Comments on: Zhang Yimou’s Blood Simple Remake Trailer

By: finaljoe

finaljoe — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 01:34:30 +0000

Zhang Yimou is the best director work today. This is a fact. So I’m willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. The mix of thriller and farce looks interesting to me at least.

As for being a remake of Blood Simple, I think it’s clear the Zhang has just taken the premise and ran with it in another direction. Blood Simple afterall is just an inverse of Double Indemnity.

By: Xu

Xu — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 01:28:07 +0000

Yep, Kenneth Loring’s commentary is one of the most insightful lecture ever

By: Sean

Sean — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 17:06:32 +0000

Reed: Make sure you listen to the audio commentary track afterward if you want to fully appreciate the film.

By: Reed Farrington

Reed Farrington — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 16:49:11 +0000

Because I do everything that rus in chicago tells me to do, I began watching Blood Simple last night. I fell asleep just past the halfway point after taking a break at the quarter way point. I think the plot twists are coming up. I’ll finish watching it tonight.

BTW, the Blood Simple DVD is the first DVD I’ve played that has advertisements for Universal DVDs AFTER you hit the play button. And what’s with the wonky intro with the film preservation guy?

I don’t speak any dialect of Chinese fluently. I can understand Cantonese, but only if the dialog revolves around domestic phrases like, “Clean your room,” and “Dinner’s ready.” Ha ha.

As for Chinese culture and its poor taste, I suppose its a matter of our local upbringing, isn’t it? I think poor taste is universal. I used to hate all the flatulence humour in Chinese martial arts films, but some North Americans seem to like that sort of thing as well.

I like that Zhang Yimou is trying something maybe a bit different. It’s the role of a creative artist to show us something different that we may not appreciate at first.

By: davidchili

davidchili — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 08:00:25 +0000

Hey Reed, wonder if you speak Chinese and are familiar with Chinese popular culture in recent years. This movie is a fucking disgrace because it’s totally sucking on chinese audience’s shitty taste and hitting on every cheesy elements.

By: Xu

Xu — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 04:34:11 +0000

As a Chinese, I can say we are all pretty much disgusted by this trailer, and Zhang hasn’t been getting good buzz here for a long long time starting from HERO.

By: projectgenesis

projectgenesis — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 00:33:18 +0000

Hmmm according to IMDB, the film is called “San qiang pai an jing qi” aka The First Gun. It’s listed as a Drama with the synopsis of “The owner of a Chinese noodle shop’s scheme to murder his adulterous wife and her lover goes awry.” How can that be what I just watched?!

By: Henrik

Henrik — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 00:15:24 +0000

Jay, where is the trailer for Nailgun Massacre?

By: rus in chicago

rus in chicago — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 22:46:32 +0000

Reed, Blood Simple is awesome – watch it now, at night, in your basement liar!

maybe this is a new thing; we already have the trend of developing properties very remotely associated with games, TV shows, etc. Now they will do foreign remakes very loosely assoc. with US films.

By: Reed Farrington

Reed Farrington — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 22:27:38 +0000

Although the individual clips are beautiful, many of the shots look similar to what Zhang Yimou has done before. I admit the acting was weird and the editing was weird. Even the English voice-over narrator was weird. I guess this is a comedy. Maybe it will be Zhang Yimou’s “1941.”

I recently bought “Blood Simple” for $1.66. I think I’ve seen bits and pieces of it before, but I’ll have to watch the whole thing before I see “Amazing Tales: Three Guns.”

By: Bill Rusnak

Bill Rusnak — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 21:13:52 +0000

Loved House of Flying Daggers and I’m sure this one will be very good as well…just, as you said Sean, how is this associated with Blood Simple in any way shape or form?

I had no idea what was going on in that trailer…

By: Jay C.

Jay C. — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 20:40:47 +0000

I was done at thirty seconds. This looks like the worst shit ever.