Flowers of Shanghai
| Flowers of Shanghai | |
|---|---|
 Poster for Flowers of Shanghai |
|
| Directed by | Hsiao-hsien Hou |
| Produced by | Shozo Ichiyama, Teng-Kuei Yang |
| Written by | Chu Tien-wen, Eileen Cheng(translation), Bangqing Han (novel) |
| Starring | Annie Shizuka Inoh, Michiko Hada, Shuan Fang, Tony Leung Chiu Wai, Jack Kao |
| Music by | Yoshihiro Hanno |
| Cinematography | Pin Bing Lee |
| Editing by | Ching-Song Liao |
| Release date(s) |  1998 |
| Running time | 130 minutes |
| Country | Taiwan |
| Language | Cantonese, Shanghainese |
Flowers of Shanghai (海上花, pinyin: hǎi shàng huā) is a 1998 film, made in Taiwan, directed by Guangdong-born Taiwanese director Hou Hsiao-hsien starring Hada Michiko, Annie Shizuka Inoh, Shuan Fang, Jack Kao, Carina Lau, Tony Leung, Rebecca Pan, Michelle Reis and Vicky Wei. It was voted the third best film of the 1990s in the 1999 Village Voice Film Poll.[1]
Contents |
[edit] Plot
In four elegant brothels, called "Flower Houses", in fin-de-siècle 19th-century Shanghai (Qing dynasty), several affairs are described. The action involves four drunkards, and takes place mostly in candlelight. Preparation and consumption of opium and tea are at the center of the business operations.
Subtitles note that the girl Crimson is in Huifang, Pearl is in Gongyang, Emerald is in Shangren, and Jasmine is in East Hexing. The relations of the rich gentlemen with the courtesans is partly monogamous and is held to an obligation of many years. The life of the graceful, well-bred girls, who were young when bought, resembles in certain respects a life of slavery. Because of the oppressing social conventions, they dream to pay off their debts, or to marry into the freedom and higher conditions.
The silent master Wang leaves the courtesan Crimson in favor of Jasmine, for which it was within only 10 days of a fire and flame after (allegedly) 2½ years. He offers to settle Crimson's debts. Wang sees himself in repeated connections and between hardening fronts. Dependence turns out as reciprocal. Crimson has only master Wang as a customer, and must sustain herself from his money to feed her entire family. Emerald was worth 100 dollars as a child once. Master Luo wants to redeem that value. The prostitute Silver Phoenix is abused by her drawing mother. Master Wang has a drunken rage accumulation, and lets it loose, when he finds out that Crimson goes foreign.
A contract over Emerald is put into play, and a notary comes to log the inventory. Allegedly Wang strikes Jasmine, who then attempts to commit suicide. Jade tries to poison her customer, with whom she had sworn her eternal love. For one arranges thereupon a marriage. Crimson, for master Wang, at last prepares an opium pipe in the quiet blissfulness of being together.
[edit] Cast
| Actor | Character |
|---|---|
| Tony Leung Chiu-wai | Wang |
| Michiko Hada | Crimson |
| Vicky Wei | Jasmin |
| Carina Lau | Pearl |
| Shuan Fang | Jade |
| Michelle Reis | Emerald |
| Jack Kao | Luo |
| Rebecca Pan | Huang |
| Annie Yi | Golden Flower |
| Hsu An-an | |
| Firebird Lu | Vagabond #2 |
| Hsu Ming | |
| Pauline Chan | |
| Cheung Shui Chit | |
| Che Hin | |
| Hsu Hui Ni |
[edit] Criticism
Film critic J. Hoberman, like Jonathan Rosenbaum, called Hou Hsiao-hsien the best director of the '90s and hailed Flowers of Shanghai as one of Hou's three masterpieces from that decade.[2]
Jeffrey Anderson finds the film incredibly beautiful despite the need for "multiple viewings and incredible patience."[3] Mark R. Leeper on the other hand found the film "static and dull,"[4] while others have called it "borderline comatose."[5]
While Jeremy Heilman didn't want to call it Hou's best film, he certainly considered it his prettiest.[6] Kent Jones called the film innovative.[7]
[edit] Awards
The film won for Best Director and Best Art Director (Wen-Ying Huang) at the Asia-Pacific Film Festival in 1998, and the next year the director won the Golden Crow Pheasant at the Kerala International Film Festival. It was nominated for the Golden Palm at Cannes but did not win.[8]
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- ^ "The Best Films of the 1990s". 1999. http://www.combustiblecelluloid.com/bestof90s.shtml.
- ^ J. Hoberman (2000). "Film Comment's Best of the 90s Poll: Part Two". Film Comment. http://www.filmlinc.com/film-comment/article/film-comments-best-of-the-90s-poll-part-two.
- ^ Jeffrey M. Anderson. "Flowers of Shanghai (1998)". Combustible Celluloid. http://www.combustiblecelluloid.com/flowshang.shtml. Retrieved 28 September 2008. "Multiple viewings and incredible patience are necessary. […] Each scene seems to be lit entirely by candles and oil lamps […] Even though we never leave the brothel, there is never any hint of sex or even passion […] A single strain of music is repeated over and over throughout the film […] I cannot stress enough the incredible beauty of this movie"
- ^ Mark R. Leeper (1998). "Hai shang hua (1998)". IMDb.com, Inc.. http://german.imdb.com/Reviews/147/14761. Retrieved 28 September 2008. "Static and dull story set in Shanghai brothels of the 1880s. The camerawork of this film is minimal and we basically have a stage play in which almost all of the action is offstage. […] Very downbeat. […] Only two scenes have any action beyond talk"
- ^ "Flowers of Shanghai". Lovehkfilm.com. http://www.lovehkfilm.com/panasia/flowers_of_shanghai.htm. Retrieved 28 September 2008.
- ^ Jeremy Heilman (October 2001). "Flowers of Shanghai (Hou Hsiao-hsien) 1997". http://www.moviemartyr.com. http://www.moviemartyr.com/1997/flowersofshanghai.htm. Retrieved 28 September 2008. "I feel […] that I was transported into another world (I realize this is a huge cliché, but I can think of no other director that evokes this feeling so well.) Flowers of Shanghai probably isn't Hou's best film, […] but perhaps it is his prettiest. […] highly recommended"
- ^ Kent Jones (1999). "Cinema With a Roof Over its Head". Film Comment. http://www.filmlinc.com/fcm/9-10-99/hou.htm. Retrieved 27 September 2008. "space at times feels as if it could spring into any direction. […] It's something new in cinema"
- ^ "Festival de Cannes: Flowers of Shanghai". festival-cannes.com. http://www.festival-cannes.com/en/archives/ficheFilm/id/4913/year/1998.html. Retrieved 2009-09-30.
[edit] External links
|
||||||||||||||
|
|
|||||
