the last time I'll watch the last emperor

Rating: Null/10 (2 July 2011)

I saw the Last Emperor when it first came out in 87. I recall being incredibly bored then so I gave it another go on DVD. In the first ten minutes its obvious why it won all those Oscars. Loads of great photography, masterful attention to period detail, fluid camera movement editing etc. Then scene after scene after scene of bowing crowds, massive palatial spreads, kow towing serfs, pomp and circumstance, and flat out dullness. The characters never come to life. Scenes are left undeveloped. The movie suffers from something a lot of movies post 80's are infected with. There is such a great need to move the plot forward to get the narrative progressing that characterization and scene development suffer. This results in the viewer (me) not giving a rat's a$% what happens to anyone in the film. Lawrence of Arabia it isn't. Even the appearance of Peter O' Toole is no help as he plays a stiff upper class British tutor in a film that is already filled with so much stiffness it is in desperate need of his Year of Living Dangerously character to liven things up. The film doesn't liven up and 24 years after first seeing it , this will be my last viewing of the Last Emperor.