Man cheng jin dai huang jin jia (2006) Reviews

• Great dramatic acting within stunning visual jewel box

  sm222812007-01-14

  I am not sure what some of the critics and spoilers of the COTGF story were expecting... I agree with the comparisons of Shakespearan tragedies and royal family intrigues, and the reference to dysfunctional families and meltdowns. Actually, I was thinking a lot about the Lion in Winter transported in a Chinese setting. In the English drama, the King simply has the Queen imprisoned for her political rebellion. In this movie, the Emperor decides to slowly poison the Empress because of her affair with his oldest son. Both lead characters have their reasons for sticking to their planned course of action. Also, I was reminded about the Borgias and some of the other Italian, French and Greek royal dramas when emotions get totally out of hand. Why do some viewers say that emotions are over the top or that the females are too scantily clad? This movie shows that Chinese characters can have very powerful human emotions: sexual attraction,lust, filial love, greed, ambition... just like any other people in the world. And yes, the Chinese Imperial Palace is displayed on an extravagantly grand scale just because it is possible to do it only in China! China has more people than any other country and can afford the larger than life scenes in opulent settings. The Emperor is at first shown as a kind father who wants to maintain a harmonious balance of family and state. Ultimately, we find out that he is a hypocritical megalomaniac who obliterated his first wife's family in his bid to become Emperor and will not allow anyone to cross his will in his kingdom. Interestingly, even for a blood thirsty dictator, he has his soft spot, and that is his love for his first born son, who means well but appears rather weak of morals. The acting is very powerful: the epitome of Chinese acting is in the facial expressions within a restrained and mechanical setting (see Chinese opera) and both Gong Li and Cho Yung Fat do a great job in their roles. Watch the eyes and the hands... The occasional outbursts of real emotion when the character is pushed beyond its limits: see the Empress when she occasionally cannot help herself and tries to seduce the Crown Prince as a woman; see the Emperor when he toys with the Empress and shows her his kindness in prescribing herbal potions and her defiant reply makes him toss his arm in frustration; the final eruption of the despot when the youngest prince dares to rear up with hate... I wonder if any dysfunctional family that lives with a totally controlling father and experiences his insane fits of punishment can relate with the control and violence shown at the end. He tolerates the Empress because she is a princess and very decorative and the mother of his 2 younger sons, and he even tolerated silently her affair for a while, but he will not tolerate her efforts to usurp him publicly. I can predict that the Empress will die a slow and humiliating death unless she finds a way to kill herself first. What I picked up very clearly is the subtle form of psychological cruelty that underlies the Chinese concept of revenge. Many long-standing cultures understand this form of torture very well which goes above and beyond killing a person. Think about the movie Jean De La Florette where the protagonist is slowly killed by the grinding labor of finding non-existing water. It is the slowly grinding down of a person's will through day-in and day-out abuse. See the daily poisoning of the Empress under the guise of caring for her health. See the impossible ending offer to the rebellious prince to choose between killing his own mother with regular offering of the herbal potion versus death under his father's hand - the prince decides to end his life to get out of this insane set of situation. He actually succeeds in comparison to the eldest prince who tries suicide the previous evening and fails to slice his own throat. Yes, the Emperor is ultimately an evil man because he sacrifices all that he loves for his political ambition to be the boss, but he has his human dimensions: he is attracted as a man to the 2 women he loves most in his life, as seen in their rare intimate moments together and he loves the first son unconditionally... Personally, I think that the characters are very well developed because they are complex, obsessed and quite multi-dimensional in their basic human drives. They make sense within the constraints in which they are cast.

• Two thumbs up!!

  torea11112006-12-17

  Just saw this film at a cinema near to my home in Wuhan China.I rated it very high because it is the first film in the last three years which can tell a story so smoothly. After the first Hollywood movie The Fugitive(lead actor Harrison Ford) was admitted in my country, the Chinese films changed forever by the affections of Hollywood movies. But the Chinese film makers did not know how to tell a story in the Hollywood way. Especially the film makers wanted to make BIG movie (the movie making cost high) to gain the high profit in the market, but in the same time they seemed like they forget how to tell a good story. But Chinese audience is very tolerable, they watch they comment and they despise. After all these years' BIG films' bombing, I watched a good story telling film, why should I not be satisfied? Disscusing this film in the technique way is not the important thing. All this years the BIG films all packed by the advanced techniques, but inside is a garbage.(sorry for the rude word, I can not say a better word for my poor English) Somebody (maybe a lot of foreign people) may want to watch more KongFu in Chinese films. But what I want to say is KongFu is not the only part of Chinese Culture, in fact it never was the major part of Chinese Culture in the past three thousand years. I can say it because I know our country and her history. The relationship and interaction of characters is the major part of film . This film is based on a novel Thunder Storm by Chao Yu in 40s of 20th century, and the background is changed to about 9th century.For the solid story by Chao Yu, the film is brilliant. And the success of this film is also a victory of Chinese writers. It proved that the real good novel can live all the time. Thank you for read this.

• I saw this AMAZING film tonight!

  anniefox2006-11-27

  I had the pleasure of seeing this film with special personal appearances by Zhang Yimou and Gong Li... I have to say I was blown away by it! I was not expecting a story with such depth...The cinematography, the art direction, and the sheer enormity of the visuals were staggering. Great sword work... exquisite wire sequences... and HUGE battles - but all done with an intensity that's stunning. And even more, the acting was superb - Chow Yung Fat is a master, and his scenes together with Gong Li are beautifully emotional. Gong Li is more beautiful than ever in a role that demands huge range from the first scene and never lets up... She does her best work ever! I have nothing but praise for this film. I can't wait to see it again.

• Intense, moving drama

  yacro2006-12-24

  This is a highly charged docudrama epic, instead of the gladiator/hero-ish action flick its marketing led people to believe. With that said, this is a very gripping film, almost to the point of eerie realism, for those of us who are familiar with ancient royal family politics. Betrayal, back-stabbing, assassination, adultery, family tragedy,... everything that could go wrong in the the royal court happened, and were woven in a way that made the complicated plot that much more involving. More than once, I felt real tangible emotions as events with each character/turning point deepens the tragedy. The one aspect I don't like was the intensity of this film... its almost like watching films the likes of Saving Private Ryan... more like a stressful experience than simple entertainment. However, if you go in expecting extravagant sword fights, kung-fu, battles, you are going to be disappointed.

• Fascinating movie-opera of rotting decadence

  thepts2007-01-13

  Me and my girlfriend watched this in Guangzhou, China. It isn't exactly a feel-good movie.. It's hard to describe what this film does, without spoiling the movie. And that structure is it's strength. Suffice to say, this is a very strongly woven movie, a movie where direction and production are the stars. And that is also "Curse of the golden flower"'s weakness. This is, after all, a movie. Moviegoers are used to seeing the full spectrum of a movie; varied scenery and ambiance, multiple stories, realistic characters, a realistic society portrait, and so on. Certainly, this movie has strong characters, but like the imperial court setting, they are puppets. They never change their directions, they are forced to play the drama. Most of the action happens on the same 3-4 scenes, with the same characters. Like an opera; stereotypic, but intensely dramatic and glorious. That said, this movie had an effect on me, and as mentioned, it is very well crafted. Without a doubt, it shows Yimou Zhang's skills in his profession, and I do recommend it. But don't expect a "movie" in the classical sense, expect Greek tragedy or opera-style drama.