China 1911 (2011)

I first chose to watch this movie because it starred Jackie Chan and the trailer looked incredibly good. So I came into this movie expecting an action packed Jackie Chan-esque War Thriller.

Story 7/10: The story was the 1911 revolution in China that overthrew the Qing Dynasty. The story itself was interesting, but the way it was presented was decent at best.

Acting 10/10: I can't complain about the acting. The characters were believable, which is about all an actor can do.

Music 7/10: The music was ok. It didn't stand out much.

Rewatch Value 1/10: I'm generally not a rewatcher, and since I disliked this film i definitely would NOT rewatch this movie EVER.

Overall 6/10: The main reason i disliked this movie was because of the way it was done. It felt like a documentary rushed into a film. It caused me to not really develop any feelings for the characters and overall not really care about the movie.

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This movie could've been an email

I normally avoid watching C-dramas set during the republican era as they tend to be the most heavily lathered in government propaganda. 1911 is case in point.

The film tells the story of the 1911 revolution (or the Xinhai revolution as it's otherwise known). I'm not surprised that this particular event was the subject of such hammed-up propaganda given the revolution is key to the grander political myth-making of the modern Chinese state. That said, you can still do propaganda a lot better than this??

The storyline reads like my high school essays on Bolshevik Russia. It's a boring chronology of events with political commentary slapped across the top. The music and melodrama seems to indicate that you're meant to care about the characters on screen. But you don't.

It's normally a pretty safe choice to start a story in the middle of the action – in this case the failed Second Guangzhou Uprising – but without an emotional hook to the characters, mid action scenes exhaust their oxygen pretty fast. By following a Great Men of History approach, the main characters feel flat and 2D, their entire psyche presented in the form of political speeches or the flashing of guns.

By the end of the film, you're feeling pretty uninspired. There's a lot of monologuing where you start to think the character just likes the sound of their own voice. Jackie Chan is the only one allowed to wear a leather jacket for some reason. And the two normie characters who should've been the soul of the movie are really awkwardly tacked on at the beginning and end.

tbh, it's quicker and more interesting to read the wikipedia page.

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