I've posted this also in the "Hero" thread.
Thought some of you might find this interesting.
Action 'Hero' Li gives drama a fighting chance in new film
Boston Harold
Sunday, August 22, 2004
Beneath the fighting killer he often plays with amazing moves and flying leaps, Jet Li is a romantic and a seeker.
As the nameless martial artist in the Chinese historical epic "Hero,'' opening Friday, Li must confront a trio of assassins set on killing a powerful warlord. The outcome will map China's future as a nation.
"Hero'' already has been a triumph. It ranks as Asia's biggest box-office hit ever, grossing $100 million, and has spawned a sequel, minus Li, that opens in November, "House of Flying Daggers.''
More importantly, it is an example of what the action star wants to do with his life and his movies. Directed by Zhang Yimou ("Raise the Red Lantern'') and exquisitely photographed by Christopher Doyle ("In the Mood for Love''), "Hero'' is like no other Jet Li movie.
"This director Yimou is the most famous Chinese director,'' said Li, a veteran of 30 films, in an exclusive interview with the Herald. "He's never done an action film before. To see the marital arts from his point of view is different than others.....This is the movie I want to make because the main idea is that violence is not the only solution. The movie says there is a different way to solve the problem.... his is not normal; it's very unique.''
So is the film's re-creation of a lost world that might have existed only in the fevered imagination of an artist.
"Visually, the director is a cameraman before, and he got a best actor award, best cinematographer award, and best director - many titles,'' Li said. "We went to the Silk Road, a famous road in China, and it took six hours on the road to get there, and you can see the lake, a very famous lake in China. But the director wants to see the lake like a mirror. Only for two hours a day is there no wind and does it look like a mirror. So we wait another day to shoot another two hours. We try to tell the director, `We can shoot another angle,' and he says, `No, I want to see this.' This is why we spend six months in China,'' Li said with a laugh.
Li has been a star for 25 years. He was 16 when his martial arts skills catapulted him to fame in his native China, and since then he has become a mainstay of the Hong Kong action movie, a Hollywood player and a European icon.
Luc Besson, France's equivalent to Steven Spielberg, just partnered with Li on their second film together, "Unleashed,'' which will open early next year.
"In French, it's `Danny the Dog,' in America, `Unleashed,' '' Li said. "I wanted to do something special, not just action. I wanted to make something with meaning.''
In "Unleashed,'' Li plays a mentally stunted man raised in a cage. He wears a dog collar and is taught only to fight.
"Mentally, the character is only 10, but physically very strong,'' Li said. "He doesn't understand life, friendship, love, until he meets Morgan Freeman, who plays a piano teacher. He makes me understand friendship, compassion, normal feelings.''
Li calls "Unleashed'' "a very dangerous movie,'' because no studio wants to take it. "They want normal drama, fight, action, and this is a drama with action in it. Not an action-action film. Its message is: If you're the toughest guy in the world and don't understand the meaning of life, you're a dog. That's why I make `Hero' and `Danny the Dog' and tell the truth: Love is the toughest thing in the world.''
Li's not just talking. He passed on starring in "Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon'' because of a romantic promise he made to his wife years earlier.
"I dated with my wife 10 years,'' he said. "When we started, I told her, `Ten years later, if we're together, we marry.' If my wife have a baby, I stop working for a whole year. That's why I married on Sept. 19, 1999, and I tell the director Ang Lee, `My wife is pregnant. I cannot take the movie to keep my promise.' ''
Now Li hopes to make another personal project: "A Monk in New York,'' about a Tibetan Buddhist monk's travails in what Li calls "the most busy city in the world, where money is important.''
A practicing Buddhist, he should have anticipated the reaction.
"I show it to the studios. Everybody says, `Where are the fight sequences?' I say, `Have you ever seen the priest fight on the street?' We have action sequences, but not much.''
