Cast: Chow Yuan Fat, Gong Li, Jay Chou, Liu Ye Dir: Zhang Yimou Rating: 4/5Set in China AD928 the Emperor (Chow Yun Fat) returns home with his second son Prince Jai (Jay Chou) to celebrate the Chang Yang Festival.But his relationship with his unwell Empress (Gong Li) is frosty. For several years she has been having an illicit love affair with her stepson Crown Prince Wan (Liu Ye). But the Crown Prince wishes to escape the palace with his secret lover Chan (Li Mon) the daughter of the Imperial Doctor.The Emperor is hiding secret plans, plans only known by the Imperial Doctor, as together they are slowly poisoning the Empress. Prince Jai is becoming worried about his mother’s health, as the poison begins to take its toll, and her growing obsession with golden chrysanthemums.When the Emperor senses a threat he has the Imperial Doctor and his family sent away to a remote area where they find themselves under attack by mysterious assassins.When Chan and her mother Jiang Shi (Chen Jin) return to the palace dark secrets are revealed and lies are uncovered as thousands of golden armoured warriors charge the palace. And Prince Jai must decide where his loyalties lie.
Curse of the Golden Flower is an adaptation of a 1930s play and is director Zhang Yimou’s follow up to the critically acclaimed House of Flying Daggers.
This is a beautifully designed, visually stunning, Lord of the Rings type extravagance (in terms of size) mixed with a Shakespearian style tragedy.
It deals with the dysfunctional family looking more at royalty and the traditional rituals of the royal family. On the surface they are setting the family example when underneath they are tearing each other apart.
The Emperor and Empress, Chow Yun Fat and Gong Li, provide the best and most tense scenes in the whole film, in this complex character driven picture, it’s a pity they don’t appear together on screen more often that they do.
The individual fight scenes are not as important or as impressive as in past movies like hero and House of Flying Daggers the major conflicts throughout the film are intellectual and emotional as opposed to physical.
But then Zhang delivers the climatic battle sequence which really is the money shot and eclipses the rest of the film.
Curse of the Golden Flower has a $45 million production budget building the palace exteriors from scratch, the largest ever built in China as well as filing in the country’s Forbidden City. Once again Zhang has delivered another stunning movie which will just add to the popularity of Eastern cinema as it continues to break through into the main stream.
Despite its slow start it’s a spectacular follow-up to curs of the Flying Daggers and its epic battle scenes would not have looked out of place in Lord of the Rings.
It really is a well crafted visual masterpiece which will cement Zhang Yimou as one of current cinemas great movie makers.
Helen Earnshaw