Curse of the Golden Flower (Zhang Yimou, 2006) - B
Adultery, betrayal, and plots for the throne in Imperial China -- you couldn't tear me away from this stuff. Zhang's film is in the best costume melodrama tradition, with unrelenting formal courtesies concealing enough cruelty and misery to fill up a year's worth of soap opera plots. Those expecting another Hero or House of Flying Daggers should know that the focus is largely on the royal family's sordid affairs, though Zhang does occasionally, and almost as an afterthought, drop in a martial arts sequence of the kind that's become his calling card. Interestingly, there's more of a physical presence to the fighting here -- metal grinds against metal, shoes scrape the floor, and it feels like people can actually get hurt. The movie concludes with a stand-off between opposing armies that almost reaches a Kurosawa scale. I'm not sure there's enough depth to the characters or the story to make this a classic, in the end, but it sure is a lot of fun.
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