Crouching Dragon—The Tiger Lily Cut

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9.2 (16)
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Crouching Dragon—The Tiger Lily Cut
Faneditor Name:
Original Movie Title:
Fanedit Type:
Original Release Date:
2000
Original Running Time:
120
Fanedit Release Date:
Fanedit Running Time:
94
Time Cut:
26
Available in HD?
Brief Synopsis:
With more than 730 rewritten subtitles, this edit profanely and absurdly alters the story of the original Mandarin-language film. Eastern martial arts and western medieval fantasy are hustled into a lush honeymoon suite where they must show each other their privates.
Orcs and zombies now populate this movie. Why? Because the subtitles say so.
Intention:
To spray graffiti on moving pictures. The original movie explored earnest themes, including the recklessness of youth, the complicated nature of student-pupil relationships, and the restricted lives of women. This edit replaces such worthy considerations with an alternate story line.
Additional Notes:
CONTENT ADVISORY: Mature language, sexuality, drug references, simulated violence, and supernatural shit.
Special Thanks:
To blueyoda and Neglify for reviewing the workprint and providing invaluable feedback.
To Captain Khajiit for industrial-strength technical wisdom.
To Brumous, Gatos, geminigod, juice4z0, L8wrtr, Neglify, Q2, reave, Stankpac, theslime, ThrowgnCpr, and wabid for additional technical guidance.
To emphatic for translating this obscenity into Swedish.
To my family for putting up with this project.
To Ang Lee and the original cast and crew for playing it straight, by which they were clearly anticipating the release of this farcical version years later.
Release Information:
  • DVD
  • Digital
Special Features
Cover art, discless disc art, trailer, and promotional material with Michelle Yeoh.
Cuts and Additions:
Added more than 730 subtitles.
Removed a whole lot of dialogue-intensive scenes, removed the marriage subplot, leaving the fight scenes intact between. . . a whole lot of talking.
Removed the characters for “tiger” and “hidden” from the title screen and added the modified English title in the same font as the original.
Several audio issues, including overly loud dialogue during a fight scene and brief audio/video asynchrony, exist in the original movie; these problems remain uncorrected.
Cover art by ssj (DOWNLOAD HERE)
image

Trailer


Promo

User reviews

16 reviews
 
69%
 
31%
5-7 stars
 
0%
3-5 stars
 
0%
1-3 stars
 
0%
Overall rating
 
9.2
Audio/Video Quality
 
9.4(13)
Audio Editing
 
9.3(14)
Visual Editing
 
9.5(15)
Narrative
 
8.6(16)
Enjoyment
 
9.0(16)
View all user reviews View most helpful
Overall rating
 
8.0
Audio/Video Quality
 
8.0
Audio Editing
 
9.0
Visual Editing
 
10.0
Narrative
 
5.0
Enjoyment
 
8.0
I once started watching the theatrical cut. Apparently, I wasn't in the mood, because I rarely DNF, but I was barely half an hour in before I became bored and intolerant. I've promised my friend I will watch the theatrical cut someday, but occasionally I like to experience a fanedit without context to see how it holds up. Ssj's edit seemed like a good way to experience the choreography and wirework that everybody praises the film for, while also dodging yawns.


QUALITY

Reviews allude to an HD copy, but I found two links that both led to an SD file. For what it is it looks decent. I did not have any issues with noticeable visual compression as others have mentioned.


VISUAL

No issues.


AUDIO

There were two fairly abrupt audio cuts, but otherwise I didn't notice any transitions or changes.


NARRATIVE

As mentioned above, I've not seen the theatrical cut. I think I gathered some vague sense of certain character loyalties based on visual action, but the newly written subtitles did nothing to communicate a coherent plot. I love the audacity of it and I wish more edits tried this kind of thing out, but I don't think ssj's new script really conveys the whimsical world and narrative he appears to be aiming for. I also think some bits of footage here and there to show the presence of something inhuman would help the vibe as well - not even anything complicated. Just show a shot of something in a crowd when a character is walking through a town square, or some goblin in a tavern when we enter an eatery. Heck, if we're right by dragon country, just throw in the sound of something roaring in the distance. Anything to back up the context the subs claim. Anywho, I had little to no clue what was going on, other than some sword being a magic cooking implement that seems to be used more often for killing than anything culinary.


ENJOYMENT

Narrative aside, I did enjoy this. Ssj has a wonderful sense of humour and his creative reworking of dialogue provoked audible merriment. I didn't laugh as often or as hard as I would have liked, but I was never bored. I think sometimes the script leans on the side of random more than genius, but the latter certainly has a presence here. Some have said that there's less room for humour in the 2nd half due to action being at the forefront, and this is true. However, since I was unfamiliar with the material, at these points I was just enjoying experiencing the action for the first time. More humour (if not subbed, then by other means) would have been ideal, but the lack wasn't detrimental. I can imagine how others might find this portion of the edit to be underwhelming if they are already familiar with the theatrical cut.

