Sacrifice

"Before you embark on a journey of revenge,” the Chinese philosopher Confucius states, “dig two graves." The quote serves perfectly as the subtitle for director Kaige Chen’s epic film, Sacrifice, the story of a military coup in 5th century China (The Yuan Dynasty) where a ruthless general wipes out 300 members of the powerful Zhao clan to clear a path for him to take over the throne. The only problem is that there are actually 301 members of the clan. A boy is born to the princess just as the coup is taking place and the royal doctor is forced to make a tragic sacrifice to make sure the young prince survives. Although the plot is straight forward – the doctor raises the child as his own with the sole purpose of teaching him what he needs to get revenge on the man who killed his family – Kaige does a masterful job of pacing the story, weaving together the formative moments of the young man’s life to create a compelling and thoroughly entertaining cinematic experience. And he does it without ever letting the audience forget that there are real people experience real human emotions at the heart of the history that is taking place.