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Beautiful New Poster for John Woo's Red Cliff

by Alex Billington
February 25, 2009
Source: IMPAwards

Although I'm not particularly a big John Woo fan, I was actually very interested in seeing Red Cliff, probably because I was hoping it'd be a throwback to his older films in some way. For those unaware, Red Cliff is a two part ancient Chinese history war epic that Woo shot in 2007. It actually debuted theatrically in China last July, but oddly, no US distributor ever bought it. It went on to make the most money in Chinese box office history (roughly $44 million), yet it still has no US distributor or film festival plans. However, we do have a new Australian poster to remind us that we're still not sure when we'll ever see Red Cliff.

Thanks to IMPAwards for the poster and thanks to everyone on Twitter who helped me choose this poster. We actually first ran a teaser trailer for this more than a year ago, as a reminder of how long its been.

John Woo's Red Cliff Poster

In 208 A.D., during the final days of the Han Dynasty, Prime Minister Cao Cao convinced Emperor Han that the only way to unite all of China was to declare war on the kingdoms of Xu in the west and East Wu in the south. Thus began a military campaign of unprecedented scale, led by the Prime Minister himself. Left with no other hope for survival, the kingdoms of Xu and East Wu formed an unlikely alliance. Numerous battles ensued, both on land and on water, eventually culminating in the battle of Red Cliff.

Red Cliff is directed by Hong Kong filmmaker John Woo, of Broken Arrow, Face/Off, Mission: Impossible II, and Paycheck most recently, in addition to numerous Chinese films. The screenplay was co-written by John Woo, Chan Khan, Kuo Cheng, and Sheng Heyu. This film is an adaptation of Guanzhong Luo's novel "Romance of the Three Kingdoms". Red Cliff does not have a US distributor yet and hasn't shown anywhere in the US. We're not sure when this might show up, but we're hoping it will be by the end of 2009.

Explore tags: Indies, Posters

http://www.amikelife.com Mike Olbinski

The poster is gorgeous...
http://img142.imageshack.us/img142/4120/sppunx06oa5.jpg Crapola

styling!
John Who? Oh, John Woo.

Nice poster indeed. But what i found funny is that they mention MI:2 and Face/Off as his previous works, couldn´t they find any better ones? : )
http://www.firstshowing.net Alex Billington

#4 - Nope, that's so that I can emphasize that his most recent films have been really bad, or at least, not as good as his earlier work...
http://rocken.com rocken

i downloaded this from karagarga. it's not that good. kind of a "hero"-wannabe. bah.
http://lamtalks.blogspot.com Clark M. Lamson

Cool poster! I'm glad you put that one up. The other one was truly shitty.
Scott McHenry

Sweet poster, sweet storyline, but like rocken said it's probably another disapointment.
Scully

Part 1 is already out on DVD in Asia. I ordered myself Part 1 because if/when it's shown in the States it will be a Combination of Parts 1 & 2 which would cut out a good chunk of the actual film, (Part 1 & 2 is a total time of approx 4 & 1/2 Hours). I liked Part 1 very much. It has an Epic feel to it while watching, some of the Battle scenes used tactics not seen in other mainstream Battle type flicks shown here in the US, and after the setup of the characters & story, the last 30 mins or so of Part 1 raised the excitement of the Fight yet to come leaving me looking very much forward to seeing Part 2 (which I believe will be out on DVD in Asia late March or early April). I truly Hope that somebody picks this film up and gives it a shot here in the States, even though it will be only a bit more than Half the actual Movie. I think with the right promotion (not Over doing it), it could easily make $100 Million US (which is not much nowadays).
http://www.asceticmonk.com AsceticMonk

I have not seen the movies yet, but from what I heard from friends who have seen it, they are disappointments. The movie is so far off from the original storyline of this classic Chinese novel that it made audience laugh out aloud, as if they were watching a comedy. Furthermore, the casting is terrible. Anyway, I am just sharing what I heard and read.
Fisherr

I like Woo and his movies.
Daniel

I ordered the original version on Bluray out of Hong Kong just a couple days ago. I can't wait for it to get here... hopefully a US distributor will pick up the original versions so I can get part 2 here... if not, I'll be awaiting another shipment from Hong Kong. BTW, dddhouse.com was the cheapest I could find the bluray copy.
Al

I thought Summit Entertainment owns the US distribution rights for Red Cliff.
Janika

