The film you should be checking out at the Apollo sometime in the following week was nominated for Best Foreign Film at both the Oscars and the Golden Globes, won seven Hong Kong Film Awards and only came out in the U.S. two weeks ago. Quite an accomplishment until you discover that the film was, of course, released two years ago and just sat on the shelf at Miramax as the studio bumbled about in confusion at how to sell it. Hero is one of the best films you’ve never seen.

The film follows a Rashomon-style structure (if you haven’t seen Rashomon, stop reading and go see it. No excuses. Just go) as the demise of three powerful assassins is told from various points of view. Why is their demise important? Well, they are trying to stop the King of Qin (Daoming Chen) from taking over all of China and he needs them dead so he can sleep easy. Enter Nameless (Jet Li), who brings with him the weapons of the three assassins as proof of their ceasing to be. The King, however, is skeptical and wants to hear how Nameless achieved such a victory. Thus begins the series of flashbacks, which eventually uncover the truth.

Hero is like Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon but slightly better. The comparison has to be made because this is a film of a soulful soft-spoken nature with some bitchin wire-fu thrown in for good measure; it revolves around political power and romantic entanglements (although there’s more of a balance in this film than there was in CTHD).

But what puts Hero a little bit ahead is its sheer beauty. You’ll have to do some heavy searching to find a film that melds fight choreography, cinematography and production design so well. Each flashback carries a different color-coding. While this device may sound somewhat corny, it isn’t. Director Yimou Zhang knows how to sell mood.

But even the prettiest girl at the party can get pretty dull, pretty fast and Hero doesn’t have a lot going for it in the story department. Yes, the Rashomon style keeps the story fresh as we’re eager to get closer to the truth behind the characters motivations, but after the film is over, there’s not a whole lot to chew on. Some will disagree and happily plunge into the expanse of the unsaid the film presents. But when you have a random fight scene where both fighters have an odd aversion to water or a repeated action in all the flashbacks that gets to be comical, there’s a problem in the storytelling. There are certainly some interesting ideas presented, but nothing that hasn’t been done better and with more contemplation in other films.

So if you’re in the mood for a soothing, visually appealing wire-fu flick that’s not going to split your mind open, Hero is definitely a good bet. If you liked CTHD, you certainly owe it to yourself to see this film. And if you like film in general, you owe it to yourself to see another Miramax-owned film that wasn’t lucky enough to make it to the theaters: Shaolin Soccer. They have it over at Campus Video. Because foreign flicks don’t all have to be about existential crisis and stolen bicycles.