House of Flying Daggers

House of Flying Daggers ({{zh-cp|c=十面埋伏|p=shí miàn mái fú}}), is a 2004 action/romance movie directed by Zhang Yimou. The Chinese title derives from a Chinese four-character idiom literally meaning "ambush from ten sides", but figuratively meaning "ambush from all sides". The English title, House of Flying Daggers, refers to a secret society (飛刀門) within the film. The film is in the wuxia genre, similar in style to Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, or the more recent Warriors of Heaven and Earth.

Trivia

Literary origins

The movie features the theme of a beauty that brought woe among two characters. This is borrowed from a famous poem written circa CE 800 by Li Yannian (李延年). The poem goes like this (these are Chinese characters with pinyin transcription added using ruby annotations; if you see words in parentheses like "(guó)",

Related Topics:
800 - Li Yannian - Chinese character - Pinyin - Ruby

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instead of on top of the characters,

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then your browser cannot handle ruby text):

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(See also external site with characters in images:

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simp.

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trad.)

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Miscellaneous

This was originally going to be Anita Mui's final appearance in film and she had already accepted the role but, because she was battling cervical cancer, her part wasn't going to be filmed until early 2004. After her death on 30 December 2003, director Yimou Zhang decided to alter the script rather than find a replacement.

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The scene in the snow was filmed in the Ukraine. It actually snowed so early (October) that the makers had the change the script and the film. They did not want to wait because the leaves were still on the trees. Zhang Yimou was very happy with how it turned out however, because it set the perfect tone.

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To prepare for her role, for two months Zhang Ziyi lived with a blind girl who had lost her sight at the age of twelve because of a brain tumour.

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