LouHomey From my favorite movies..

BoardChiri Bad Acting and worse Bad Screenplay

Blake Rivera If you like to be scared, if you like to laugh, and if you like to learn a thing or two at the movies, this absolutely cannot be missed.

Celia A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

SnoopyStyle It's 1839 near Canton, China. Chinese officials come to the British settlement demanding for Tai-Pan (chinese word for supreme leader) to appear before the emperor's commissioner for importing opium. Dirk Struan (Bryan Brown) goes despite his companion May-May (Joan Chen)'s warning. The commissioner orders the opium burned without compensation and all foreigners leave Canton. The foreigners retreat back to Macau. Struan sets up his new Nobel House in Hong Kong and convinces Britain to claim the land.The production looks more like a TV movie. The quality isn't there. The acting is pretty stiff. The story is even worst. This world is too complex to be simplified this way. It basically skims over such tricky issue such as the Opium War. The movie feels lifeless and overwrought.

Libretio TAI-PAN Aspect ratio: 2.39:1 (J-D-C Scope)Sound format: Dolby Stereo1840's China: Thrown off the mainland because of his opium dealings, a western merchant (Bryan Brown) sets up home on the island of Hong Kong where he faces conflict from friend and foe alike in the lead-up to colonization.Hugely derided at the time of its release, this handsome production - based on the novel by James Clavell, and directed by TV specialist Daryl Duke (THE THORN BIRDS) - plays to the gallery at every turn, embracing the book's labyrinthine plot and outrageous melodrama with unashamed fervour, an approach which appears to have sealed its fate at the box-office. The movie opens a little too abruptly, indicating a troubled post-production, but John Briley's busy screenplay (co-written with Stanley Mann) unfolds against a colorful historical backdrop and includes just enough nudity and violence to keep boredom at bay. Brown's performance is compromised by an unconvincing Scottish accent, and he's upstaged by Joan Chen (THE LAST EMPEROR) as the Chinese girl who loves him regardless of his failings, while handsome Tim Guinee (HOW TO MAKE AN American QUILT) is achingly sincere as Brown's naive young son, led astray by villainous merchants plotting his family's downfall. Also starring John Stanton, Russell Wong, Norman Rodway, Kyra Sedgwick and Bert Remsen in supporting roles. Production values strive to capture an epic feel and are largely successful, though no one's ever going to mistake this for "Lawrence of Hong Kong"! Italian makeup maestro Giannetto de Rossi (a regular contributor to the films of Lucio Fulci) provides some occasional flashes of gore, including a brief - but realistic - decapitation near the beginning of the picture.

John This film is very very bad. I saw this in a theater on opening weekend with about 10 other people. (That tell you something). Set in 1800's, the storyline is plain wacky the funniest thing is the Russian Ambassodor speaking with a down home Georgia drawl. I guess the casting people thought maybe this character was born in the Georgia region in Russia and they would speak that way. Anyway the acting is amazingly bad not helped by the lines they had to deliver. Count how many times they mention "poxed whores". By the end of the film, after a disaster that takes place, I mentioned to my companion watch the smoke will clear and it will reveal modern Hong Kong. Yep that is what happens modern Hong Kong, Or was it Singapore? Atlanta? What have you. As a good/bad movie to laugh at (like The Oscar, Valley Of The Dolls, Showgirls, The Heretic, etc.)it manages some laughs but unlike the others mentioned above, it is not uniformly hysterical as these are. There are a lot of long dull stretches especially in first half of film. 2/10 only for the Russian's accent. Recommend to avoid otherwise. Go read the book.

karlpall As a movie reviewer for my college newspaper, I often was told: "You've got a great job, you get paid to go to movies." My standard answer was: "It's not that great - I had to sit through 'Tai-Pan'." The only movie that has given me more pain was "Ishtar."