But The Great Wall struggles mightily to transcend its two-dimensional storyline, a dull roteness not much helped by its zoological villains.
Renowned director Zhang Yimou ( House of Flying Daggers, Hero) has placed Westerners at the center of a fundamentally Chinese narrative before, notably with Christian Bale in 2011’s The Flowers of War, and he is clearly no stranger to the scope of scale of historical epics. But hark, who is this leaping into the breach, rescuing young cadets from certain death with a well-placed blade? William, the loner legionnaire who believes in nothing and no one! Is impressing the commander part of his escape-plan long game, or has he suddenly grown a conscious? Tovar and another member of the Wall’s involuntary-Caucasian-lodger club named Ballard (a haunted, predatory Willem Dafoe) don’t care to stick around to find out, though their own getaway strategy may have a few plot-shaped holes of its own. Even with flawless preparation and swarms of immaculately coordinated fighters at the ready, though, the battle begins to shift away from victory. As something between provisional prisoners and houseguests, William and Tovar are allowed to bear witness to a Tao Tie raid that unfolds like a sort of bloody green-screen Cirque du Soleil: Pounding drums and swirling silks, soldiers arcing a silvery stream of arrows across the sky or diving swan-like from raised platforms, daggered spears in hand.