User Review

Do you recommend this edit?
Yes
Format Watched?
Digital
T
Top 50 Reviewer 103 reviews
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(Updated: March 26, 2016)
Overall rating
 
7.8
Audio/Video Quality
 
7.0
Audio Editing
 
9.0
Visual Editing
 
8.0
Narrative
 
7.0
Enjoyment
 
8.0
Brilliant idea to use subtitles to create a new story. Yes, the story doesn't make fully sense, but it's just fascinating reading about monsters and necromancers... gives it a completely different atmosphere, and sometimes I laughed really hard, and it's not like ssj just inserted some funny lines, he tried to create a new story-line, kudos for that.

As to the videoquality, while it is HD, the small filesize reduces imho the quality.

User Review

Do you recommend this edit?
Yes
Format Watched?
Digital
Report this review Comments (0) | Was this review helpful? 0 0
Overall rating
 
9.0
Audio/Video Quality
 
10.0
Audio Editing
 
9.0
Visual Editing
 
9.0
Narrative
 
8.0
Enjoyment
 
9.0
When the original was released in 2000, it sent thousands of Asia film fanboys into a tailspin tizzy.
“This is going to ruin all our cherished Hong Kong and Japanese exploitation fun!”
Apologists for the film and peddlers of imports did their best to mollify all those nervous Nellies.
And yet - - the mainstream Western world got exposed to and excited by Asian action cinema.
Crouching Tiger made a shitload of money, and, as doomsayers predicted, future Asian fare became ever more tasteful. Easier for the world digestion. The wackiness was on the fade.
All hail ssj for doing his best to return this talky bi-polar film to the crazy roots of Shaw Brothers!

Video - MPEG-4, 960 X 400p. Now this is widescreen. Plenty of dark scenes in this, though I saw nothing amiss. There were quick edits, but one gets so caught up in the goings-on that you don’t pay attention.

Audio - 2 Channel stereo, AAC. 160 Kbps. Subtitles - Yes, some of the best! This reviewer does not understand Mandarin, so I did more reading than listening. The audio seems exactly as the original. Fine for dialogue. Actiony bits by Shanghai Percussion Ensemble terrific. Anytime Yo Yo Ma picks up his cello, naptime.

Narrative - Bit overdone, with references to orcs and goblins and other creep-sters. If creatures get mentioned, then I want to see them. The Iron Chef theme comes and goes worse than a studied accent. Often I had no idea what was going on, plot wise. Jokes not necessarily relatable to ongoing screen follies.

Enjoyment - This is a great antidote to the borefest that the original was. Energy level diminishes in the final act, and jokes start to fall flat. The story tumbles into a confused mess, but I laughed out loud often. ssj has provides several generous extras, as well. Info sheet, trailer, and extraordinary press conference with Michelle Yeoh. Brilliant. I only wish I had a time machine and could kick a copy of this back to 2000 era readers of Asian Cult Cinema.

User Review

Do you recommend this edit?
Yes
Format Watched?
Digital
Report this review Comments (0) | Was this review helpful? 0 0
Overall rating
 
8.8
Audio/Video Quality
 
10.0
Audio Editing
 
9.0
Visual Editing
 
9.0
Narrative
 
7.0
Enjoyment
 
9.0
Drugs, orcs, goblins and dragons oh my!

Super fun edit! I should have known, ssj is hilarious on the regular in the forums and his style of humor really shines through here. The jokes slow down a bit in the second half but it remains funny (and it's because of more great action scenes, so no harm, no foul). Some personal highlights for me are: part with a sword that's a second dick to you, Beijing's Top Chef, snorted brain magic, don't hurt my hair!, super similar really, the preciousss will summon skyrocks down on your ass, plump-ass rump, wrong movie, disturbing my bottom will only lead to sorrow and prepare me a dragon egg smoothie. The new story is pretty out there but funny, which is really all that matters.

Bonus: the subtitled interview is hilarious, as well!

User Review

Do you recommend this edit?
Yes
Format Watched?
Digital
T
Top 50 Reviewer 114 reviews
Report this review Comments (0) | Was this review helpful? 0 0
Overall rating
 
9.3
Audio Editing
 
9.0
Visual Editing
 
9.0
Narrative
 
10.0
Enjoyment
 
9.0
Rebue:

A mind-bending re-imagining of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon through the use of rewritten subtitles. Now a story of drugs, love, sex, and more drugs.

I really enjoyed this edit, even when I didn't quite understand it. ssj is a demented (in the best way) poet, and the subs are never dull. I chuckled many a time and even ALLOL'd (actually literally laughed out loud) several times.

The only disappointment was that the humor slows down in the second half of the edit, as there is not much dialogue to subtitle. But then again, we still get to watch the great action sequences, so that's not a bad thing.

Highly recommended to all dragonkin and non-dragonkin alike. I rate this 9 out of 10 Banana Lime and White Peach Yogurt Fountains.

(*Note: I did not rate audio/video quality as I watched this on my phone)

User Review

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Yes
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