By Matt Soergel
Florida Times-Union

This Chinese-language film, a sensation where it's already opened, makes it to Jacksonville today. It lives up to the hype that's built up around it -- and then some.

The action scenes are as spectacular as reported (perhaps too spectacular, even, for its own good). But -- and this is a pleasure to say -- it also has a soulful, even mournful story, a welcome part of the package.

Much of the attention surrounding this Oscar favorite is on its airborne stunts, a technique The Matrix made familiar to American audiences. They've gotten to be something of a cliche already: Charlie's Angels used them, and they were spoofed in a Super Bowl ad on Sunday, in which an elderly bank guard turned into a wall-walking martial-arts hero.

The Matrix, with its weaponry and black trench-coat cool, was American through and through, despite its appropriation of stunts from Hong Kong action films.

Crouching Tiger is far more, well, foreign than you might have expected: To fully embrace it, American audiences are going to have to settle in and allow themselves to be caught up in its moody spell. There are long, meditative sections -- OK, it's slow in spots -- and much of it is built on mystical, mythical storytelling that's never fully explained.

Its most obvious hero, though, will be fully familiar to fans of Westerns: He's a legendary fighter who wants to put his bloody days behind him but can't quite get away that easily.

Chow Yun Fat plays Li Mu Bai, a warrior of the Confucian era who gives up his 400-year-old sword for a quiet life that may involve the love of his life, a love he's put on hold for so long.

She is Yu Shu Lien (Michelle Yeoh), a fighter of considerable skill herself. She's charged with getting the sword to safety in a nobleman's house, but when it's stolen, she's called into action.

In the world of Crouching Tiger, women can be noble, powerful action heroes; one can even be the high-kicking villain.

That part's played by the cunning Jade Fox (Cheng Pei Pei), a deadly opponent who is out to corrupt perhaps the most interesting character in the movie.

That's a young noble bride-to-be named Jen (played by the stunningly beautiful Zhang Ziyi), who's also a promising -- if immature -- warrior. She may be caught up in Jade Fox's evil plans; or she may save her soul by joining our heroes. Her fate is in doubt even up to Crouching Tiger's final moments.

A couple of romances give Crouching Tiger much of its dreamy power.

Watch for Jen's romance with a dashing, long-haired desert warrior named Dark Cloud (Chang Chen), much of which is played out in the wide-open spaces of the Gobi Desert. It's sexy and fun -- love as passionate warfare.

It's the opposite of the relationship between the legendary Li and his longtime love Yu, a slow-burning, lasting passion that's just as rewarding.

Crouching Tiger is a confident step forward for director Ang Lee, a Taiwanese expatriate who's become one of Hollywood's most rewarding filmmakers (Sense and Sensibility, The Ice Storm). He makes us wait for the action scenes, but when they come, they pop, whether set to pounding drums or the melancholy beauty of Yo-Yo Ma's cello solos.

His fighters are able to perform superhuman feats. They jump from street to rooftop. They skip across water. They fight high amid trees, swaying on the branches. They dodge a fusillade of poisonous darts.

There's beauty amid this choreographed violence, and humor, too -- watch how combatants place a foot on top of their opponent's foot, the better to keep them from flying away, and watch the damage young Jen makes on a pack of burly ruffians who think they can best her.

If there's a nit to be picked here, it's on Crouching Tiger's overreliance on its airborne stunts, which get more extravagant as the film goes along. Its final wild flight is a winner, but before that there are some high-flying sessions that are just overkill, counter-productive, even.

It almost feels like you're watching Mary Poppins soaring over the rooftops or Elliott and E.T. riding to the moon on their bicycle.

It's a minor complaint, though; I wouldn't find fault if someone else thought there's no such thing as too much of a good thing.