Full River Red

The corridors of power are narrow and spider-vein-thin in Full River Red but still well-traveled and precisely navigated by Zhang and his well-synchronized collaborators.

Its blend of styles and sensibilities may be occasionally confounding, but Full River Red is certainly never less than entertaining in its richly inventive mining of history.

Longtime fans of one of China’s greatest living filmmakers won’t want to miss this one. It isn’t every day that Zhang Yimou jokes around. You’ll want to be there for every bloody punchline.

For every person who finds the tone a welcome inclusion that helps make this two-and-a-half-hour mystery feel a whole lot breezier than you expect, there’s bound to be another who cannot separate what appears to be surface distraction from a highly convoluted tapestry of convenient twists and turns. Most will surely fall in the middle––like me.

At times, particularly in its overwrought closing act, the film feels as if it’s going to collapse under the weight of its relentless, convoluted twists. But the lighthearted tone poking through keeps it afloat, and suspends the viewer in mostly carefree entertainment for its two-and-a-half-hour running time.

Zhang’s own authorial touch is unmistakable in the mazelike palace intrigues, the phalanxes of armed soldiers and the ferocious bursts of action, plus the climactic nationalist overtones of a story that pits the will of several individuals against the fate of an empire.

With a twist-packed plot to match its labyrinthine location, Zhang’s fast-paced film motors along nicely as an engaging “Knives Out”-style whodunnit before stumbling a little in the protracted final act.