Da hong deng long gao gao gua
Tags: depressing, murder, intrigue, insanity, romantic, claustrophobic, tragedy, revenge

Plot synopsis:
The film is set in 1920s China during the Warlord Era, years before the Chinese Civil War. Nineteen-year-old Songlian (Sònglián, played by Gong Li), an educated woman whose father has recently died and left the family bankrupt, is forced by her mother to marry into the wealthy Chen family, becoming the fourth wife or rather the third concubine or, as she is referred to, the Fourth Mistress (Sì Tàitai) of the household. Arriving at the palatial abode, she is at first treated like royalty, receiving sensuous foot massages and brightly lit red lanterns, as well as a visit from her husband, Master Chen (Ma Jingwu), the master of the house, whose face is never clearly shown.
Songlian soon discovers, however, that not all the concubines in the household receive the same luxurious treatment. In fact, the master decides on a daily basis the concubine with whom he will spend the night; whomever he chooses gets her lanterns lit, receives the foot massage, gets her choice of menu items at mealtime, and gets the most attention and respect from the servants. Pitted in constant competition against each other, the three concubines are continually vying for their husband's attention and affections. It is this hierarchical competition, and the artificiality of human relations within the compound, that projects the film's strongest critique.
The First Mistress, Yuru (Jin Shuyuan), appears to be nearly as old as the master himself. Having borne a son decades earlier, she seems resigned to live out her life as forgotten, always passed over in favor of the younger concubines. The Second Mistress, Zhuoyun (Zhuóyún, Cao Cuifen), befriends Songlian, complimenting her youth and beauty, and giving her expensive silk as a gift; she also warns her about the Third Mistress, Meishan (Méishan, He Caifei), a former opera singer who is spoiled and who becomes unable to cope with no longer being the youngest and most favored of the master's playthings. As time passes, though, Songlian learns that it is really Zhuoyun, the Second Mistress, who is not to be trusted; she is subsequently described as having the face of the Buddha, yet possessing the heart of a scorpion.
Songlian feigns pregnancy, attempting to garner the majority of the master's time and, at the same time, attempting to become actually pregnant. Zhuoyun, however, is in league with Songlian's personal maid, Yan'er (Yàn'ér, played by Kong Lin) who finds and reveals a pair of bloodied undergarments, suggesting that Songlian had recently had her period, and discovers the pregnancy is a fraud.
Zhuoyun summons the family physician, feigning concern for Songlian's "pregnancy". Doctor Gao (Gao-yisheng, Cui Zhigang), who is secretly having an illicit affair with Third Mistress Meishan, examines Songlian and determines the pregnancy to be a sham. Infuriated, the master orders Songlian's lanterns covered with thick black canvas bags indefinitely. Blaming the sequence of events on Yan'er, Songlian reveals to the house that Yan'er's room is filled with lit red lanterns, showing that Yan'er dreams of becoming a mistress instead of a lowly servant; it is suggested earlier that Yan'er is in love with the master and has even slept with him in the Fourth Mistress' bed.
Yan'er is punished by having the lanterns burned while she kneels in the snow, watching as they smolder. In an act of defiance, Yan'er refuses to humble herself or apologize, and thus remains kneeling in the snow throughout the night until she collapses. Yan'er falls sick and ultimately dies after being taken to the hospital. One of the servants tells Songlian that her former maid died with her mistress's name on her lips. Songlian, who had briefly attended university before the passing of her father and being forced into marriage, comes to the conclusion that she is happier in solitude; she eventually sees the competition between the concubines as a useless endeavor, as each woman is merely a "robe" that the master may wear and discard at his discretion.
As Songlian retreats further into her solitude, she begins speaking of suicide; she reasons that dying is a better fate than being a concubine in the Chen household. On her twentieth birthday, severely intoxicated and despondent over her bitter fate, Songlian inadvertently blurts out the details of the love affair between Meishan and Doctor Gao to Zhuoyun, who later catches the adulterous couple together. Following the old customs and traditions, Meishan is dragged to a lone room on the roof of the estate and hanged to death by the master's servants.
Songlian, already in agony due to the fruitlessness of her life, witnesses the entire episode and is emotionally traumatized. The following summer, after the Master's marriage to yet another concubine, Songlian is shown wandering the compound in her old schoolgirl clothes, having gone completely insane.

Review: It shows us that film, real film that is, does not need $100 million to look good, rather the combination of a haunting setting in the middle of vastness and the equally haunting beauty of it's star, Gong Li, but at it's heart the house itself resembles a claustrophobic pot, boiling over the surface.This is in my opinion, Zhang Yimou's greatest film, it is a triumph in film form and narrative.
