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Topic:
The Incredible Ang Lee: "Ride With the Devil"
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Django211
Registered:
Mar '99
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Date Posted:
6/30 6:41pm
Subject:
RE: The Incredible Ang Lee: His Early Taiwanese Films
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In regards to Woo, Ang Lee was in an entirely different situation. He came to the US & got an education at the U of I & NYU. He cut his chops in the world of independent film. There was no expectation for his films to make huge profits. Together with his partner James Schamus they crafted stories that were important to them. Lee was able to distinguish the differences between Eastern & Western cultures & those are at the forefront of his early films. He was also able to focus on performances, something he was well versed in. He grew as an artist & became more daring in each film. He seems like the last guy to make dramas about the American civil war, a suburban 70s family, a Jane Austen adaptation & a comic book movie.
Woo on the other hand was already the biggest director in Hong Kong when he moved to Hollywood. Like Jackie Chan, Jet Li & Chow Yun-Fat they left amid uncertainty of what the Chinese takeover would bring in 1997. Woo soon discovered he couldn't make films like he did in HK yet the studios were still expecting large box office grosses. Woo's films have none of the daring of his Hong Kong films and he mostly seems to repeat himself to the point of parody.
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darth_frared
Registered:
Jun '05
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Date Posted:
7/1 3:30am
Subject:
RE: The Incredible Ang Lee: His Early Taiwanese Films
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yeah you're right. i find it interesting though, that ang lee never fell into that trap of staying a foreigner, he must never have seen that as a limitation in any way, more like an enrichment. i cannot think of another director who crossed boundaries so effortlessly.
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illegalise stupidity.
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darth_frared
Registered:
Jun '05
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Date Posted:
7/22 6:08am
Subject:
RE: The Incredible Ang Lee: His Early Taiwanese Films
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hello! mover over for
Sense and Sensibility
a movie not even i can hate, even if it's based on jane austen and all of that.
familiarize yourself with it here if you like.
pitched against braveheart that year it of course had to lose 
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illegalise stupidity.
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Zaz
Title: Manager:
The Amphitheatre
Registered:
Oct '98
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Date Posted:
7/22 2:32pm
Subject:
RE: The Incredible Ang Lee: Sense and Sensibility
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I have seen this one and enjoyed it; great cast and sensitive direction.
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Zaz
Title: Manager:
The Amphitheatre
Registered:
Oct '98
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Date Posted:
8/5 3:38pm
Subject:
RE: The Incredible Ang Lee: Sense and Sensibility
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Needs an update, frared... 
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darth_frared
Registered:
Jun '05
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Date Posted:
8/6 4:55am
Subject:
RE: The Incredible Ang Lee: Sense and Sensibility
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i know! won't happen today tho 
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illegalise stupidity.
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Zaz
Title: Manager:
The Amphitheatre
Registered:
Oct '98
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Date Posted:
8/6 1:36pm
Subject:
RE: The Incredible Ang Lee: Sense and Sensibility
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When you can spare ze time is fine.
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Obi Anne
Title: FanForce RSA
Europe
Registered:
Nov '98
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Date Posted:
8/6 2:26pm
Subject:
RE: The Incredible Ang Lee: Sense and Sensibility
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Well then I have time to join in before the update.
First the Wedding banquet, I had no idea this was Ang Lee. To me it's just "that awful, boring asian movie my sister rented once". I might have seen it with the wrong expectations though, since we were going to watch it on a "girls' night" and my sister rented it with the explanation that "this seems to be a hilarious comedy". Lets just say the theme wasn't exactly what a bunch of young teenagers had expected.
Sense and Sensibility is one of my favourite films though, I love Jane Austen overall as well. I actually think Lee made a great effort in reducing a lot of the quite confusing plot in the book, so that only the vital parts remained. With the exception of Emma Thompson not really being believable as such a young girl the cast was also wonderful. I love Alan Rickman's Colonel Brandon.
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Tea one, proud member of the Tea Squad, FanForce Meeting 2006, Berlin  GSADMINCOACHEMPERORRULERPRESIDENTTSARMINISTERQUEEN liuba 
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darth_frared
Registered:
Jun '05
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Date Posted:
8/18 4:01am
Subject:
RE: The Incredible Ang Lee: Sense and Sensibility
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i felt that the film was enjoyable (sense and sensibility) but i got confused over emma thompson and kate winslet and their age because i thought kate shouldn't have gone with the younger guy.
i have never read austen's books, you see.
