"I hated this place, but now I'm afraid to go."

Rating: 8/10 (22 May 2018)

There's no denying the fact that the movie has it's adherents, and with nine Academy Award wins to back it up, it deserves it's place among cinema's finest films. However for this viewer, I wasn't inspired by a sense of grandeur or awe in the life of Pu Yi, the titled Last Emperor of the Ching Dynasty. A person of importance by birth perhaps, but someone who ultimately observes history pass him by, preferring to watch things happen instead of making things happen. The picture is a study of a man attempting to reconcile personal responsibility with a political legacy, but the ramifications of Pu Yi's (John Lone) life didn't resonate with this viewer. The most artistic elements in the movie for me include the production design by Ferdinando Scafiotti and Vittorio Storaro's cinematography, capturing the harsh beauty and elegance of Peking's fabled Forbidden City. As other reviewers have noted, the movie's near three hour run time also plays on one's attention span, and I'm generally fairly patient by nature. However without any significant high points in the story, the impact of the movie had more of a documentary feel than what I would have hoped for.