But beyond its beauty, its moral seriousness, the fact that not for a moment is it "dumbed down" in the regrettable Hollywood fashion, its superb acting, and its almost unbelievably perfect pacing, make it a rare, rare experience."Red Sorghum," the only other Zhang Yimou film I've seen so far, I found somewhat propagandistic but gripping and visually stunning (even more so than "Raise the Red Lantern.")  I will be making an effort to see more of this director's fairly extensive body of work.
Raise The Red Lantern is one of the only Chinese movies I've seen, but I'll definitely admit that it's unusual to see a film this stylistically masterful come out of Hollywood (although it can happen -- The Thin Red Line, for example).
The characters take on the mask-like appearance of ghosts, except that right in the middle of it all, living and breathing human beings are caught, stripped of their will, and subjugated beautifully; their sterile riches suffocating them.In the VHS version I saw, the cover notes were very poorly written and misleading, hinting at a particular love interest that (fortunately, I can say) is not in the film, yet ignoring the symphony of clashing hearts and minds that are central to the wonderfully woven plot.
When the Master has chosen the wife he wishes to spend the night with, huge red lanterns are lit and hung around the outside and inside of the house of that wife and she is given a foot massage with small weighted silver hammers whose castanet-like sounds echo through the entire complex, and they serve as an overt display to the others that they were not good enough on that day to win his affections and must try harder the next day.
Zhang Yimou solidifies his standing as one of cinema's most brilliant craftsmen with Raise the Red Lantern, a heartbreaking and fascinating look into the life of a young, well-educated woman who gives up her future to become the fourth wife of a wealthy landowner in 1920s China.
Zhang Yimou makes films as exquisitely composed as any master's painting, and his palette extends beyond the obvious beauty of Gong Li to include the details of the courtyards, lanterns, silks, and rooftops with an inexplicable mixture of tranquility and austerity..
Consequently, the women must jockey for position, all vying for the privilege of the titular lanterns, lit outside the house of whatever woman is lucky enough to receive the master's company.Raise the Red Lantern  a genuine masterpiece  bears the fruit of the planet's last three-strip Technicolor lab, located in Shanghai, and you can't so much as glance at the screen without noticing the difference.
Gong Li. Songlian(Gong li) is the fourth wife of the elusive Master.When she arrives in this secluded remote place the other wives pay attention,the film shows the female vanity and a competition to gain the master affection but why?
Songlian looks very delicate but she proves that she can be strong and  even rebel.The great  chinase Director  Zhang Yimou did a wonderful job to focused on the beautiful,flawless face of the impressive Gong Li.The film begins when we see her face on the screen and a tear drops slowly.Other poignant scene is when her flute disappearswhy she makes too much noise about it?is the only gift she had from her late father.When the winter arrives and the snow envelops this place it seem more remote and eerie Then a series of tragedies occur and the heroine starts to fade slowly.
I think that the ending is so sad but at the same time is like a fairy tale To me.Songlian looks like a ghost walking around,alone without a soul .She represents a tragic past that will always haunt this place.I'm a big admirer of the actress Gong Li,all her films impressive me in different levels: `Jou Du'; The Story of Qiu Ju; Farewell to my Concubine.
The various use of color tinting: demonstrating sunrise and sunset, light emitted by the red lantern in its different shading and position, the symbolism behind the red lantern and the women's condition within the mansion, and the draping in black curtains of Songlian's lanterns when she has committed a crime against tradition are both visually stunning and extremely effective in creating the mood of the time.
The plot is essentially about how the mistresses vie for their master's attention while they attempt to out-manipulate each other for that precious recognition.RTRL has complex themes, but I think the film is mainly about the emptiness and pointlessness of these women's lives in a society that sees them as having no worth, and how they destroy themselves and each other because of their insecurities and lack of self-respect, in an attempt to achieve (what they regard as) some kind of self-worth.
"Raise the Red Lantern" has a real story and real acting to match.I really like this film!.
RAISE THE RED LANTERN is a family drama about Songlian, a 19-year-old Chinese woman who chooses to become the fourth wife of a rich magnate.
Songlian enters her husband's mansion in the second scene, and not a single shot thereafter strays from this prison masquerading as a home, where there is no color except for the red lanterns that signify the master's choice of which wife he will sleep with tonight.
The character I found myself rooting for the most was the servant girl Yan'er, who is just as nasty as any of the others, but is the only one to show any real defiance, any willingness to fight against the restrictions the house places on her.The clearly redeeming feature of RAISE THE RED LANTERN is Gong Li's performance as Songlian; she plays her character to the hilt, with amazing verisimilitude.
The writing may not allow her to win much sympathy, but you cannot avoid the feeling that this is woman, however awful, is a real person with real feelings.Oddly, the subtitles constantly refer to the four wives as `Mistress' and the IMDB credits them as `concubines.'  However, it appears that they are indeed wives, each married to the master; the Mandarin word used is `tai-tai,' which means wife.I think that Zhang Yimou meant this movie as a denunciation of polygamy.
