I wasn’t sure what to expect with this Chinese fantasy adventure film, but to my delight I really enjoyed it.  The first half-hour or so is simply great, the next hour is really good and it’s only the finale that tails off toward mediocrity (and that problem is due to the writing rather than the filming).  Director Yimou Zhang has been making acclaimed movies since the 1980s so I should not be so surprised.  This one is a bit too heavy on computer graphics, but they are well-integrated into the story and the action is first-rate.

Yimou Zhang’s film posits that China’s Great Wall was built in the distant past to protect the kingdom from a horde of monsters which emerges every sixty years.  Adventurers William (Matt Damon) and Tovar (Pedro Pascal) stumble upon the Wall and its thousands of defenders just as the monsters are about to attack.  The adventurers prove their mettle in battle and are invited to stay.  What they really want is mythical black powder (gunpowder), and their greed threatens to ruin everything.  But when things go seriously wrong, as they will with rampaging monsters, adventurers are good people to have around.

Zhang does a great job staging the Chinese forces against the monsters and then visually explaining what each color-coded group does to fight them.  The detail, precision and beauty of the images reminded me of how David Lean might have directed such a film.  It is fascinating to watch and marvelous to behold.  It also helps that one of the Chinese commanders is a beautiful woman, Commander Lin (Tian Jing), who is braver and smarter than just about everyone else — and who speaks perfect English.  Complicating matters is another Westerner, Ballard (Willem Dafoe), who sees the arrival of the adventurers as an opportunity for himself.

Except for one major aspect involving the ending, The Great Wall is innovative, original and superbly filmed.  It is a tremendously exciting, entertaining action film that creates memorable monsters but is dedicated to telling the human side of the story.  I really enjoyed it and recommend it to everyone.  ☆ ☆ ☆ 1/2.  21 February 2017.