YMMV / Red Cliff

• Awesome Music: The entire soundtrack.
  • "Da Jiang Dong Qu" is one of the most emotional and epic ending themes there are to a movie out there. In an entire soundtrack filled with spectacular music, this one stands out from all the others (which is saying a lot).
• Funny Moments:
  • True to his historical depiction, Zhang Fei delivers a few. The most notable one is him shouting in Zhou Yu's face after Zhou Yu made the mistake of interrupting his calligraphy practice. Bonus points for Zhuge Liang, clearly anticipating what's coming next, covering his ears when Zhou Yu picks up the paper and then uncovering them with a smug "I told you so" look afterward.
  • The scene with Zhuge Liang's scheme to capture arrows with straw boats has a few, due to this adaptation having Lu Su tagging along:
    • When the straw boat ruse is underway, Zhuge Liang says nothing of the details, or much of anything for that matter, to Lu Su as they sail into enemy lines, while Zhuge Liang calmly sips his tea. Lu Su then turns to one of the straw effigies for companionship while Zhuge Liang continues to not have a care in the world.
    • As the Wei archers start firing, Lu Su looks a bit worried, and Zhuge Liang reassures him that the effigy will take an arrow for him. It immediately does, and Lu Su finally figures out the plan.
    • When the arrows start raining down, Zhuge Liang calmly sips his tea...then as the boats start to tip with the weight of the arrows his expression suddenly changes as if he's suddenly thinking "Hm, this is unexpected." Then when the fleet is returning to Red Cliff he deliberately has one of the small boats cast adrift, and as Lu Su panics and tries to get them to go back he idly fans himself while muttering "What a shame..."
  • Shangxiang meets Liu Bei for the first time...and knocks him out via a Tap on the Head.
    • Only because her brother's unbelievably inconsiderate... and drunk.
  • Couple with Mood Whiplash in the first part, where the Shu-Wu tortoise maze proves effective and the Wei soldiers are mown down in the most bloody fashion imaginable - cut to a lone cavalryman wondering where everyone else has gone, seconds before a noose from nowhere pulls him in.
• Germans Love David Hasselhoff: Originally a model and appearing in advertisements, Lin Chiling struck a high chord with Japanese audiences for her Yamato Nadeshiko portrayal as Xiao Qiao...and this was her debut film role.
  • Combined with Hilarious in Hindsight, Lin would later reprise her role as Xiao Qiao in a Japanese stage play "Red Cliff -Ai-", with Ryōhei Kurosawa (Akira from the band "Exile") as Zhou Yu. Nearly a decade after they worked together on said play, they married in 2019.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: One of the Something Awful photoshop contests involves making posters for better video game movies, and Red Cliff was a popular choice for being retitled as Dynasty Warriors due to sharing the same source material. The 2016 China-produced TV series God of War Zhao Zilong, which uses Stock Footage from Red Cliff, actually got marketed in some other countries under the name Dynasty Warriors.
• Ho Yay: Zhou Yu and Zhuge Liang make beautiful music together... and sometimes stand really, really close to each other. The movie is more or less Zhou Yu And Zhuge Liang's Epic Bromance, And Also Some Battles Happened.
  • Zhuge Liang seems to bring the Ho Yay with him everywhere really.
• Moment of Awesome: It'd be easier to list what isn't.
• Moral Event Horizon: Lampshaded when Cao Cao starts sending the plague-ridden corpses across the river, which causes typhoid to break out amongst the alliance forces and among the villagers that were in Red Cliff and forced to leave, possibly spreading the disease across the South.
• Narm: The last scene has Zhuge Liang wearing a nice hat for a change, but his strut combined with the long tassels from the ears make him look like he's listening to an iPod...
• Romantic Plot Tumor: The romance subplot is also a comedic plot tumor woefully out of place in an otherwise serious movie.

---