divemaster13
Member: Rank 4
For Monday's review, I'm offering up the mainland China movie Jasmine Women (2004). I know, I know. It's a long review for a movie that I didn't exactly love. It's basically 3 movies in 1, so perhaps I can be forgiven my verbosity. And the film does have merit, which I hope you can suss out from my write-up. And it features Ziyi Zhang in three diverse roles.
Hopefully the film is now available for viewing without having to watch the DVD version I reviewed--b/c the DVD was crap. (At least I didn't pay for it.)
LOL: just got a forum message that my post was too long. Ha. So I'll divide it up--movie review this post; DVD review next post.
Jasmine Women (aka Jasmine Flower) (2004)
Directed by Yong Hou
Starring Ziyi Zhang, Joan Chen, and Wen Jiang
In Mandarin with English subtitles
Film: 3.5 stars (out of 5)
Jasmine Women was directed and written for the screen (adapted from a novel by Su Tong) by Yong Hou, whose other credits include cinematography on the films The Road Home and Not One Less. Hou was also a camera operator on Hero.
The film stars Ziyi Zhang. I could end the review right there and that should be enough to know that this is a movie worth watching. Miss Zhang is an amazing actress. In my opinion one of the best working right now. She can convey so much with a turn of the head, or a shift in that dancer’s body, or a flash of her eyes. Who can forget the seething raw power of her scenes in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, her vindictiveness in Hero, her transcendence in the “echo game” scene in House of Flying Daggers, her naïve cuteness in The Road Home? How many other actresses have such range, can command a scene like she can? If I had to sum it up in one word, it would be exquisite.
Jasmine Women takes full advantage of Miss Zhang’s range. The film is divided into three chapters that follow a family through the middle part of 20th Century China. Ziyi Zhang (as well as Joan Chen) each play a different role in each of the three chapters.
Chapter 1 (“Grandmother”): Zhang plays the part of A Motou (or Mo). The setting is pre-Communist urban China, some time in the 1930s by the look of it. Western styles are in vogue. Mo is a teenager who works at her mom’s photography/film shop. Mo spends her time going to movies, poring through film magazines and dreaming about handsome movie stars. But her mom (Chen) disapproves. One day a movie producer walks in, sees Mo’s pretty face, and invites her for a photo shoot/audition. He’s suave in his neat western suit and in his ability to speak English. Mother really disapproves.
But Mo has stars in her eyes. She ends up with her picture on the cover of a trade magazine and she is set up in a hotel suite. (Mother really, really disapproves.). But, as Mo says, “He’s really a nice guy” and he treats her well. So well, in fact, that she ends up pregnant. Mother by this time is apoplectic.
Circumstances find Mo having to fend for herself and so she moves back home. She has to stave off the advances of her lecherous “Uncle Wang,” manage to get along with her mother, and learn how to care for her baby.
In my opinion this is the best of the three chapters. Most of the notes rang true, and both Zhang and Chen do a fine job, Zhang as the cute star-struck teenager turned single mother and Chen as the mom who knows best for her daughter but is powerless to force her out of her headstrong ways.
Chapter 2 (“Mother”) takes us to a point 18 years later, toward the beginning of Chairman Mao’s rise to power and the beginnings of the Great Leap Forward. Mo’s baby from the first chapter (“Lily”) has grown up and is now played by Zhang. The middle-aged Mo is now played by Chen.
Lily attaches herself to an up-and-coming Party member (“Zhou Jie,” played by a fresh-faced Yi Lu). All his talk about “contributing our youth to the construction of the great socialism” and getting the people back to farming and the labors for the collective good gives her the dreamy sighs. She takes him home to meet her mom and as one would expect, the western-hating young communist and the faded movie star do not get along. Mom, remembering the fateful repercussions of her young love, disapproves. What goes around, comes around.
Anyway, Lily marries Jie and moves in with his family at a socialist collective.
As one brought up in western/capitalistic ways, Lily’s move into the life of a commune worker/wife does not exactly work out. I’m not sure what she thought life on a socialist collective was going to be like—it’s not like Jie misled her as to his idealistic ways. It was about this point in the film that things starting ringing a little false with me. We are not given any real reason why she was attracted to this guy in the first place and why she was originally so taken with the socialist movement. Idealism? Rebelling against mom and her outmoded dreams of the past? Perhaps, but we just have to take it on faith.