This movie has a fantastic soundtrack
http://film-book.com Film-Book dot Com

I have seen both Part 1 and Part 2 of Red Cliff already. Part 2 is actually better in a few aspects than Part 1. Red Cliff Part 1 FILM REVIEW: http://film-book.com/review-red-cliff/ Red Cliff Film TRAILERS: http://film-book.com/zhao-wei-is-on-a-red-cliff/
http://www.elte.com/ Hand Knotted Rugs

Well most of the commenters here seem to think decently of it. Lets hope turns out to be as good as they say.
johnny

red cliff comes in 2 movies, both suck monsters balls
JeffreyChow

Poster reminds me LOTR-2, this one with Saruman...
Thor

Years of playing the Dynasty Warrior series made part 1 thoroughly enjoyable to watch! Looking forward to part 2! But really, I think you have to know the three kingdoms story to really enjoy it.. To put it in perspective this movie only covers around 2-3 levels of Dynasty Warriors out of.. a lot.
Ric Flair

WOOO!!!
Eric

Woo is the man.
Concerned Viewer

Having seen both, honestly, it's not an instant classic. The movie is good without a doubt. Both parts are excellent, but chances are most of the people who have nothing good to say about it are Three Kingdoms purists who want to see each character and event EXACTLY as the novel or the historical records (the San Guo Zhi) says. Now, as a historian I'd admit, I'd like that. But if you're looking at this from a cinematic point of view, that would just be a documentary. It's impossible to make a fully enjoyable historical epic without taking liberties or simplifying some parts of the plot. Most non-asians, save those video game geeks who follow KOEI's nonstop slew of Dynasty Warriors games, haven't a clue who these characters are and why they're important. If you go in to watch the movie baring that in mind you're going to have a good time, I can promise you that, and if you don't, I'll eat my own socks. The first movie suffers from one flaw that a great deal of Chinese movies suffer from: poorly done pacing. While the action scenes and the writing and the acting (save Tony Leung's poorly dubbed Zhou Yu) are all superbly done, throwing a battle scene in the beginning, then a massive amount of character development and fairly unessential scenes for another 2 hours completely bogs the movie down. However, the action scenes when you do see them, while a little over the top, are brilliantly done in typical Woo fashion. However my friends and I have a joke that you wouldn't be too much the truth to slip in a lifebar, kill count and combo meter. (and yes, there are doves.) The acting, especially those featuring veteran actors such as Zhang Fengyi and Jin Cheng-wu (Takeshi Kaneshiro to some) is particularly impressive- Zhang's Cao Cao is both a megalomaniacal tyrant and an admirable machievellan, the subtleties in his acting and demeanor telling more about the character than his lines. Takeshi's Kongming is exactly as I felt he should have been portrayed- instead of the omnipetent god that he has so often been portrayed, he seems both brilliant, and yet at the same time distinctly human, making him more than just someone to aspire to, but also to relate to. Tony Leung's Zhou Yu however is a little lackluster, coming off as fairly stiff and lacking of a personality. However it is likely because of the dub- although his personal mannerisms make him seem cold and standoffish, certainly not nearly as much of the hero he's supposed to be. The second movie...so far as I was concerned was perfect. Most of the actors slipped into their roles fluidly and the movie didn't lack the pacing issues of the first as they were able to slip right into the action without bogging down the story with character side stories. The final battle is absolutely epic, and for those who think Jackson is the best for doing battle scenes clearly don't watch very many movies, and are also much less qualified to judge what is a good battle in terms of movie lingo. Take the two movies as a whole and you have hear probably the best Chinese costume epic in a long time, tied, if not second only to Chen Kaige's The Emperor and the Assassin (Jing Ke Ci Qin Wang- which also featured Zhang Fengyi as the titular assassin.) Watch the movie with an open mind and just enjoy the story and you'll find you'll have a much better time of it, unlike the Three Kingdoms fanatics who wished that Cao Cao had the exact number of pimples or Liu Bei the same nose hair thickness.
http://www.tracksounds.com Christopher

@#22 Well said! Could hardly agree more. I'd just add that Taro Iwashiro's score, while at first a little surprising in its tone, evolves into a great fit by the middle of the first film. By the end of the second film, it's well ingrained in the brain. It's too bad he nor Woo looks like they will get the credit due them for this effort.
http://www.goldenrule.com/health/health-savings.shtml Hsa

I was always a big fan of John Woo's movie so this one in particular should be pretty good.