The Eight Hundred

Starring: Zhi-zhong Huang, Zhang Junyi, Hao Ou, Wu Jiang, Yi Zhang, Qianyuan Wang, Siyu Lu, Chun Du, Vision Wei, En Bai, Youhao Zhang, Yixin Tang, Jiuxiao Li
Directed by: Hu Guan
Rating: Not rated
Genre: Action, Drama, War
2020

Times Seen:
Tim: 1

Summary: In 1937, a small group of Chinese soldiers fight to defend a warehouse besieged by Japanese troops.

Review:

Tim: 2020 will always be one of the worst years of any of our lives and it'll always be one that never makes much sense. One of the oddities of that awful year is that the Chinese film The Eight Hundred emerged as the highest grossing film worldwide. Having a non-American film take the worldwide box office crown is definitely unexpected, even though this film made a fraction of what the top films make in non-pandemic years. By all accounts, though, even though this isn't a great movie, it's a very good one and we can at least take solace that an effective movie was the highest grossing one.

I don't watch a lot of Chinese movies, so I found this one especially interesting. The movie definitely has a propaganda feel to it, a self-promoting look at brave Chinese soldiers battling the Japanese. I imagine me watching this movie feels similar to how non-Americans view many of the American war movies. There's nothing wrong with taking pride in your country and your military. Hollywood does that continually. It was just interesting seeing that as someone not from the country being acclaimed.

I enjoyed that this film was based on a true story, as I'd never heard of this warehouse battle in Shanghai. It's kind of a shocking story, with the International Settlement right across the river. So, you had this bloody, devastating battle taking place and right across the river, a protected area where people observed the fighting in relative piece. It's certainly a unique war situation and I found that aspect of it fascinating. The movie does a good job of showing both sides of the river and their views of the fighting. I'd never quite seen a war story like this one.

I didn't know any of the cast members and it was a bit challenging at first keeping track of so many different characters. The talent of director Hu Guan comes in that he slowly builds up each of these characters over the course of the movie. The film is probably a bit too long at 2 hours, 29 minutes, but Hu Guan does use the time for character development. Towards the end of the film, you really do identify with these soldiers and care about their plight. That's one of the reasons I enjoyed the movie so much- those human connections you make.

My favorite cast member was Qianyuan Wang. I thought he delivered a breathtaking performance, full of nuance and authenticity. It was the most powerful performance of the film. Zhi-zhong Huang was effective as well. The entirety of the cast worked well and I was impressed by how many strong performances emerged from the film.

The movie absolutely has an epic scope to it, which is a bit surprising since it's mostly self-contained to one warehouse in Shanghai. The movie spans back, though, providing scale and scope to this story. It definitely gives you a helpful view of this battle and the importance of it to the war and to China as a whole. The visual effects were impressive- there are many intense, exciting moments. While these never get to the heights of the best American war movies, they got closer than I would expect. This helps with the runtime, as the movie rarely drags. It does hold your attention.

I really enjoyed The Eight Hundred and I'm glad I watched it. It's a reminder to me that I should watch more movies from China. I wouldn't have seen this one, except I'm trying to watch more movies from 2020 and this one won the global box office. That is what really propelled me to watch the film and I'm glad I did.



Rating 1-10
Tim's Rating: 7.5



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