{"id":12064,"date":"2008-04-25T01:29:32","date_gmt":"2008-04-25T05:29:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/?p=12064"},"modified":"2008-04-25T01:29:32","modified_gmt":"2008-04-25T05:29:32","slug":"the-dragon-painter-1919","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/2008\/04\/25\/the-dragon-painter-1919\/","title":{"rendered":"The Dragon Painter (1919)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/dragon-painterDVD.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-12065\" alt=\"dragon-painterDVD\" src=\"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/dragon-painterDVD.jpg\" width=\"459\" height=\"313\" \/><\/a><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>\n <w:WordDocument>\n  <w:View>Normal<\/w:View>\n  <w:Zoom>0<\/w:Zoom>\n  <w:PunctuationKerning\/>\n  <w:ValidateAgainstSchemas\/>\n  <w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>false<\/w:SaveIfXMLInvalid>\n  <w:IgnoreMixedContent>false<\/w:IgnoreMixedContent>\n  <w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>false<\/w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText>\n  <w:Compatibility>\n   <w:BreakWrappedTables\/>\n   <w:SnapToGridInCell\/>\n   <w:WrapTextWithPunct\/>\n   <w:UseAsianBreakRules\/>\n   <w:DontGrowAutofit\/>\n  <\/w:Compatibility>\n  <w:BrowserLevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4<\/w:BrowserLevel>\n <\/w:WordDocument>\n<\/xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>\n <w:LatentStyles DefLockedState=\"false\" LatentStyleCount=\"156\">\n <\/w:LatentStyles>\n<\/xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 10]>\n\n\n<style>\n \/* Style Definitions *\/\n table.MsoNormalTable\n\t{mso-style-name:\"Table Normal\";\n\tmso-tstyle-rowband-size:0;\n\tmso-tstyle-colband-size:0;\n\tmso-style-noshow:yes;\n\tmso-style-parent:\"\";\n\tmso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt;\n\tmso-para-margin:0in;\n\tmso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt;\n\tmso-pagination:widow-orphan;\n\tfont-size:10.0pt;\n\tfont-family:\"Times New Roman\";\n\tmso-ansi-language:#0400;\n\tmso-fareast-language:#0400;\n\tmso-bidi-language:#0400;}\n<\/style>\n\n\n<![endif]-->While I would have loved to adore \u201cThe Dragon Painter\u201d and the story that unfolds, I can\u2019t say that I did. For a movie made in 1919, Sessue Hayakawa\u2019s film is a wonderful epic with some rather incredible splashes of stark color and sweeping landscapes. Even for a print that\u2019s aged and was nearly lost the picture transfer for \u201cThe Dragon Painter\u201d is awfully fantastic with crystal clarity, and an incredible score. Even those who dislike the movie will find some value in the backdrops and set pieces, including Hayakawa\u2019s eagerness to break all stereotypes of the Asian culture.<\/p>\n<p><!--more-->While it is a very important piece of filmmaking with an incredible statement to make defying all anti-Asian sentiment among the masses that were generally accepted, \u201cThe Dragon Painter\u201d isn\u2019t too good. The primary problem, among many, is that Sessue Hayakawa just didn\u2019t convince me that he was this incredibly passionate painter and artist destined to be re-united with his long lost love stolen by a dragon a long time ago. He looks far too spaced and wide eyed to be convinced as passionate, and just resembles a mentally defective man rambling on about nothing at times. As for the story, there are just too much happy coincidences and convenient twists to take it seriously.<\/p>\n<p class=\"MsoNormal\">Even for a movie made in 1919, I just didn\u2019t buy that this painter would happen on a woman he believed was his lost wife, whose father happened to be an admirer of his work. On the same level, the dialogue suffers greatly, even if it is a translation, with exchanges that are trite and often clunky, with very little emphasis on character and chemistry. Even the greatest of silent film enthusiasts will be hard pressed to recommend it, and this raging movie buff knows how they feel. Hey, no one ever said all legendary films had to be good ones, and \u201cThe Dragon Painter\u201d is proof. While I adore its contribution to Asian cinema, it\u2019s just not a good enough film to put it in the gamut of classic silent cinema.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>While I would have loved to adore \u201cThe Dragon Painter\u201d and the story that unfolds, I can\u2019t say that I did. For a movie made in 1919, Sessue Hayakawa\u2019s film is a wonderful epic with some rather incredible splashes of stark color and sweeping landscapes. Even for a print that\u2019s aged and was nearly lost [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[64,249,302,349,874,944],"class_list":["post-12064","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-movie-reviews","tag-adaptation","tag-d","tag-drama","tag-fantasy","tag-romance","tag-silent-film"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12064","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12064"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12064\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12064"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12064"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cinema-crazed.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12064"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}