2/13 -- Flowers of Shanghai -- Hou Hsiao Hsien -- 1998
An intoxicating, time-bending experience bathed in the golden glow of oil lamps and wreathed in an opium haze, this gorgeous period reverie by Hou Hsiao-hsien traces the romantic intrigue, jealousies, and tensions swirling around four late-nineteenth-century Shanghai “flower houses,” where courtesans live confined to a gilded cage, ensconced in opulent splendor but forced to work to buy back their freedom. Among the regular clients is the taciturn Master Wang (Tony Leung Chiu-wai), whose relationship with his longtime mistress (Michiko Hada) is roiled by a perceived act of betrayal. Composed in a languorous procession of entrancing long takes, Flowers of Shanghai evokes a vanished world of decadence and cruelty, an insular universe where much of the dramatic action remains tantalizingly offscreen—even as its emotional fallout registers with quiet devastation.
This was quite a nice experience, dad was awake for most of it, and with a little bit of adjusting to the setting, was getting into it, verging on expressing Feminist viewpoints, but would never use that term. What a gorgeous looking film this is, the best of HHH I have, but I still need his most acclaimed stuff.
I might be trying for a 3rd film of the night, which will be a good standard for each night like this, so that perhaps I could fit in a famous trilogy sometime this week.
I think it's needed these days more than ever to have a taste of the exotic, to get away from the news, and just soak up a different culture, forget what's happening and be enchanted.
46-50, M
