The movie is beautifully shot and is drastically different to the many iterations about this classic eternal tale. The shots are crude, gritty and dirty. You can almost say it's akin to the spaghetti take on western with the catch that there is no action here whatsoever and the entire movie is about a delirious dying rascal who found himself an emperor because of chance (arguably luck ? His ability to endure and survive ?) and a wife that is trying her best to survive the currents after she finally became an empress but having to resort to cruelty (and the historical records spare no time telling of this).
There are some great shots that left me staggering like when the empress' shadow looms and covers prime minister Xiao, then there are some cheap CGI that are just outta the place, but when taken with the fact that Liu Bang is on his deathbed and delirious does do the job.
There is a general lack of ambition that I respect. It almost feels like the movie concedes that the emperor and his ministers are just a punch of rascals from a small county who lucked out, but again the scenery is just amazing for what it shows.
You can watch this after you do King' War tv series to have a conclusion. It does it better than the show. Qin Lan plays Liu Bang's wife Lady Lu in there as well.
I actually wonder if there are similarly shot movies now...