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Vortigern99
Title: Manager Emeritus
Registered:
Nov '00
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Date Posted:
8/18 9:20am
Subject:
RE: The Incredible Ang Lee: Sense and Sensibility
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Obi Anne posted:
Sense and Sensibility is one of my favourite films though, I love Jane Austen overall as well. I actually think Lee made a great effort in reducing a lot of the quite confusing plot in the book, so that only the vital parts remained. With the exception of Emma Thompson not really being believable as such a young girl the cast was also wonderful. I love Alan Rickman's Colonel Brandon.
Two things here: Emma Thompson wrote the screenplay, so the cedit for reducing the plot to its essentials must go to her, not to Lee; and second, since Thompson's character is referred to as an "unmarried spinster", she can hardly be construed as attempting to portray "a young girl". I don't know the character's age in the book, as I haven't read it, but in the film it's evident she's supposed to be in her 30s.
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"I knew from the beginning I was not doing science fiction.
I was doing a space opera, a fantasy film, a mythological piece,
a fairy tale."--George Lucas
My "Vader's Origins" thread:
http://boards.theforce.net/Classic_Trilogy/b10002/8708417/p1
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Rogue1-and-a-half
Title: Manager: Amphitheatre
Registered:
Nov '00
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Date Posted:
8/18 2:06pm
Subject:
RE: The Incredible Ang Lee: Sense and Sensibility
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Sense and Sensibility is probably the best theatrical Austen film. Clueless is close, but not as great. The P&P miniseries may beat it out, but it's probably a dead heat really.
Regardless, great casting and great acting and a truly awesome screenplay by Thompson make this one fly. She's got to be every bit Branagh's equal when it comes to adaptation.
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All they found of the Duchesse d'Alencon was her head.
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darth_frared
Registered:
Jun '05
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Date Posted:
8/21 5:53am
Subject:
RE: The Incredible Ang Lee: Sense and Sensibility
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what happened next was -predictably-
THE ICE STORM
here's the trailer
if you've never seen it, it's scary in a quiet and understated way.
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illegalise stupidity.
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Zaz
Title: Manager:
The Amphitheatre
Registered:
Oct '98
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Date Posted:
8/22 9:35am
Subject:
RE: The Incredible Ang Lee: The Ice Storm
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Upped for subject change...
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Vortigern99
Title: Manager Emeritus
Registered:
Nov '00
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Date Posted:
8/22 2:56pm
Subject:
RE: The Incredible Ang Lee: The Ice Storm
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The Ice Storm is a good, well-made movie about suburban malaise, with thoughtful performances from an ensemble cast that includes Elijah Wood, William Hurt and Sigourney Weaver. I don't love this film as I do some others by Ang Lee, but it's definitely worth seeing.
-----signature-----
"I knew from the beginning I was not doing science fiction.
I was doing a space opera, a fantasy film, a mythological piece,
a fairy tale."--George Lucas
My "Vader's Origins" thread:
http://boards.theforce.net/Classic_Trilogy/b10002/8708417/p1
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JohnWesleyDowney
Registered:
Jan '04
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Date Posted:
8/22 3:41pm
Subject:
RE: The Incredible Ang Lee: The Ice Storm
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Two things here: Emma Thompson wrote the screenplay, so the cedit for reducing the plot to its essentials must go to her, not to Lee;
How do you know he didn't suggest that to her? Even if he was hired after the fact, I guarantee you he put his two cents in. Directors do have screenplay input, even if they don't actually do any writing, especially one of the stature of Ang Lee. I think a lot of people think of the function of the screenwriter as separate from the director, but the director has a say in the work of everyone. They don't just direct actors, they give input to everyone involved creatively in the film such as cinematographer and production designer and composer, and that certainly includes the screenwriter. Very few directors of any importance just take a script that's handed to them and say, "oh yes, that's just perfect. I'll shoot that, just the way you wrote it." In some way, they want to put their stamp on the picture. Major film directors are not passive when it comes to scripts, since they're the ones that have to face several months of 14 hour days making it come life. If they were passive, they'd probably be directing TV shows.
Most film directors suggest novels be reduced to their essentials. Most famous example:
Spielberg on JAWS, memo to Carl Gottlieb regarding the novel, "EVISCERATE IT."
On a separate topic...
By the way, there's a funny reference to an ice storm in Brokeback Mountain.
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Peace.
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