Director Ang Lee (Ice Storm, Sense and Sensibility) knows the drama side of film well. He has been making them consistently, since his first film. However, his urge to make a kung-fu movie over took him. He brought together the best talent the world has to offer. Chow Yun Fat the charismatic star of John Woo’s Hong Kong action films, as the leading man. The woman in his life is played by Michelle Yeoh, quite possibly the most famous woman kung-fu artist ever. Along with the help of veteran kung-fu film director (Iron Monkey) and choreographer (The Matrix) Woo-ping Yuen . Lee set off to make the most ambitious "kung-fu" film yet realized.

Based upon a Chinese pulp-fiction novel, it has all the standard elements of these type of stories. Chow is Li Mu Bai a kung-fu master, who longs for peaceful days, but must first avenge the death of his master. Michelle is Yu Shu Lien, another kung-fu master who now runs her fathers professional security business. They share a forbidden love, which their honor and tradition will not allow. The governor’s daughter Jen, is played by newcomer Ziyi Zhang, she longs to live the adventurous life of a warrior. She also shares a forbidden love, for a charming desert pirate named Lo, but she is betrothed to marry another. Their romance is one of the most interesting seen on the screen in a long while, they spend the first half of it scuffling. We learn that Jen’s mentor is the infamous Jade Fox, an old witch-like woman, who is wanted for her many crimes.

Most of the film focuses on these relationships, the how, if, where and why of them. When needed, we are treated to the fantasy based fight scenes. In one such scene, Jen steals Li’s magical sword, and the camera chases and flies along with her as she bounds effortlessly across the rooftops. Once the fight scenes begin, there is no such thing as gravity or physics. And you couldn’t care less, you’re just caught up in the wondrous drool inducing pleasure of it. These moments are courtesy of Woo-ping’s now famous technique of "wire-fu". The actors are hooked onto these wires, giving them the appearance of flight. In the film’s most beautiful scene, Jen and Li fight among the whispery tops of a bamboo forest. They perform a midair ballet as they glide and balance with the bamboo shoots that bend and sway under their weight.