A pair of shady brothers, Shisun and Chen Liu, ineptly try to rob a farmer and ravish his daughter, only to be interrupted by a platoon of marauding soldiers. Because the robbers' scorn for the military is even greater than their scorn for ordinary, law-abiding citizens, they stop what they're doing and slaughter the soldiers. The farmer and neighboring villagers are so grateful that they take Shisun and Chen Liu prisoner. The brothers escape by distracting their dimwitted guards with bawdy stories. They are caught and imprisoned again. Again, they escape. And so on, and so on.
Half Kurosawa-Mifune swordplay spectacle, half Fear and Loathing in the Tang Dynasty, this tale of 8th-century China unfolds pretty much as you'd expect but is fun to watch despite its predictability. Writer-director Yang Shu-peng seems to operate on a policy of "when in doubt, impale, decapitate, or hang someone," yet the film still manages to feel frothy and light. That's no easy feat.
Hu Jun and Jiang Wu work a very pleasing chemistry as the comically brutal titular characters. Hu as Shisun is the smart one, cool and aloof in the face of any danger. Jiang as Chen Liu is the emotional slob who rails apoplectically against everything that befalls them until he runs short of breath. "Shisun, you go on cursing," he says. "I'm tired out."
A wedge is driven between them when Chen Liu falls in love and wants to remain in the village. Shisun stays, too, but he hungers for their old way of life, feeling that stability will make them soft. Meanwhile, the village is under constant threat from the seemingly-inexhaustible garrison of tyrannical soldiers. In the wake of a particularly vicious attack, the brothers try to convince the villagers to flee, to no avail. The villagers are convinced that the only reason the soldiers keep attacking is because they want to arrest the robbers. Only when the soldiers try to rape the village women do the locals finally lift a finger to defend themselves.
Full of wary alliances, betrayals, and deceit, this black comedy falls apart at the climax. Yang can't sustain the pitch of perpetual carnage and concludes on a dreamlike note that matches nothing in the rest of the movie. (The sudden and complete change of tone was almost as grating as the projectionist who played the movie at twice the volume necessary.) One leaves the theatre feeling baffled and deflated. A more straightforward resolution--any discernible resolution at all, in fact--might have made The Robbers a winner. Close, but no cigar. Still, Yang is a filmmaker to watch. His visual acuity, deft hand with his actors, and knack for creating interesting characters and relationships will serve him well when tempered with a little more restraint.
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