Ashes of Time

1994 ‘東邪西毒’ Directed by Wong Kar-wai

Ouyang Feng is a heartbroken and cynical man who spends his days in the desert, connecting expert swordsmen with those seeking revenge and willing to pay for it. Throughout five seasons in exile, Ouyang spins tales of his clients' unrequited loves and unusual acts of bravery.

Leslie Cheung Tony Leung Ka-fai Brigitte Lin Jacky Cheung Tony Leung Chiu-wai Carina Lau Charlie Yeung Maggie Cheung Li Bai Collin Chou Siu-Lung Liu Xun Li Yin

Alternative Titles

Este contraveneno del Oeste, Cenizas del tiempo, Ashes of Time Redux, Dung che sai duk, 東邪西毒終極版, 东邪西毒终极版, Cinzas do Passado Redux, 东邪西毒：终极版, 동사서독 Redux, มังกรหยก ศึกอภิมหายุทธ์, 東邪西毒：終極版, Die verlorene Zeit - Redux, Les Cendres du temps, Die verlorene Zeit

drama action

100 mins More details at IMDb TMDb Report this film

Popular reviews

Review by Sean Gilman ★★★★★ 10

Dug out the original, pre-Redux version. Having seen this in its two forms a total of six times, I can safely say it really isn't that hard to follow. Tony Leung is going blind and is married to Carina Lau who is in love with The Other Tony Leung. The Other Tony Leung is in love with Maggie Cheung who is in love with Leslie Cheung. Leslie Cheung is in love with Maggie Cheung but she married his brother because he was too busy being a wandering swordsman. Jacky Cheung is a wandering swordsman who doesn't like shoes, loses a finger getting revenge for a woman in exchange for some eggs, and brings his wife along with him while he…
Review by josh lewis ★★★ 3

i have no fuckin clue what happened but it's beautiful and i was vibing
Review by iana ★★★

👁👄👁 ooo pretty colours
Review by davidehrlich ★★½

Without a past, every day would be a new beginning. Wouldn’t that be great?”
In hindsight, it’s so perfectly on-brand: The big-budget martial arts epic that was supposed to launch Wong Kar Wai into the highest echelons of commercial Hong Kong directors turned out to be so inscrutable that even some of his most dedicated fans struggle to make sense of it (this critic included, though I’ll try my best). A sandy and over-cranked wuxia soap opera that cobbles together so many different stories it ends up feeling more like an exquisite corpse of old suds, “Ashes of Time” unfolds as if Wong put all of his pet obsessions into a blender and let the blades sort them out where…
Review by Sean Gilman ★★★★★ 3

The Redux version. Shocked at how similar the two versions are. Other than the rerecorded score and the hallucinogenically color-timed images, there is essentially no difference between the two. The Redux adds some on-screen titles connecting the characters more explicitly to the Legend of the Condor Heroes novels from which they're taken, making the whole enterprise feel like backstory, like a prequel to adventures we won't see, defining these wuxia heroes as much by their romantic disasters and haunting memories as by their martial skill or arcane codes of honor.
Review by BrandonHabes ★★★ 8

There's a reason WKW pulled his hair out while making this film and squeezed in CHUNGKING EXPRESS during production. The guy had to be stressed outta his mind making this unwieldy kung fu epic, and it shows. Thing lulls you into an obscure trance that runs like water color through a blurred, Jodorowskian hallucination. Think EL TOPO meets CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON. A film so drunk on WKW's style that it practically vaunts self-parody, as if he's trying to impersonate himself on SNL. Style for style's sake is a criticism that could be applied to all of his films, but here it feels deliriously pumped full of lysergic wine, to the point of becoming this garish abstraction that never quite…
Review by Jonathan White ★★★½ 6

