Crouching tiger hidden dragon landscape movie#
Crouching tiger hidden dragon landscape full#

YANG: I mean, yes, right? But the reality is this, right? When we talk about even a word as loaded as racism, it isn't always outright bigotry. YANG: I mean, it's a little too perhaps glib to just simply say, well, racism.

Crouching tiger hidden dragon landscape movie#

I mean, we didn't see another basically all-Asian cast in a major Hollywood movie until 18 years later with 'Crazy Rich Asians.' Why do you think that was? You know, but despite the love and all the excitement and energy around this movie, Hollywood didn't really follow up with, like, a blockbuster sequel to 'Crouching Tiger.' It didn't follow up with a bunch of other Asian movies featuring storylines set in Asia with mostly Asian actors. But at the same time, every time I heard something like that, I was thinking to myself, Tom Cruise is an American Chow Yun-Fat, you know?ĬHANG: Totally. And to hear Americans talking back then about how, like, Chow Yun-Fat, at least for a small moment, was like some Chinese Tom Cruise - that was eye-opening to me because it was like, no, duh. Because this moment of wonder, this just incredible martial arts choreography by Yuen Wop-ping - this was something which most audiences in America would never have experienced.ĬHANG: Totally.

Crouching tiger hidden dragon landscape full#

YANG: But once I was actually in the theater - and it was a packed house - I remember just looking to my left and my right, realizing that the rest of the theater was full of, well, non-Asian folks who were there not knowing what to expect.

And for me, this was something that just seemed like a breath of the familiar, the nostalgic. YANG: When this film came out, it was seen, at least initially, as kind of this exotic independent film, foreign movie that probably would not garner too much attention, certainly not much by way of general audience interest.

Can you just take us back to what this moment meant at the time for, like, Asian Americans, for Asian filmmakers? So I remember this movie came out when I was still in law school, and my parents, my brother and I - we all made this point of going to see it together as a family because it was such a big deal to all of us. JEFF YANG: Thank you, Ailsa - so glad to be here.ĬHANG: Oh, I'm so excited to have this conversation. And to take us back to what a phenomenon this movie was and also how bittersweet this rerelease kind of is, we're joined now by author and culture critic Jeff Yang. And if you missed it the first time around back in 2000, it is reopening to theaters today. It was a huge deal for a movie that was almost totally in Mandarin with English subtitles. box offices by grossing more than $100 million. UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: (As character, speaking Mandarin).ĬHANG: And this was a movie with an all-Asian cast, including Michelle Yeoh, who's up for a best actress Oscar this year. (SOUNDBITE OF FILM, 'CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON') 'Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon' was the movie that had it all - love, mystical weapons and out-of-this-world fight scenes.