You'd
think a company with as poor a track record for distributing foreign films as
Miramax would at least clean up its act if only to ensure future business with
the international film community. Miramax, a Disney subsidiary and
self-professed champion of independent and foreign film, is notorious for buying
North American distribution rights for foreign films with the broken promise
that the film will see the light of day in the US. The majority of these films
(particularly Asian films) are either unreleased or have been released only
after being bastardized by extensive re-editing, re-scoring and heinous dubbing.
Their most recent victim is a Cantonese film called Hero. Hero is a wuxia film (period fantasy), directed by Zhang Yimou (Raise the Red Lantern). It’s the story of Nameless (Jet Li), a sheriff that rids a kingdom of assassins Sky (Donnie Chen), Broken Sword (Tony Leung) and Flying Snow (Maggie Cheung), who plot to kill the king (Chen Dao Ming). When the king doubts Nameless’ story of defeating the assassins, several versions of the story are told through Rashomon-like flashbacks.
Hero producer, Zhang Weiping, told Nanfang Daily that Miramax promised to do its best to promote the film for the upcoming 75th Annual Academy Awards. After Weiping fulfilled all of the qualifications for submissions in the Best Foreign Film category in Hong Kong, Miramax failed to do its part by not releasing the film in this country. Furthermore, Hero didn’t even make the list of films Miramax chose to screen for the Academy. Instead, as a last-minute appeasement, Miramax showed it to voters of the Golden Globe awards (which is only a hair less insulting than the MTV Movie Awards).
Not surprisingly, Miramax has chosen Roberto Benigni’s Pinocchio to be its contender for Best Foreign Film, seemingly recreating the magic and dollar signs it made off its last Benigni collaboration, Life Is Beautiful.
It seems Hero is doomed to join the Miramax dust piles along with Shaolin Soccer, The Touch, The Accidental Spy and Legend Of Zu.
Miramax is within its legal rights to do whatever it pleases with the films it acquires. It can toss them aside, re-edit them in its slash and burn style, or release them as-is. It's a case of ethics vs. legality. The arts are the last frontier for any universal common bond between cultures. Miramax's habitual ill treatment of foreign films sends out a message of disrespect and prejudice that, if continued, might just sever that cultural bond for good.