Nanzi Flores, Post #4 - Raise the Red Lantern

The movie I chose to watch was Raise the Red Lantern, directed by Zhang Yimou and produced by Hou Hsiao-hsien, Chiu Fu-Sheng and Zhang Wenze. I chose this movie because I had previously seen it while in high school and remembered it to be a good movie so I thought it would be interesting to revisit the movie. It was an interesting movie that had me making prediction after prediction about what would happen next and at each prediction the movie would prove me wrong.

The movie was about a young girl, Songlian, who is forced to leave school after the death of her father and become the fourth concubine of a rich man. When she arrives the third mistress is very mean to her while the second mistress befriends her giving her expensive silk as they gossip about how mean and spoiled the third mistress is. The oldest of the wives does not say much and has accepted the idea that her husband is not interested in her anymore but she gave him his first son so I think that is why he keeps her around. As time passes Songlian gets to know her "sisters" more and discovers that her first impressions were not accurate. When Songlian raids her maids room looking for a missing flute, Songlian discovers that it is actually the second mistress that is the evil one and not third mistress. Second mistress is later described as having the face of the Buddha, yet possessing the heart of a scorpion by third mistress who tells her stories of the atrocious things second mistress had done to her. On her 20th birthday Songlian ends up getting drunk and talks about the secret the third mistress had told her about in which she had an affair with her doctor. Second mistress hears this and tells on third mistress and eventually third mistress gets hanged. Having witnessed this Songlian goes insane and is left to just wander around in her school clothes.

One of the themes of the movie was that the concubines are always competing for the attention of the master or at least three out of the four concubines. Mistress number three constantly says she is sick and needs the master at her side. She used to be an opera singer so she sings for the master and he says she is always so nice to him and that he loves how she sings. Third mistress says that her and the second mistress were pregnant at the same time and that second mistress would slip abortion medication in her food so she could lose her baby. Second mistress also took expensive medicine so that her baby could be born before that of the third mistress but unfortunately for her she had a girl a few hours before third mistress gave birth to a boy. At first Songlian tries to compete for the attention of the master by faking a pregnancy and succeeds for a while but later gives up when it is discovered that she had her menstrual cycle. This leads Songlian to later come to the conclusion that she is happier alone. She eventually sees the competition between the concubines as hopeless, since all women are just being emotionally and physically being abused by the master.

This brings me to the next theme of the movie: solitude. All four women are alone with no one really to care for them. First mistress is as old as the master and has given up trying to compete with the younger wives for her husband's attention. Second mistress rarely gets visited by the master unless she is sick or hurt. Songlian's father has died and her step-mother pushes her to leave and get married with a "rich man."

Another theme of the movie was the idea that death is easier then being a concubine for the Chen family. After the death of her maid, Yang, Songlian seems to envy her because although dead, she was able to return to her family and town while Songlian is stuck in the Chen house.

When it comes to different cultures and countries sometimes it is better to simply observe rather then try to change them. We have our culture and things that work for us and as it seems the Chinese have the same. I do say that from watching this movie I find it very hypocritical that a woman has an affair and she is killed for it where as a man has 4 or 5 wives and he is praised and glorified. I guess I can say I’m happy to be an American and that our culture does not openly approve of such acts otherwise I would be one said, lonely and mad woman.

While the story was somewhat interesting I would not recommend this movie. The picture quality was not the greatest and it did not impact me as much as other movies such as Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon did in the past.

I also did a little research on what others opinions were of this movie and there was one statement in particular in the wikipedia.org website that caught my attention. It stated the following. “The film has been interpreted by some critics as a criticism of contemporary China, although Zhang Yimou himself has sternly denied this.^[24]. Jonathon Crow of Allmovie states that "the perpetual struggle for power that precludes any unity among the wives provides a depressingly apt metaphor for the fragmented civil society of post-Cultural Revolution China". James Berardinelli makes a similar analogy in his review where he states that "Songlian is the individual, the master is the government, and the customs of the house are the laws of the country. It's an archaic system that rewards those who play within the rules and destroys those who violate them."^[25]”

I didn’t think about this while watching the movie but it is a very good analogy.