a review of 代号美洲豹

Something is being withheld from us. There are entire scenes that were seemingly filmed and then chopped up into a slideshow with dry exposition narrated over them. The movie is only 1 hour 16 minutes, but if you don't count the opening credits and the pointless flashback montage at the end, it's more like 1:06. The story is very rushed, there's a lot of exposition and very little character development. You can tell that the scenes are good individually, but they don't come together in a coherent and enticing way. There is definitely a longer version lying on the cutting room floor. I suspect because the main theme of the movie is humanization of the enemy. It's very reminiscent of JSA in that regard. But there is no thematic resolution. Instead it proceeds as a basic terrorist movie. They stop the terrorists and that's it. I remember Zhang Yimou saying in an interview that he regrets making this film because he was young and was trying to follow the trends. I think what he really regrets is that he hadn't yet figured out a way to criticize the government in more subtle ways. The movie was clearly made with the government's involvement (where else would they get all the helicopters and military equipment?), and I suppose they eventually forced him to change it. Cut it up and clumsily patched it together. That's what it seems like, but we will never learn the truth.