Well quite simply, it's interesting due to the battle you see between the wives who are subtly plotting against one another to gain the upper hand in status and also self respect for a guy whom they don't love, but feel that he is the only one who can provide it for them.There is a sense of claustrophobia in the film, as our main character, Songlian (Gong Li) at first starts to think this new life as a concubine is quite glamorous until she starts to see the reality of the concubines situation.
The shots of the complex they live in almost gives a sense of isolation from the rest of the world and that they are confined in their homes to serve their one and only master, the husband they all share.The title refers to the fact that lanterns are raised at one of the concubines' houses if the master chooses to spend the night with the one with whom he chooses.
You see the four concubines waiting to hear the daily announcement before they sleep as to whom will have the pleasure of spending the night with the master.Zhang Yimou's films often have a message which can be interpreted in different ways.
Songlian struggles to obey all the rules but also tries to play the political game in order to gain the master's attention.With its simple yet very well told story, with a terrific performance by Gong Li and the rest of the cast, it definitely is worth the watch.
The film powerfully portrays the life of Songlian (Gong Li) as she becomes the "Fourth Wife" to Chen a wealthy landowner in 1920's China.
From the opening scene to the very last frame I was mesmerized by the strong acting of all the cast but most especially with Gong Li. I was impressed by her abilities in Memoirs of a Geisha, but Raise the Red Lantern offered her a bigger stage to present the wide range of her acting abilities.There Gong Li presented a character who, at times, commanded presence and self-assuredness as she struggled to untangle the complexities of the "duties and customs" of a concubine in their master's household.
They make an incredible team and this is an incredible movie.It provides an inside look at Chinese custom as four wives fight for the right to have the lanterns lit at their house each night representing whom the Master will sleep with.
and has known what is to be "free." In the constricted, feudal environment of the Master's palatial house, Zhang Yimou shows Songlian's physical and psychological imprisonment in a "gilded cage." The most horrific thing about this movie is the fact that, in 20s era China, something like this could conceivably happen.
The way Zhang Yimou gradually unwinds the story, with sumptuous colors and the incredibly believable acting of Gong Li and the rest of the cast, is beautiful and has a depth that most Hollywood movies lack..
A few years later, I saw it at Blockbuster, rented it, and saw exactly why it was a great movie, and its still in the top 5 of my favorite movies.Set in 1920's China, the story is about Songlian, a 19 year old university student who decides to marry a rich, older man after the death of her father.
Raise the Red Lantern, has a Kurosawa quality to it; very slow, very dramatic and very thought provoking.Set around the beginning of the 20th century, The film is about the conflict between four concubines in the massive household of a Chinese lord.
Like Truffaut's "The 400 Blows" alerting the cinematic world to the rising of the French New Wave, Yimou's film serves as fair warning to all that the best films in the world are now coming out of Asia.No, I'm not overstating it.In 1920s China, 19-year-old Songlian (Gong Li) is sent to the home of a feudal nobleman to become his fourth wife.
And the female servants dream of how wonderful life must be to live as one of the Master's wives.Yimou films the story with an astonishing beauty, giving even a scene of deadly violence (mercifully hidden from the camera) a gorgeous look.
Yimou is also very aware of his leading actress's incredible beauty and he coaxes more expressions from Gong Li's face than it would seem one person is capable of making.If you have any hesitations about viewing a subtitled film, put them aside and allow yourself to be taken on one of the most wonderful  cinematic journeys you will ever travel..
We aren't afraid of work and we are certainly as clever as men =)Every time I see this movie, it reminds me to be loving to my fellow women and stop playing bitchy mind games that we consciously and unconsciously play and direct my focus on more important things.Yes, I do believe that we can change this and I will start by not being a part of that game that we have all been a part of at some point in our lives..
Raise the Red Lantern is a film directed by Zhang Yimou which is an adaptation of the novel Wives and Concubines by Su Tong.
Alas, not all is as perfect as it may seem, with three other mistresses under one roof (coupled with a scored maid) - the events get dramatic, mistresses pine for time with the "Master", and the hardships of living in this culture become clear as "Raise the Red Lantern" couples history, fiction, and amazing visuals to weave an important story to the screen.
This film, Raise the Red Lantern, refers to the signal a rich husband would give for which wife or concubine he wanted for that evening.