This is the first watch of the second to last Wong Kar-Wai film I have left to see. Being a huge WKW fanboy, this is a big deal, yet, it’s a task I’ve always rather dreaded rather than relished with anticipation. The reason? I’m not a martial arts film fan, particularly wuxia.
Almost exactly a year ago I cracked the seal on a Blu, newly arrived direct from Hong Kong, of Wong’s latest Martial Arts opus, The Grandmaster. It’s funny, looking back at that review now, I feel pretty much the same about Ashes of Time.
Here, in Ashes, I get the same sense that Wong desperately adores the genre; much like Tony Leung’s character from In The Mood for…
Review by amrit ★★★★★ 1

while taking a break from editing this wkw shot and wrote CHUNGKING EXPRESS to ‘clear his head’ ... so Wong kar-wai’s way of taking a break and relaxing while making one of the best movies ever made is by making another one of the best movies ever made
Review by TajLV ★★★½ 6

"Was it worth it to lose a finger for a basket of eggs?" ~ Ouyang Feng
Before watching this, I think it is good to know that it is a "remix," if you will, of the original "Ashes of Time" that director Wong Kar-wai made in 1994 before the handover of Hong Kong to China. The filming was done mainly on location in remote areas of the People's Republic, with Christopher Doyle as the primary cinematographer and the legendary Sammo Kam-Bo Hung as the action sequence choreographer.
Because the original prints were lost after the colony's reversion, Wong re-edited and re-scored the film in 2008 so that it could be released on DVD and Blu-ray. Major differences between the two…
Review by PopcornIdeology ★★½ 2

Yeah this wasn’t for me, it’s really not that long of a film but it felt like I was watching Sátántangó on 1/4th speed. Honestly it reminded me of the weird experience I had with Dune where I’m watching it, but legit don’t really remember/know any of the characters besides a few main ones. It’s the same feeling when you are reading a book and you realize that the past page and a half you’ve kinda just been going through the motions and not really digesting the narrative. Normally I’d say that’s my fault as a shitty viewer, but in this instance I do think some of the the blame should be placed on the film because I did not…
Review by tom ★★★½ 6

Incroyablement confus d’un point narratif, Ashes
of Times méritera plusieurs visionnages afin d’en saisir toute sa sève et tirer le plein potentiel des personnages et émotions véhiculées.
Au delà de ce problème qui rendra l’immersion quelques peu difficile, WKW nous offre ici une véritable leçon de cinéma, son plus beau film et
l’un des plus beaux films que j’ai eu l’occasion de voir dans ma chienne de vie (Redux).
Christopher Doyle marche littéralement sur l’eau pendant 1h33 pour nous offrir une maestria de photographie, tutoyant la perfection quand il est
allié au sens du cadre et de la poésie de WKW,
dévoilant peinture sur peinture sur peinture sans jamais sembler en rade de créativité.
Des compositions ahurissantes et inoubliables de…
Review by <Todd> ★★★★

"A drunk man's words can't be taken seriously,"
-Scavenger Hunt 45: boxd.it/2dQsw
Clue 1. Watch a Wong Kar-wai film (29/30 tasks complete)
This movie is so much better than Mortal Kombat!
This is my first Wong Kar-wai film and I'm in....now I just have to find all of his other films. Over the five seasons of the Chinese almanac, and taking place in the world of Martial Arts, Ashes of Time is a twisty fantasy martial arts drama that I can't pretend I fully understood on first watch. What I love about this film however, and the reason I'm looking forward to future films, is the use of color, direction, creativity, and the way he films martial arts. In addition, Wong Kar-wai gets A LOT out of these performances. I'm excited to watch again to more fully grasp the story.
***Redux version

Recent reviews

Review by Peebles ★★½

Wong Kar-Wai's only wuxia and really for good reason. His romance and drama films far outshine this film. With that being said this is certainly an ambitious movie and it has a lot of things going for it. The mise-en-scène is perfect here, actors are positioned in a way that they compliment the scenery. It's a beautifully shot movie with impressive cinematography. The sweeping desertscapes compliment the beauty of the lantern lit hobble that consistently appears as a setting in the film. As beautiful as this film is, regrettably, I found at times that I am trying to spend more time keeping up with the intricacies of the non-linear narrative to appreciate the beauty of the film. This is my…
Review by James ★★½

