The guy story is so strong that conventional romantic interludes with the woman torn between two men could easily have been dropped.
Comment
11/07/08
Tau Ming Chong (2009)
57
%
Tomatometer
How does the Tomatometer work 
Reviews Counted:14
Fresh:8
Rotten:6
Average Rating:5.6/10
Consensus: Slightly stodgy historical Chinese epic with impressive battles.
Runtime: 2 hrs 6 mins
Genre: Action/Adventure
Reviews for Tau Ming Chong
1 - 16 (sorted by date; UK critics are listed first)
Top CriticSide-stepping the cold-steel visual perfection of ‘Hero’ and the fairytale detachment of ‘Crouching Tiger…’, the film hews closer to ‘Spartacus’
11/07/08
Top CriticGrand historical filmmaking from Peter Chan, if slightly confusing and cobbled in places.
11/07/08
Top CriticThere are no pecs and no leather Speedos, but there is a baffled general who, when facing defeat, blurts out the iconic line: “This is madness!”
11/07/08
Top CriticAs so often with this sort of material, I found the battle scenes beautifully shot, but strangely uninvolving, and the narrative is cumbersome and overlong.
11/07/08
Top CriticA village-pillaging extravaganza whose music and pitched slaughter compete to ruin your inner ear.
11/07/08
Top CriticLi brings the intensity previously seen in Fearless to his compromised General, while Lau is a noble savage, vying with Pang for Lian’s affection in the obligatory romantic subplot.
11/07/08
Handsomely mounted as it is, it’s a bit on the stodgy side. Romance inevitably causes a rupture in the trio, but as time grinds by, your interest is also bound to buckle.
11/07/08
Intense, visceral and highly violent, they look just great, placing you right there in the thick of the action, making The Warlords our film of the week.
11/07/08
Great for battle re-enactment fanatics, not so good for The Sneak, whose senses have been dulled to the slow-motion slicing of limbs and heads which recur so often in these kind of films.
11/07/08
Lest the spectacle alone fail to conquer, a truth-based plot is wheeled into place and historical actualities are hurled over the walls of audience resistance, as if to say: “This rise and fall of a rebel leader”
11/07/08
The vicissitudes of Qing dynasty politics in the mid-19th century remain rather confusing, and the bloodiness of the battles is relentless, but the film has something to say about the spiritual corruption that afflicts men who live by war.
11/07/08
But the action often gets in the way of the drama — which is what generally happens when there’s an enormous budget and an obvious pitch for box-office appeal.
11/07/08
Peter Chan's period epic features some spectacular battle sequences and a strong performance from Jet Li but it drags considerably in the middle section and it's hard to really engage with the story.
10/23/08
Click to read the article
10/18/08
Top CriticClick to read the article
10/18/08
1 - 16 (sorted by date; UK critics are listed first)
Latest News for Tau Ming Chong
May 19, 2009:
Magnet Drawn to Jet Li's Warlords 
Jet Li and Andy Lau's "Warlords," a "historical action epic" that drew crowds and won awards in China, has found an American distributor in the form of Magnet Releasing. More...
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