Chinese auteur Zhang Yimou's fourth feature, Venice's Silver Lion winner and an Oscar BEST FOREIGN LANGUAGE FILM nominee, RAISE THE RED LANTERN, first and foremost, emblazons Zhang's indubitable sense of form as a cinematic aesthete by curtailing the whole shebang within the perimeter of a palatial residence (the Qiao Family compound near Pingyao, Shanxi Province) in the Warlord Era China of the early 20th Century, and vetting women's tragic life immured inside a feudal prison with a fine-tooth comb.Songlian (Gong Li), a 19-year-old college-dropout, marries into the wealthy Chen Family as the fourth wife (or the third concubine), and soon is embroiled into the harem's backdoor maneuver, validated by the lantern-lightening ritual vouchsafed by Master Chen (Ma Jingwu) - whose face is never shown in close-up, a bold generalization pregnant with Zhang's tacit swipe at the draconian patriarchy's clutches - to indicate which wife he intends to spend the night with and is concomitant with privileges like sensual foot massage and preferential culinary options vested to the cherry-picked one.With the exception of Chen's first wife, the scraggly Yuru (Jin Shuyuan), who is long in the tooth and has become philosophical towards her long-gone heyday, the quotidian contest revolves around Songlian, Meishan (He Saifei), the third wife, a cosseted former Peking opera star who sub rosa engages in an illicit affair with the family doctor, and Zhuoyun (Cao Cuifen), the second wife, a Buddha-faced, scorpion-hearted figure, who befriends Songlian with an ulterior motive to exact.
Among the supporting players, He Saifei impresses with her stupendous opera posture and a friend-or-foe intrigue that occasions a precious if elusive sense of solidarity that is essential to the film's feminist slant; on the opposite of the gamut, veteran actress Cao Cuifen, intriguingly excels in exemplifying the artificiality of sororal rapport.It goes without saying that RAISE THE RED LANTERN owes its appreciable renown as much to its performers as those behind the camera, namely, the rigidly-framed, chromatically stunning cinematography from Zhao Fei and Yang Lun that falls in line with a unique color scheme out of Zhang's ingenious conception, and the aural pleasure engendered by the oriental strains masterly composed by Zhao Jiping along with shrill Chinese opera snippets, honing the trenchant strength of this benightedness-censuring, universally allegorical tale that judiciously scrutinizes womanhood in its dead center..
A young woman (Gong Li) becomes the fourth wife of a wealthy lord, and must learn to live with the strict rules and tensions within the household."Raise the Red Lantern" has been distributed on VHS, Laserdisc and DVD by numerous different distributors, with many coming under criticism for their poor quality.
That's so helpful.-- Sullen, immature concubines looking for a few pointersI'll give Raise the Red Lantern a 4 out of 10, which is the highest rating I'll give a film I could not watch all the way through.
That's so helpful.-- Sullen, immature concubines looking for a few pointers I'll give Raise the Red Lantern a 4 out of 10, which is the highest rating I'll give a film I could not watch all the way through.
remember the Warlord Era. Zhang Yimou's Academy Award-nominated "Da hong deng long gao gao gua" ("Raise the Red Lantern" in English) is one of the many movies that sets up why China is like it is today.
Raise the Red Lantern is one of the best Chinese movies I have seen.
"Raise the Red Lantern," the story of a college-educated young woman who becomes the fourth wife to a wealthy man in imperial China, made an indelible impression on me when I first saw it in the theater.
Zhang Yimou's "Raise the Red Lantern" is slow and stately and quite genuinely beautiful to behold, but the ornate stilness and single setting serves only to blunt the film's virtues.
As such, I understand why many younger people do not like Raise the Red Lantern.Anyways, it's about a story of an educated female who due to her father's death, must become the fourth concubine of a wealthy landowner in order to support her family at home.
It's all a very striking and realistic look at how women were treated in China back then by the mainly paternalistic society.It's quite slow, which is the main reason why I'm not enamoured with it, and nothing really happens in the movie (aside from the fact that she must compete with the other mistresses of the household, something that I've known already, considering I've watched many other Chinese films involving royal intrigue and infighting to get more power etc).
Gong Li is Songlian, a nineteen year old whose father has died, which results in her marrying a wealthy man, Master Chen, becoming the fourth wife and third concubine.
Raise the Red Lantern is a gorgeous movie, as are most of Yimou Zhang's films.
Set in 1920s China, Raise the Red Lantern begins with a close-up of Songlian's face.
Seemingly imprisoned in her rooms, Songlian is not even able to keep a flute, an heirloom of her father's, because Master Chen is worried that it was a gift from a boy at Songlian's university.Like other Zhang Yimou films, Raise the Red Lantern is a visual delight.
Raise the Red Lantern directed by Zhang Yimou is the perfect testament to the harsh realities women had to face during the 1920's in China.
Yimou accomplished his task of showing the oppressive lives that these women must live and through the use of Songlian he showed that there is no way out.The only flaw in Raise the Red Lantern was the acting.
Gong Li plays Song Lian in "Raise the Red Lantern" as the fourth concubine of the master Chen.