Cliff Walkers (2021)

By: Mike Ward on Thursday, May 06

R Running Time: 120 mins

SHOULD I SEE IT?

YES

Fans of director Zhang Yimou’s work will love the idea of the visually groundbreaking filmmaker turning to the spy/espionage genre for the first time.
From the costumes to the production design to the now-expected beautiful cinematography, Cliff Walkers looks as good as a move has looked in a long, long time.
If you can follow it, I imagine a fair amount of viewers will develop a curiosity with the historical realities surrounding this fictionalized story.

NO

Grab a notepad, maybe some red string, and consider popping an Adderall. To follow the story, the machinations of characters and who they are and what they do - Cliff Walkers requires tremendous focus.
The dazzle of the visual presentation only takes you so far if you have no emotional connection to the story being told to you.
Director Zhang Yimou has made much better films and while a well-made shift of course, fans may be looking for his return to more familiar, more grounded work in the future.

OUR REVIEW

The visual style of director Zhang Yimou has long been recognized as innovative, groundbreaking, and with few notable comparisons. The creator of such visually striking films as Hero, House of Flying Daggers, and Shadow, Zhang moves from the martial arts (or “wuxia”) genre and delivers an intriguing, if not somewhat convoluted, espionage thriller for his 25th feature film.

Cliff Walkers, previously named Impasse, walks us through a story of four secret agents, paired off as two romantic couples, each trained in the Soviet Union. They are tasked with completing “Operation Utrennya,” a covert operation placing the agents in the Chinese-located, Japanese-controlled puppet state of Manchukuo. Set in 1930, Yimou’s film presents a fictionalized story in historical context.

Those couples are tasked with rescuing a survivor of a Japanese internment camp and bringing them to safety. De facto team leader Zhang (Zhang Yi) decides to split up the couples (the screenplay by Quan Yongxian fails to offer much of a palpable reason) and pairs up with Lan (Liu Haocun), the young wife of Chuliang (Zhu Yawen). He subsequently partners up with Yu (Qin Hailu), and soon thereafter they set forth with their mission.

The four, seeing their mission unnecessarily complicated by their own decision-making, are soon trailed by a team of agents secretly put together by someone revealed to be betraying the mission. What unfolds is a series of dialogue-heavy sequences, with Quan’s screenplay tossing in a myriad of moments where people question loyalty, rationalize decisions, and speak in passages of dense exposition.

One film critic described the film’s script as “unnecessary,” which is a curious critique. Sadly, what gets lost along the way is the purpose of the mission - to notify the world of atrocities being committed against the Chinese people. Cliff Walkers requires strict attention (and maybe a notepad) while one admires director Zhang’s beautiful attention to detail. Spies resemble Westernized gangsters at times, with fedoras, impeccable suits, and an on-screen presence that keeps us rapt with attention.

When Zhang delivers an action sequence, the work is largely flawless from a technical standpoint. Even if you are lost in the story’s movement from Point A to Point B, it is easy to lose yourself in Zhao Xiaoding’s terrific cinematography and great atmosphere enhanced by costume and production design.

The question becomes how engaged and patient one will be with the story. We have four characters, who split apart soon after we meet them. Another team of spies are introduced, and each development leads to more and more characters and more and more historical discussion.

Understandably, Quan’s script assumes that viewers have some working knowledge of the history of Manchukuo and the use of human experimentation, murder, and torture by the infamous Unit 731 of the Imperial Army. Well-acted, the cumbersome storylines knock the film’s effectiveness down a peg or two, leaving director Zhang to dazzle us with that retro spy movie aesthetic, but leaving us bundled up and stuck out in the snowy forest, which provides the setting for the film’s opening act.

Cliff Walkers is a film I seem to admire more than enjoy. The craftsmanship is unmistakable, the basic framework of the plot is fascinating. The writing lacks cohesion. Ultimately, we are presented with a pretty impressive bauble to look at. The problem is that we, as viewers, are left to ponder just what exactly we are supposed to do with this shiny, curious object.

CAST & CREW

Starring: Zhang Yi, Liu Haocun, Qin Hailu, Yu Hewei, Li Naiwen, Yu Ailei, Zhang Hanyu, Zhu Yawen

Director: Zhang Yimou
Written by: Quan Yongxian
Release Date: April 30, 2021
CMC Pictures

Fans of director Zhang Yimou’s work will love the idea of the visually groundbreaking filmmaker turning to the spy/espionage genre for the first time.

From the costumes to the production design to the now-expected beautiful cinematography, Cliff Walkers looks as good as a move has looked in a long, long time.

If you can follow it, I imagine a fair amount of viewers will develop a curiosity with the historical realities surrounding this fictionalized story.

Grab a notepad, maybe some red string, and consider popping an Adderall. To follow the story, the machinations of characters and who they are and what they do - Cliff Walkers requires tremendous focus.

The dazzle of the visual presentation only takes you so far if you have no emotional connection to the story being told to you.

Director Zhang Yimou has made much better films and while a well-made shift of course, fans may be looking for his return to more familiar, more grounded work in the future.