Well, almost immediately Lily figures out that she hates her new life. It pretty much seems like she is willing to divorce Jie because she dislikes doing the collective laundry. She stomps off back to home. This is where I started paying more attention to “Why is she acting like that? It makes no sense” than to the story itself. Which is too bad, because I really wanted to get caught up in the drama.
Jie actually turns out to be an okay husband, coming back for Lily and even suggesting that they adopt a daughter when it turns out Lily can’t get pregnant (or, as the subtitles say, “the Fallopian tube is illogical.”). As the chapter plays out, however, most other behaviors and scenes seem to be arbitrary and come out of left field. As for Lily—well, the best way to put it is that she goes a bit nutso throughout the rest of this segment (the weakest of the three chapters, in my opinion).
Chapter 3 (“Daughter”) is the story of A Hua, the adopted daughter of Lily and Jie. A Hua is now in her early 20s and is played by Zhang, an interesting choice because A Hua was adopted into the family, thus negating the need for a family resemblance. (But I’m not complaining—the more Zhang, the better!). The one constant is Mo, now at granny age and again played by Chen. Lily and Jie are out of the picture, so the story focuses on the relationship between A Hua and her grandmother. (Anyone with a predilection for the bookish librarian type will fall down in rapture over Miss Zhang in this segment, with her eyeglasses and university student look. I know I did.)
Anyway, A Hua finds a fella (“Xiou Du,” played by Ye Liu). They are in love, and again we are treated to a dinner table scene as a guy is brought home for approval. A Hua and Du get married, there are conflicts--we know the drill by now.
This chapter starts off good; a welcome step up from the second chapter, and keeps it up for the most part. Even so, the climax and dénouement come across as a little drastic and melodramatic (again, rather arbitrarily in my book) but things end on a life-affirming note. (But someone tell me—would a modern Chinese city gal, nine months pregnant and living alone, really not have a telephone?)
In summary, don’t watch Jasmine Women for the story. It is serviceable, but not much more. Instead, relish the performances, especially those of Ziyi Zhang and Joan Chen. Each has to play several different characters of widely different types and ages and they do it very well.
And did I mention that Ziyi Zhang is exquisite?
The film I give 3.5 stars out of 5. This is my balance between a 3-star story and 5-star acting.
Hopefully the film is now available for viewing without having to watch the DVD version I reviewed--b/c the DVD was crap. (At least I didn't pay for it.)
LOL: just got a forum message that my post was too long. Ha. So I'll divide it up--movie review this post; DVD review next post.
Jasmine Women (aka Jasmine Flower) (2004)
Directed by Yong Hou
Starring Ziyi Zhang, Joan Chen, and Wen Jiang
In Mandarin with English subtitles
Film: 3.5 stars (out of 5)
Jasmine Women was directed and written for the screen (adapted from a novel by Su Tong) by Yong Hou, whose other credits include cinematography on the films The Road Home and Not One Less. Hou was also a camera operator on Hero.
The film stars Ziyi Zhang. I could end the review right there and that should be enough to know that this is a movie worth watching. Miss Zhang is an amazing actress. In my opinion one of the best working right now. She can convey so much with a turn of the head, or a shift in that dancer’s body, or a flash of her eyes. Who can forget the seething raw power of her scenes in Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, her vindictiveness in Hero, her transcendence in the “echo game” scene in House of Flying Daggers, her naïve cuteness in The Road Home? How many other actresses have such range, can command a scene like she can? If I had to sum it up in one word, it would be exquisite.
Jasmine Women takes full advantage of Miss Zhang’s range. The film is divided into three chapters that follow a family through the middle part of 20th Century China. Ziyi Zhang (as well as Joan Chen) each play a different role in each of the three chapters.
Chapter 1 (“Grandmother”): Zhang plays the part of A Motou (or Mo). The setting is pre-Communist urban China, some time in the 1930s by the look of it. Western styles are in vogue. Mo is a teenager who works at her mom’s photography/film shop. Mo spends her time going to movies, poring through film magazines and dreaming about handsome movie stars. But her mom (Chen) disapproves. One day a movie producer walks in, sees Mo’s pretty face, and invites her for a photo shoot/audition. He’s suave in his neat western suit and in his ability to speak English. Mother really disapproves.
