Ang Lee (left) and Feng Xiaogang meet at a recent symposium in Beijing. [Photo provided to China Daily]

Yet, the movie is very inward-looking, a rumination on the protagonist's world-view with very little outward action.

It is almost like Saving Private Ryan but with the opening and closing battle scenes deleted, leaving only the debate on the values of one life vs eight lives.

It may be counter-intuitive to use the technology of immersion for such a cerebral subject, in this case much more complicated than in the Spielberg movie, but that is where Lee's ingenuity－or folly, depending on how you view the end result－lies.

He seems to have transported viewers to a talkfest. And that, I believe, is also the root of its commercial failure.

Lynn would have worked perfectly as a play.