When Did it Become Obvious That Ang Lee Would Devolve Into Nauseating Sentimental Dreck?

Cafe Society
1

I’ve never seen Ang Lee’s earliest few films, but I saw, at the time they were released in theaters, everything from Eat Drink Man Woman through Brokeback Mountain except for Ride With the Devil which I only just now became aware of by looking at his IMDB page. I haven’t sat though repeat viewings of these films, but I remember mostly enjoying them at the time and generally respecting Ang Lee as a filmmaker.
To recap, everything “from Eat Drink Man Woman through Brokeback Mountain except for Ride With the Devil” would be:[ul]
[li]1994 - Eat Drink Man Woman[/li][li]1995 - Sense and Sensibility[/li][li]1997 - The Ice Storm[/li][li]2000 - Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon[/li][li]2003 - Hulk[/li][li]2005 - Brokeback Mountain[/li][/ul]

Hulk, I thought was a well-intentioned miss.
Brokeback Mountain was, I thought, his first truly nauseating terrible film.

His next film, Lust, Caution came and went without me noticing so I’ve never seen that one.
I’ve never seen Taking Woodstock but I do remember that one from when it was released. I did not know at the time that Ang Lee directed it- I didn’t know until just now looking at his IMDB page. Knowing that he directed it kinda intrigues me. I never would have guessed that that was him.

Then we get Life of Pi in 2012. Oh, boy. This sentimental garbage almost makes Brokeback Mountain look good. What utter saccharine, dime-store philosophy, emotionally manipulative bullshit.
Now, over the past couple months, I have not been able to see a new movie (regardless of the genre or rating) without having to sit through a trailer for Ang Lee’s newest film, Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk. Just the trailer alone makes it obvious that this will be one of the most nauseating, sentimental, pandering, juvenile, self-important but ultimately unchallenging, garbage “prestige” films that everyone knows they’re “supposed to” like that’s ever been vomited into the laps of the movie-going public.

Just the children’s chorus performance of David Bowie’s “Heros” is enough to make it clear that this movie will be irredeemable. Seriously, I was at a movie theater the other day, walking down the hall, and I simply walked past a screening room that was playing this trailer. I heard the children’s chorus singing “Heros” and I nearly threw up in my mouth a little bit- and I wasn’t even in the room where the trailer was playing!

As I mentioned, I have not sat through repeat viewings of his earlier films when I still thought of him as a respectable filmmaker. I remember that I liked the films at the time but I don’t remember the films in detail. It’s possible I would evaluate them differently if I watched them now with more mature eyes.
So, my question is this:
Should I have been able to see clues prior to Hulk or Brokeback Mountain that should have made it obvious that Ang Lee Would Devolve Into Nauseating Sentimental Dreck?

2

Hey, an ang’s gotta eat…

3

There was a sentimental streak in all of them. (Yes, even The Ice Storm. That was the work of a sentimentalist, bitching about other people’s lack of sentiment.)

I don’t know that I would call it devolution. Every artist has some hits, and some misses.

4

Don’t make me Ang Lee. You wouldn’t like me when I’m Ang Lee.

5

Stewart Lee “You wouldn’t like me when I’m Ang Lee”

6

1993 - I like that movie, but it certainly qualifies as sentimental.

7

Please re-direct your anger where it belongs. Most all of the Ang Lee movies you decry are based on books (or in the case of Brokeback, on a short story). So, Ang did not “author” these stories, the dreck was on the pages before he got ahold of them.

Now, more appropriately, you may call out Ang for choosing these pieces to direct.

8

Oh, and I do, I most certainly do.
MrDibble, thanks for your evaluation of The Wedding Banquet. I haven’t seen that one.