Zhang's Yellow Chrysanthemums

I've always associated Chrysants with Japan, so it was a surprise to see thousands of them in The Curse of the Golden Flower.

I went into this screening not knowing what to expect. I'd seen the trailer and got a sense of lukewarm reviews, but neither really prepared me for the film. I shouldn't be surprised that I was very taken with it -- after all, I've never been really disappointed with one of Zhang's films. He remains for me one of the top players in the premier league, whatever political confusions his films create.

The first task in responding to the film is to try to categorise it. Despite the use of the term by several critics, I don't think the film is a wu xia, at least not in the sense that I have understood the term. The main characters are not warriors following the code of a dedicated master and displaying 'super skills'. There are opera techniques in the fight scenes, which are choreographed on an epic scale, but not with the romantic intensity that ran through Hero and House of Flying Daggers. Instead, I think that this is melodrama/opera with clear links to European/Indian/Japanese films/theatre.

In terms of melodrama, I've never seen this use of colour in anything else (I saw a digital print and the effect of slightly different contrast and shades might mean the 35mm print looks more familiar). Zhang does it again, I guess. The music was the only problem for me. By the end of the film I'd got used to it, but earlier it just didn't seem to fit.

Above all, the film offered two pleasures I hadn't ever imagined I would see, the return of Gong Li to a Zhang Yimou film and the chance to see Li and Chow Yun-fat together. I could have done without all the thrusting bosoms, but Gong Li's wonderful face drew my attention all the time. If the film isn't really the third film in a trilogy, it might just be a return to Zhang's first trilogy (and indeed his first Gong Li trilogy). The film that Curse of the Golden Flower most reminded me of is Raise the Red Lantern. The Gong Li character is proud, haughty and independent, plotting to achieve some power for herself but finally defeated by the implacable nature of patriarchy in Imperial China, just as she was in the earlier film. No doubt the China watchers in the West and in China itself are working on readings. I did think of the Tiananman Square massacre and I could see the film as a critique of both patriarchy and the internal plotting of the ruling elite. On the other hand, Chow Yun-fat's Emperor has risen up from a relatively lowly position to assume power and he intends to keep it. Perhaps Zhang secretly wants to celebrate this? As usual the posters on the IMDB bulletin boards are claiming the film as 'communist propaganda'. You takes your choice. I want to know why I'm not getting to see the film Zhang made before this, Riding Alone for Thousands of Miles. UK distribs please note.