The difference between people who think Red Cliff (赤壁) successful and those who do not, is a proper education in Chinese history. Having not had it, I enjoyed the film thoroughly: exquisite scenery, illustrious cast,  dry humour, epic story. Never mind that I have almost zero knowledge of the who’s who or any idea of the time line, I asked my girlfriend questions in glee and she was happy to answer. It was, however, not as entertaining for her because – in her own words – the film had the tendency to be slow-paced and historically inaccurate for commercial purposes.

And damn the cliffhanger we did not even find out about before this first seating of the film, I was just getting into it. To brush up on my oriental savoir-faire, the girlfriend has paid for the 84 episodes of Romance of the Three Kingdoms on DVD. Even though I could really do with Takeshi Kaneshiro as Zhuge Liang in this 1995 cheena drama, I am completely enjoying it. I am the new history geek!