Stunningly composed imagery, but, yeah, I had a hard time following and just couldn't get fully into it, sorry.
The DVD has some interesting interviews with Wong Kar Wai, Christopher Doyle and some of the actors at the Cannes seaside for the redux release.
Review by Franco Funes ★★★★

Cuando la reseñan o la valoran la ponen muy abajo en relación con el resto de las películas de Kar Wai, pero no encuentro nada para reprocharle. Están los temas que toca siempre, el montaje vertiginoso, la fotografía saturada de Doyle y toda la melancolía que suscitan los planos breves para contar una larga espera.
Una gran película, lástima que parece ser el chivo expiatorio de la obra de WKW
Review by damla🍒 ★★★★★

tarif edilemez bir güzellikte
Review by A ★★★

No soy nada fan del Wuxia y la verdad es que no me he enterado de absolutamente nada, pero me ha entretenido y se me ha pasado volando ésta hora y media.
La fotografía es muy bonita como en todas las películas de WKW y siempre es una delicia ver a los actores que habitualmente acompañan a este director.
Review by Lorenzo Lee ★★★½

2021 Asian Cinema Challenge
Week 27 Theme: Martial Arts Films
Current Progress: 10/52
My apologies in advance for the long review and it's going to be even longer longer, after I watch the Redux version and add my comparison comments here.
Theatrical Version
My very first Wong Kar-wai film and of course for me, I had to start with his only Wuxia film that he done so far.
I have a DVD copy of the Redux version still on my physical media shelf, unwatched, as I wanted it to watch the theatrical version first and yesterday, I was finally able it to find it and watch it.
The theatrical version (btw, it seems that even before WKW did his Redux,…
Review by Mai ★★★★★

water go: *splash*
Hung Qi go: mmm egg
5/5
Review by Evandro Royka ★★★½

Empolgado para ver o que mais o Mubi tem a oferecer
Review by JoelArcherFilms ★★½

When his friend Huang (Tony Leung Ka Fai) visits mercenary Ou-yang (Leslie Cheung), they trade stories including that of princess Mu-rong (Brigitte Lin), who is alternately male and female.
More stylistically driven than anything else, this film feels a tad uninspired and lacking.
Has some impressive action sequences but I felt that didn't sustain me enough. An interesting deviation for director Wong Kar-Wai but I'm not sold on it was the best one.
Review by OMC ★★★★★

Finally watched the redux version. Looks beautiful compared to the somewhat grainy DVD I have lying around somewhere. This is one film that really needed a cleanup although at some points they may have gone overboard with some of the digital colouring. Doesn't really matter, in fact, it adds to the overall psychedelic intensity of the whole enterprise. Ashes of Time used to be a hermetic story, it still is to a certain extent, although time and experience have made it somewhat easier to understand. Besides, the story never was important, it's more about intensities, the big ones: loneliness, sadness, dreams, memory, death. The imagery is filled with a strange mixture of elegance and primitivism, the elegant part undoubtedly helped by the presence of Hong Kong's finest actors, especially Leslie Cheung is super charismatic here. A superb piece of dream cinema, again falling apart as I try to remember it.
Review by Rhys ★★★

SHOW ME THE FIGHT SCENES WONG YOU FUCK
Review by Nicolò Grasso

Original Title: 東邪西毒
Year of Release: 1994
Genres: Action; Historical Drama
Director: Wong Kar-wai
Writers: Wong Kar-wai, Louis Cha
Main Cast: Leslie Cheung, Tony Leung Ka-fai, Brigitte Lin, Jacky Cheung, Tony Leung Chiu-wai
Final Wong Kar-wai feature film I had left to watch. If "poetic action" was a genre, Ashes of Time would fit the definition perfectly. The director's more artistic and lyrical sensibilities are coupled with a non-linear, paper-thin story that removes narrative depth in favor of the beauty of words and visuals.
Of all the films of this Hong Kong filmmaker, this was easily the one I was least looking forward to given its reputation, but I'm happy to report that I quite enjoyed this peculiar wuxia. The…