Lust,Caution

LUST- Ang Lee's Chinese espionage thriller has some of the steamiest, most intimate sex scenes seen for a very long time.

CAUTION- You have to sit though hours of subtitled dialogue to get there.

Sex yes.

But don't go expecting "Debbie Does Shanghai."

Ang Lee's study of deception and passion is set during the World War Two Japanese occupation of Shanghai. Wong Chia Chi joins a group of friends in a resistance movement, plotting to kill a Japanese sympathiser. Unable to break through the tight security, Wong Chia must first charm their target into bed before attempting to fill him full with lead.

If the intensity of the sex scenes could have been matched by the film as a whole, this would have been something special.

Sadly it isn't.

Beautiful photography, obsessive attention to detail and convincing performances fail to hide the fact that Ang Lee's focus on character over action makes for a slow and sometimes turgid film.