It's really saying something to say that Zhang Yimou has gone overboard. The writer-director of such memorable epics as "Raise the Red Lantern", "Hero" and "House of Flying Daggers" has never been one to shy away from spectacle. But with "Curse of the Golden Flower", his sweeping melodrama of royal intrigue in 10th century China, he might have finally gone a bit too far.
Adapted from the play "The Thunderstorm" by Yu Cao, all the ingredients are in place to make "Curse" Zhang Yimou's "Ran". Like Akira Kurosawa's 1985 masterpiece, "Curse" is filled to the brim with royal intrigue, romantic deception and bloody battles. Secrets are revealed (characters say "You must be hiding something pretty big from me",
twice), sons vie for the crown and wives betray husbands. You know, a typical day in the beleaguered Tang Dynasty.
The Chrysanthemum gives the film its titular flower and provides a climatic festival around which the characters conspire. Without getting too far into the plot (if that's possible), the Emperor is slowly poisoning the Empress ostensibly because she's having an affair with the Prince (not her biological son), though from Chow Yun-fat's stoic performance, it could just be for kicks. The Prince, meanwhile, is messing around with the Royal Physician's daughter, who is in on the poisoning. And as you might imagine, the Empress, played by the as-stunning-as-ever Gong Li, won't go out without a fight.
Playing the role Chow Yun-fat might have taken years ago, relative-newcomer Jay Chou shows promise as the Prince Jai, the middle son. It's great to see veteran actors like Chow Yun-fat and Gong Li play dress-up and bite into their roles. In particular, Ms. Li is excellent as the Empress. Still radiant after all these years, the actress creates a classic mix of power and vulnerability.
Mr. Yimou directs the early scenes with an urgency lacking towards the end. At two-hours, "Curse" shouldn't feel over-long, but it does. Characters are still getting up-to-speed long after the audience has resolved the plot. Since this is a Zhang Yimou film, the visuals are a feast for the eyes. Characters march down ornate sherbet-colored hallways like an Asian Aaron Sorkin melodrama. When the swords fly, there are battles here that rival anything in "Hero" or "Flying Daggers".
But "Curse" spends so much time with its characters, that its sweeping battles are actually distracting. Endless rows of soldiers stretch to the horizon, impossibly coordinated maidens adorn acres of palace grounds. If there are a billion people in China, surely each of them had a role in this film. By the time we get to a climactic battle scene of such scale that the Fellowship of the Ring would run for cover, we've lost a sense of intimacy vital to making the film work. The "Curse", it seems, is having a brilliant director with all manner of CGI-trickery at his fingertips. The story, somehow, gets lost in translation.
