1991 ‘大红灯笼高高挂’ Directed by Zhang Yimou
China in the 1920s. After her father's death, 19 year old Songlian is forced to marry the much older lord of a powerful family. With three wives already, each living in a separate house within the great castle, there is fierce competition for his attention and the privileges that are gained. This competition gets out of hand...
Da hong deng long gao gao gua, Raise The Red Lantern, Épouses et concubines, Lanternas Vermelhas, Esposas y concubinas, La linterna roja, Lanterne rosse, 홍등, こうむ, Bak den røde lykten, Zavěste červené lucerny, Rote Laterne, Σήκωσε τα κόκκινα φανάρια, La Linterna Roja, Punainen lyhty, Épouses et Concubines, הפנסים האדומים, A vörös lámpások, 紅夢, აანთე წითელი ფარანი, Da Hong Deng Long Gao Gao Gua, Zawieście czerwone latarnie, Esposas e Concubinas, Creșterea Lanternei Roșii, Подними красный фонарь, Den röda lyktan, Kırmızı Fenerin Yükselişi, Підніми червоний ліхтар, Đèn lồng đỏ treo cao, 大紅燈籠高高掛
Canada
Toronto Film Festival
Italy
(Milan)
Italy
FranceU
South Korea15
UKPG
Belgium
Netherlands16
Spain12
PortugalM/12
Germany12
Brazil18
Belgium
Brazil
Canada
France
Germany
Italy
Netherlands
Portugal
South Korea
Spain
UK
"Isn't that a woman's fate?"
"Our fate is the same"
Misogyny, a custom so old and culturally ingrained it's in the damn architecture.
Somber, tantalizing, and contemplative, Raise the Red Lantern is a thought-provoking and powerful portrait of a young woman who, after marrying a significantly older and wealthier man, finds herself confronted with the surreptitious conspiracies pervading the relationships between his three other wives—and soon, her relationships, too.
What begins with a static, yet powerfully stirring closeup of our protagonist, Songlian, soon unfolds into a nearly bewitching picture of four women constantly pitting against each other only to win their husband’s affection for a mere night—and with it, the brightly lit red lanterns raised in front of their house. Zhang Yimou gives the characters the time and space they need to resonate with the audience; as a consequence, this film slowly lures us into its world,…
Bewilderment. A word that I think comes close to the sensation I felt after watching a film so breathtakingly gorgeous, but also incredibly intricate at the same time. The usage of the color red has never been this powerful, both in a literal and a metaphorical sense. It pulls you in by starting with a thought-provoking phrase that will resonate louder and louder as the film progressed.
Let me be a concubine, isn’t that a woman’s fate.
For so long, women are only considered as an accessory, an object, or something lesser to men, and this film amplified the sensitively disturbing subject by integrating an old-age tradition of Asian concubinage. Due to her father’s death, a 19-year-old Song Lian is…
Raise the Red Lantern is a mournful tribute to Chinese women of past generations, whose existence merely served in accordance to men's needs, or as the movie itself puts it, was "like dogs, cats, rats, but not people."
In this daunting tale of jealousy, murders and lies, we follow Songlian, a college dropout forced by her stepmother to marry a rich old man who already has three wives in his labyrinthine, ritualistic household, as she juggles deflecting the malignant jealousy from her fellow concubines, and forming her own understanding of survival of the fittest. It's truly an edge-of-your-seat experience filled with catty fights, both large-scale and subtle, among the calculating wives. We witness the equal parts hilarious and saddening extremities…
"Please, I don't want to live that long" - Song Lian,
This sexism is killing her inside.
When young Song Lian becomes the fourth wife to a super old dude she learns all about the oppressive power of money and experiences the isolated position of women in a patriarchal economy. This movie is about women competing for a prize that is still shitty for them and that's part of what makes this film so interesting, that and the outstanding production design. Raise the Red Lantern masterfully presents the self-cannibalizing quality of living in system of patriarchy. Women enforce the rules against themselves leaving men to appear more powerful and less petty. I totally get why Song Lian drinks all the time, this oppression is killing her inside. This lovely and powerful story would be less effective if it weren't for the excellent sets, score, and costume design.
I'd say more but nobody cares. Just see it.
How difficult it is to talk about Raise the Red Lantern because it is at once a film that's so clearly about the patriarchal oppression of women in many modes of living, a stark yet honest demonstration of how systems that pit women against women serve to both profit off of and delude those they subjugate. Of how adherence to order and enthusiasm to please are natural human compulsions that can be manipulated and abused. Mistresses, lovers, courtesans and concubines, they exist in a state of constant competition and artificial scarcity for the sole benefit of the master.
These same things can also be said of capitalistic systems as well, in how a tiny fraction of a fraction of the…
For my two cents, Raise the Red Lantern is Zhang Yimou's best film, with the also excellent To Live running a very close second. Gong Li, playing the newly recruited fourth wife of a wealthy 1920s nobleman, is simply stunning, both in appearance and as a then up-and-coming actress. He Saifei also shines in her performance as the third wife and it is her heartbreaking story that really makes this film the masterpiece that it is.
Centered on the intrigues between the three younger wives and, to a lesser degree, an unlucky servant girl (perhaps the film's most tragic character) who soon finds herself far out of her league, the slowly evolving, but immaculately paced, plot is sure to tug at the heartstrings of even the most jaded of cinephiles. Beautifully shot and perfectly crafted, Raise the Red Lantern is simply a must-see film.
This film as a craft is so masterfully made. Everything about it technically is stellar: the cinematography, costumes, sets, score. All impeccable. At times it felt like I was looking at paintings; this film is so beautiful.
The story is also extremely powerful and one of my favorites that I’ve seen. It’s a story that is relevant at any time and any culture. Women are constantly pitted against each other for the favor of men and it can be so traumatizing and lead to catastrophe.
This film is quiet with tragedy. Tender with how it depicts these women and their choices. Their oppression is seeped into the story slowly and calmly until it’s become the norm without you realizing it. Easily one of the best, most beautiful, and most sorrowful films I’ve seen.
Zhang Yimou’s greatest film, Raise the Red Lantern perplexingly never supplies a close-up of the Master of the house, instead only giving stark focus to the four concubines of the opulent 1920’s compound including new Fourth Mistress Songlian (Gong Li). The new arrival Songlian is barely twenty years old when her father died, forcing her to surrender a college education so she marry into a wealthy family. The rivalry amongst concubines is treacherous, devoid of friendships and permits only a slender thread of alliances, each woman jockeys for position to win the Master’s favor. Songlian doesn’t like sleeping with him but she prefers the Master choosing her over the others at night: Red lanterns will be lit, the maids will…
Film #16 of Project 90
” If you act well, you can fool other people; if you do it badly, you can only fool yourself.”
Zhang Yimou turns his lens toward a world where the happiness and sadness of women rely on the way men act, feel and think, but instead of putting one of those mighty men at the center of his film he bravely focuses on those unfortunate women and calmly shows us the inevitable tragedy of their life. Raise the Red Lantern is the sorrowful story of a group of women’s lives who are trapped in a life build of unfulfilled wishes, unspoken desires, jealousy, failure, humiliation and spoiled prides.
Yimou’s main success is that without getting…
Very good movie, but we should feel relieved that Zhang doesn't make movies like this anymore. There's no need. China is fixed now.
