The Founding of a Republic

Original title: Jian guo da ye

2009
2h 18m

IMDb RATING

YOUR RATING

Inspired by true events, Founding of a Republic weaves a rousing tale of one man who fought against the tyranny of a ruler and led his people in battle in the ultimate sacrifice for his coun... Read allInspired by true events, Founding of a Republic weaves a rousing tale of one man who fought against the tyranny of a ruler and led his people in battle in the ultimate sacrifice for his country.Inspired by true events, Founding of a Republic weaves a rousing tale of one man who fought against the tyranny of a ruler and led his people in battle in the ultimate sacrifice for his country.

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

4.9/10

3.9K

YOUR RATING

See production info at IMDbPro

Awards
- 15 wins & 7 nominations total

Trivia
This movie was made to coincide with the 60th Anniversary of the Chinese Communist Party founding of China. This movie boasts the most number of China's movie stars in one movie. Many of the top stars were invited to star as leads, supporting characters, or just cameo in the movie, reportedly including some of the top Chinese stars like Jackie Chan and Jet Li, who only have one shot or one line in the movie.

Quotes
Li Ji-chen: I heard you intend to resign. Even if you were to resign, at least wait till after the capitulation ceremony in Nanjing. You helped defeat the Japanese. The ceremony can't do without a national hero like you.
Chen Shaokuan: If I don't resign, very soon I'll be blamed for the civil war. We fought against the country's enemy for 8 years. We've struggled, we've fought all, nothing more need be said. And now that we've won, we're still warring. Against whom ? Chinese people fighting Chinese people... this kind of job, I do not want.

User reviews21

Review

Featured review

Good aspects but ignore the DVD cover which is on sale in the UK

On the UK DVD summary the film is described as; 'Jet Li, Jackie Chan and Donnie Yen star in this action-packed, monumental epic for the first time in film history... With breath-taking cinematography, explosive action sequences" The cover shows the 3 actors above in white outfits taking up most of the cover.

Ignore this completely!! For one thing Jet Li and Jackie Chan have extremely small cameos which combined last around 2 minutes TOPS!! Their parts in this are not even worth mentioning.

There are 1 or 2 shots (at the most) that are anything like "breath-taking", one of these consisted of a shot that was in sepia style which was similar (but had unfortunately less impact) to the beach scene in Saving Private Ryan (including the extreme wide panning shots). The editing and many of the shots seem amateur making some parts seem comical, which is a shame as many of the actors seem very talented and don't deserve to be represented as poorly as they are in some of the scenes.

The "explosive action sequences" consists of a few explosions (one man has his foot blown off) and no action.

If you are interested in the history of China then this is a film for you, as I would suggest it is a good representation of the events. And the actors who ARE in the film are very good. For educational purposes, this film succeeds.

But if you read the cover in the UK then choose to buy thinking you will be getting 2 and a half hours of epic battles then you have been fooled. Instead prepare yourself for a very long, unwitty docu-drama. There are epic battles but unfortunately they are only political ones.

Using Jackie Chan and Jet Li to sell this is practically fraud.