CURSE OF THE GOLDEN FLOWER

China, 2006, 114 minutes, Colour.
Yun- Fat Chow, Li Gong, Jay Chou, Ye Liu.
Directed by Xhang Yimou.

Audiences who have enjoyed Hero and House of the Flying Daggers will want to see The Curse of the Golden Flower. It is spectacular, though it is a more serious look at Chinese history without a lot of the flair of the acrobatic choreography of the previous films. Not that there aren’t some spectacular battles!

It is twenty years since cinematographer, Zhang Yimou, directed his first film, Yellow Earth, and won the Golden Lion in Venice, 1987. His impressive career has gone through several phases. With actress, Gong Li, he made a series of beautiful and profound films, Ju Dou, the Story of Qui Ju and the powerful and beautiful Raise the Red Lantern during the early 1990w. Then his interests broadened into 20th century Chinese life, again with Gong Li, in To Live and Shanghai Triad. In the late 1990s, he directed what might be called small gems, two more simple and focused stories of country Chinese life, Not One Less and The Road Home. In these he introduced Zhang Zizi who went on to Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, Memoirs of a Geisha as well as starring in his new phase of spectacular history starting with Hero.

The Curse of the Golden Flower requires words like ‘sumptuous’, ‘glittering’ and ‘opulent’ to describe the visual impact of its sets. Most of the action is confined to the Forbidden City and its courtyards and the interiors of the imperial palace in the latter years of the Tang Dynasty in the 10th century of the Christian era. The décor is magnificent. When it comes to the lavish costumes for the royal family, one has to look to words like ‘gorgeous’. On the level of production design, audiences will be more than satisfied.

The Tang dynasty went through a period of great prosperity but slipped into political and moral decline. There is rottenness and decay beneath the beauty and the stateliness of the imperial customs, manners, protocols and rituals. Here is a terminally dysfunctional family. As the action plays out, we are reminded of some of Shakespeare’s tragedies, like Hamlet. However, as the drama progresses, and the family turns on each other, the film becomes more like a 17th century Jacobean play with its revenge tragedy motifs and bloodbaths.

It needs to be added that when the final battle sequences do arrive, it is computer graphics which take over. Leonidas and the makes of 300 need to look to their laurels as thousands and thousands and thousands of troops do battle with swords, with arrows, with battering shields in the last forty minutes of the film. For some it will be too much – and, certainly, too many! Yet, the director says this is his favourite part of the film, where the ferocious external battles contrast with the fatal domestic drama playing out indoors.

The Emperor has a son by his first wife whom everyone thinks is dead. He is now the Crown Prince, though unwilling, preferring to stand aside for the elder of the two sons of the Empress. Meanwhile the Empress is being poisoned through her medicines and is determined to stage a coup at the feast of the chrysanthemums, the Golden Flowers, using her older son. The family is consumed by power struggles, sexual intrigues and jealousies which eventually take their toll.

Chow Yun Fat plays the Emperor and it is good to see Gong Li, after her strange appearances in Hannibal Rising and, especially, Miami Vice, back in her own history.

After his trilogy of beautiful and spectacular histories, where does Zhang Yimou go now?

1.Chinese spectacular? History? The glitter and the interiors? A portrait of a family? War? The Jacobean-style revenge tragedy?

2.The impact for Chinese audiences? History? Universal audiences?

3.The impact of the visuals, Oscar nomination for costumes? The sets and their opulence, the palace, the rooms, the curtains, the glass and the light, the décor? The gorgeous costumes? Style and movement, decorum, rituals and protocols? The musical score and the mood?

4.The exteriors, the mountains, the mountain passes and gorges, the night?

5.The Forbidden City, the courtyards, the chrysanthemums? The battles in the courtyard?

6.The special effects, for the battles, for the fight between the emperor and Jai, between the mother and Wan? The ambushes and the descent by rope? The battles? The cleaning after the battles and the new set-up for the celebration?

7.The history, the period, 10th century AD, the Tang Dynasty, its decline, its internecine strife?

8.The crisis? The empress and her dressing, preparation for the emperor’s arrival, the troops on horseback, his going to the inn, the delay of the welcome, the meeting with Jai, the fight with him, the mastery of the emperor? His final arrival at the court?

9.The empress, Gong Little and her presence, style? Her story, the marriage to the emperor, Wan as her adopted son, her own sons? Their illness, the poisoning? Her continual embroidery of the chrysanthemums? Her plan? Vengeance against the emperor? Her youngest son and his place? Her welcoming Jai, wanting him to be the emperor? Wan and the liaison with the empress, the relationship with Chan, in the room, the empress arriving, Wang and his plea, the empress sparing Chan her punishment? Chan’s mother and giving the information? The meetings with the emperor? Her youngest son and his watching? The confrontation with Wan, the truth or not? Sending the carrier pigeon? Summoning the rebels? Her waiting for the emperor? Wan and his return, stabbing himself? The truth about his mother? His younger brother killing him? The emperor, the battles, going in to dinner, the bloodbath, Jai and his leading the rebels? His killing himself?

10.The administering of the poison? His meeting with Jai, Jai and his wanting him to be emperor? The discussions with Wan, Wan and his stepping back as the heir? The arrival, the clash with the empress, holding court? His first wife and her arrival, promoting her husband, sending him to the town, arranging the ambush and the slaughter? The mother and Chan arriving? Their deaths? The intrigue, the mayhem of the battles, Jai and his killing himself – and the emperor’s survival?

11.Wan as the oldest son, his not being a warrior? His standing back for his younger brother? The liaison with the empress? Wanting to get out of it, her passionate demands on him? The relationship with Chan, promises to her, his hoping to leave, pleading with the empress against Chan’s punishment? His riding to the inn, finding out the truth, the return, with the empress, stabbing himself, not dying, the emperor’s arrival, his being killed by his jealous younger brother?

12.Jai, away training, the warrior, meeting his father, the swordfight with him? Plots, his mother’s stances, loyalties, his disgust at her being poisoned? Finally leaving the rebels? His valour in battle? Coming into the palace, killing himself – rather than the emperor sparing his life as long as he administered the poison to his mother?

13.The youngest brother, cheerful, in the background, watching, spying, his final vengeance, rebellion against his father, his easily being thwarted and his death?

14.The doctor, sinister, administering the poison, in the pay of the emperor? His wife, her secrets, her portrait in the palace, the first wife of the emperor, mother of Wan? Chan, her love for her daughter? Helping her to escape, the ride back to the Forbidden City, their being captured? Deaths?

15.The presentation of the battles, the thousands and thousands? The special effects? The cleaning up after the battles? The interiors with the Jacobean slaughter? The end with the emperor and empress surviving? Her breaking the poison cup and its splattering on the emblem of the chrysanthemum?