But Mo has stars in her eyes. She ends up with her picture on the cover of a trade magazine and she is set up in a hotel suite. (Mother really, really disapproves.). But, as Mo says, “He’s really a nice guy” and he treats her well. So well, in fact, that she ends up pregnant. Mother by this time is apoplectic.
Circumstances find Mo having to fend for herself and so she moves back home. She has to stave off the advances of her lecherous “Uncle Wang,” manage to get along with her mother, and learn how to care for her baby.
In my opinion this is the best of the three chapters. Most of the notes rang true, and both Zhang and Chen do a fine job, Zhang as the cute star-struck teenager turned single mother and Chen as the mom who knows best for her daughter but is powerless to force her out of her headstrong ways.
Chapter 2 (“Mother”) takes us to a point 18 years later, toward the beginning of Chairman Mao’s rise to power and the beginnings of the Great Leap Forward. Mo’s baby from the first chapter (“Lily”) has grown up and is now played by Zhang. The middle-aged Mo is now played by Chen.
Lily attaches herself to an up-and-coming Party member (“Zhou Jie,” played by a fresh-faced Yi Lu). All his talk about “contributing our youth to the construction of the great socialism” and getting the people back to farming and the labors for the collective good gives her the dreamy sighs. She takes him home to meet her mom and as one would expect, the western-hating young communist and the faded movie star do not get along. Mom, remembering the fateful repercussions of her young love, disapproves. What goes around, comes around.
Anyway, Lily marries Jie and moves in with his family at a socialist collective.
As one brought up in western/capitalistic ways, Lily’s move into the life of a commune worker/wife does not exactly work out. I’m not sure what she thought life on a socialist collective was going to be like—it’s not like Jie misled her as to his idealistic ways. It was about this point in the film that things starting ringing a little false with me. We are not given any real reason why she was attracted to this guy in the first place and why she was originally so taken with the socialist movement. Idealism? Rebelling against mom and her outmoded dreams of the past? Perhaps, but we just have to take it on faith.
Well, almost immediately Lily figures out that she hates her new life. It pretty much seems like she is willing to divorce Jie because she dislikes doing the collective laundry. She stomps off back to home. This is where I started paying more attention to “Why is she acting like that? It makes no sense” than to the story itself. Which is too bad, because I really wanted to get caught up in the drama.
Jie actually turns out to be an okay husband, coming back for Lily and even suggesting that they adopt a daughter when it turns out Lily can’t get pregnant (or, as the subtitles say, “the Fallopian tube is illogical.”). As the chapter plays out, however, most other behaviors and scenes seem to be arbitrary and come out of left field. As for Lily—well, the best way to put it is that she goes a bit nutso throughout the rest of this segment (the weakest of the three chapters, in my opinion).
Chapter 3 (“Daughter”) is the story of A Hua, the adopted daughter of Lily and Jie. A Hua is now in her early 20s and is played by Zhang, an interesting choice because A Hua was adopted into the family, thus negating the need for a family resemblance. (But I’m not complaining—the more Zhang, the better!). The one constant is Mo, now at granny age and again played by Chen. Lily and Jie are out of the picture, so the story focuses on the relationship between A Hua and her grandmother. (Anyone with a predilection for the bookish librarian type will fall down in rapture over Miss Zhang in this segment, with her eyeglasses and university student look. I know I did.)
Anyway, A Hua finds a fella (“Xiou Du,” played by Ye Liu). They are in love, and again we are treated to a dinner table scene as a guy is brought home for approval. A Hua and Du get married, there are conflicts--we know the drill by now.
This chapter starts off good; a welcome step up from the second chapter, and keeps it up for the most part. Even so, the climax and dénouement come across as a little drastic and melodramatic (again, rather arbitrarily in my book) but things end on a life-affirming note. (But someone tell me—would a modern Chinese city gal, nine months pregnant and living alone, really not have a telephone?)
In summary, don’t watch Jasmine Women for the story. It is serviceable, but not much more. Instead, relish the performances, especially those of Ziyi Zhang and Joan Chen. Each has to play several different characters of widely different types and ages and they do it very well.
And did I mention that Ziyi Zhang is exquisite?
The film I give 3.5 stars out of 5. This is my balance between a 3-star story and 5-star acting.
