie select menu, chose "Norbit" instead, finished "Norbit" and fell asleep.IT TOOK ME 2 MONTHS, OVER 14 TIMES TO FINALLY FINISHING "THE PROMISE".Why? Because EVERYTHING in "The Promise" hurts. Deep inside my soul, I cried in agony for the quality of this movie.I know some people in IMDb liked this movie. I'm not here to debate how wrong they are. I'm just here to say how "The Promise" made me felt.First, let's take a look at the story. It's been a few years, and I've seen re-runs of "The Promise" on televisions for a couple of times. Yet, I still don't understand what this movie is trying to tell me.To clear things out, I have to confess that I am a fan of MST3K. I had my share of bad movies. I even watched "The Island of Dr. Moreau" in the theater. However, I still don't have a clue what "The Promise" is about.The story of this movie makes me feel that the director, Kaige Chen, is trying to tell you five stories in ONE SINGLE MOVIE. And the bad thing is, he can't tell even ONE story well enough for me so I can understand at all.As for the acting... I don't know, I really don't know what to say. I can tell that this movie was starred by some really talented actors/actress, yet they were all hampered by the incompetence of the director.To be honest, I envy for those who loved this movie and weren't native Chinese speakers. They don't have to endure what I've been through. Ignorance is bliss, I guess.It hurts my eardrums every time when I hear those ridiculous lines. Really. Oh yeah, did I mentioned that two of the main actors in this movie didn't even speak Chinese? (They are Korean and Japanese) SO, what do we have here now? A bunch of actors/actress speaking ridiculous lines in a cheesy way? Have you ever played Resident Evil on Playstation? I'd say that voice acting in Resident Evil is better than those in "The Promise", and it's not the actor/actress's fault.I can go on and on and on and on for EVERYTHING I hate in this movie to no end. Yet, it soon occurs to me: OH MY GOD! THIS IS IT! "The Promise" is THE milestone for Chinese movie industry! Finally there's a movie can be as bad as "Battlefield Earth" or "Plan 9 from Outer Space" (OK, maybe not that bad) in Chinese. I think this is a major breakthrough for Chinese-speaking people like me.Yes, for me, "The Promise" can be viewed as movies as "Water World", "Superman IV", or even "Manos: The Hands of Fate". And YES, "The Promise" is a bad movie. It sucks in every aspect. But I feel pleased to see this movie. Because "The Promise" showed that China now have the potential to shoot expensive, flat-out, meaningless, BAD movies like this one.

Claudio Carvalho When the world was young, laid a Kingdom between the Land of Snow and the Barbarian Territory where gods and men lived side by side and promises were lies. When the poor and starving orphaned girl Qingcheng meets the Goddess Manshen (Hong Chen), she accepts to become the wealthy beauty of beauties with the curse that she would lose every man she loves, unless three things happen: snow falls in the spring, time moves backwards and the dead comes back to life. Years later, the slave Kunlun (Dong-Kun Jang) helps the Great General Master of the Crimson Armor Guangming (Hiroyuki Sanada) to defeat a barbarian army with almost seven times more warriors, and Kunlun becomes his slave. When Guangming is wounded, he asks Kunlun to wear his armor and save the king from the cruel Duke of the North Wuhuan (Nicholas Tse) that put the Imperial City under siege with his army. However, Kunlun kills the king to save Princess Qingcheng (Cecilia Cheung) and promises her to never let her die. Princess Qingcheng falls in love for the man of the crimson armor that she believes is General Guangming. When Snow Wolf (Ye Liu) saves Kunlun and brings him to the Land of Snow, he recollects his childhood when his mother and sister were killed by the evil Wuhuan. Kunlun decides to return to the Kingdom to face Wuhuan and fight for his love."Wu Ji" is one of the most beautiful fantasies that I have ever seen, and I list this magnificent film among my favorites. The story has romance, magic, betrayal, loyalty, action, supported by a stunning cinematography, great screenplay, wonderful special effects and awesome direction and performances. This film is surprisingly underrated in IMDb, with and user rating of 5.6. Cecilia Cheung is one of the most beautiful actresses of cinema and is perfect in the role of the Beauty of Beauties. In the end, fate can be changed. My vote is nine.Title (Brazil): "A Promessa" ("The Promise")

s0m3n4m3 Chen Kaige is no stranger to epics, and he has shown he knows how to handle it. In this movie though, the director perhaps stretched his material little too much to make a movie that it was not meant to be. The movie's plot is burdened by its extraneousness, and its characters are not grounded properly to reach the depth this movies seems to want reach. However, the movie still is entertaining if viewed with lighter heart to ignore its superfluous elements.The main flaw of the movie lies in its directions. The heart of the story reads more as a fairytale, rather than a grand storyline that supplements complex characters that made his previous two epics "Farewell My Concubine" and "The Emperor and the Assassin" successes. Even amidst of their grand story lines of the aforementioned movies, the driving engines for those movies were the Dostoevskian depth his characters display in the stories. In this movie though, the director falls a bit short on both ends, and the reason seems to be the director's trying bit to much with what was given. The movie might have been more successful as a straightforward fairytale, yet the movie is burdened by extraneous story lines that tries to give extra depths with unsuccessful results. The 10+ minutes preview of the movie hinted for something extravagant, an epic set in almost Peter Greenwayesque background, yet the movie fails to live up to what it seems to want to be.The movie, with all its flaws, still offers value. The main story still has some power to enchant, especially viewed as a fairytale. The cinematography, as usual for Chen Kaige affair, can be breathtaking at times. The acting throughout the movie is solid. The movie is weighed down by its own expectations, but underneath it, the movie is still entertaining at its core.