Director Hu Guan
Starring OU Hao, JIANG Wu, ZHANG Yi, WANG Qianyuan, DU Chun, LI Chen, TANG Yixin
Rated MA
Score 6/6

In 1937, eight hundred Chinese soldiers fight under siege from a warehouse in the middle of the Shanghai battlefield, completely surrounded by the Japanese army.

Okay, I kind of stumbled across this one when I found the trailer for The Eight Hundred and knew that I had to go see this while it was at the cinema after hearing the duet Remembering between Andrea Bocelli & Na Ying.
I really wasn’t that familiar with the director or anybody cast in this movie, though I will admit that there was one actor with a moustache who for a couple of moments had a passing resemblance to Don Frye. It was not Frye and sitting here writing this review I’m starting to think that the Moustache merely gave the actor, Jiang Wu the aura of Don Frye. It should be noted that apparently director Guan Hu had been preparing for the film for 10 years.

I went into The Eight Hundred knowing nothing about the Defence of the Sihang Warehouse in 1937 Shanghai. The first thing that struck about this was that it was unlike most of the other World War 2 movies that I have previously seen come to think any other war movie that I have seen. I am sure you have noticed how war movies have that ensemble feel and how they take time so that the audience gets know all of the main characters so that you will end up caring what happens to them by the end of the movie. Considering that the Chinese soldiers portrayed in the movie are known to Chinese history as ‘the Eight Hundred Heroes’ I am certain that there are more then a few people who might view this movie as a piece of propaganda considering it only really tells the Chinese side of the story. To those people I ask considering that The Eight Hundred has a runtime of two and a half hours, so I take it your down for watching a more ‘well rounded movie’ with a five-hour runtime? I got the impression that the filmmakers where framing the movie in such a way that highlighted the actual defence of the Sihang Warehouse being more important than the actual soldiers.

There were a few odd moments in the movie that left wondering ‘did that really happen?’ such as the gambling on the battle by the civilians who witnessed the battle across the river and the presence of a white horse in the factory.
There is some brilliant camera work I was particularly impressed by the aerial sequence of the two fighters attacking the factory, that at first glance looked as if it appeared to be file footage.
What I really wasn’t expecting was how the final moment of the movie was remarkably similar to the final scene of the 6th episode Goodbyeee of Blackadder goes fourth was structured.