After such works as “A City of Sadness” Taiwanese auteur Hou Hsiao-Hsien, member of the Taiwanese New Wave, was looking for new topics, also outside his home country. Eventually he stumbled upon a novel by Han Ziyun, translated into Mandarin by Eileen Chang, about the Shanghai flower houses, their relevance to urban life in the early 1900s and before, as well as their hierarchy. The work inspired “Flowers of Shanghai”, in they eyes of many cinephiles and critics his most artful feature, which was nominated for Best Film at Cannes Film Festival in 1998 and won the award for best Art Direction and the Jury Award at Golden Horse Film Festival.
Flowers of Shanghai is screening at Vesoul International Film Festival of Asian Cinema The Spark is screening at Vesoul International Film Festival of Asian Cinema
The story takes place during the 1880s, and covers many characters and their encounters in...
Flowers of Shanghai is screening at Vesoul International Film Festival of Asian Cinema The Spark is screening at Vesoul International Film Festival of Asian Cinema
The story takes place during the 1880s, and covers many characters and their encounters in...
- 2/9/2024
- by Rouven Linnarz
- AsianMoviePulse
Getting over my grudge that one hasn’t really seen Flowers of Shanghai unless seen on an abjectly hideous all-region DVD taken from your college library, I can acknowledge a 4K restoration of Hou Hsiao-hsien’s masterpiece as essential beyond essential. A milestone in the most seminal of contemporary careers and (even in a fuzzy transfer) one of the most enveloping movies of its time, this is cinema for which neglecting of any sort simply will not stand.
And you can see it starting tomorrow, courtesy Film Forum, in advance of which there’s a trailer showing off the work conducted by Shochiku and Shanghai International Film Festival, who worked from the original 35mm negative. No joke, no exaggeration: seeing even just a bit of this on a browser window in a compressed version felt like a warm bath for my eyes.
Watch the trailer below:
An intoxicating, time-bending experience...
And you can see it starting tomorrow, courtesy Film Forum, in advance of which there’s a trailer showing off the work conducted by Shochiku and Shanghai International Film Festival, who worked from the original 35mm negative. No joke, no exaggeration: seeing even just a bit of this on a browser window in a compressed version felt like a warm bath for my eyes.
Watch the trailer below:
An intoxicating, time-bending experience...
- 11/19/2020
- by Leonard Pearce
- The Film Stage
Wong Kar Wai’s In The Mood For Love, starring Maggie Cheung and Tony Leung is a Revival selection Photo: Anne-Katrin Titze
Film at Lincoln Center has announced the Revivals of the 58th New York Film Festival will include Terence Dixon’s Meeting The Man: James Baldwin In Paris, shot by Jack Hazan and Steve McQueen Selects: Jean Vigo’s Zero For Conduct (Zéro De Conduite) available for free 'limited rentals'. Other highlights in the program are Joyce Chopra’s adaptation of Joyce Carol Oates’ Smooth Talk, starring Laura Dern and Treat Williams; William Klein’s Muhammad Ali, The Greatest; Hou Hsiao-hsien’s Flowers Of Shanghai with Tony Leung, Michiko Hada and Vicky Wei; Béla Tarr’s collaboration with László Krasznahorkai on Damnation, and Wong Kar Wai’s In The Mood For Love, starring Maggie Cheung and Leung. Wong Kar Wai was the Artistic Director for The Metropolitan Museum of Art Costume Institute...
Film at Lincoln Center has announced the Revivals of the 58th New York Film Festival will include Terence Dixon’s Meeting The Man: James Baldwin In Paris, shot by Jack Hazan and Steve McQueen Selects: Jean Vigo’s Zero For Conduct (Zéro De Conduite) available for free 'limited rentals'. Other highlights in the program are Joyce Chopra’s adaptation of Joyce Carol Oates’ Smooth Talk, starring Laura Dern and Treat Williams; William Klein’s Muhammad Ali, The Greatest; Hou Hsiao-hsien’s Flowers Of Shanghai with Tony Leung, Michiko Hada and Vicky Wei; Béla Tarr’s collaboration with László Krasznahorkai on Damnation, and Wong Kar Wai’s In The Mood For Love, starring Maggie Cheung and Leung. Wong Kar Wai was the Artistic Director for The Metropolitan Museum of Art Costume Institute...
- 8/24/2020
- by Anne-Katrin Titze
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
Helter Skelter (2012) Review (Mika Ninagawa)STORY82%ACTING78%DIRECTING75%VISUALS90%Great castMeaningful storyExcellent cinematographyThe script is a little naive at times2015-10-0981%Overall ScoreReader Rating: (1 Vote)66%
Based on the homonymous manga by Kyoko Okazaki, that won a number of awards in Japan, Helter Skelter was one of the most successful films of 2012, grossing Us$24,231,554 and netting the 26th position at the Japanese box office.
Lilico is the top Japanese female idol: Stunning to perfection, kind, funny and generally, socially unblemished, she is a woman every teenage girl wants to be like and every man wants to conquer. Underneath that flawless facade though, a plethora of secrets and discrepancies is lurking.
Lilico is actually an insecure, shallow, malicious and overall sad individual that permanently obeys the commands of her corrupt and emotionless manager, Hiroko Tada and is totally depended upon her assistant, Michiko Hada. The latter actually arranges everything in her daily life,...
Based on the homonymous manga by Kyoko Okazaki, that won a number of awards in Japan, Helter Skelter was one of the most successful films of 2012, grossing Us$24,231,554 and netting the 26th position at the Japanese box office.
Lilico is the top Japanese female idol: Stunning to perfection, kind, funny and generally, socially unblemished, she is a woman every teenage girl wants to be like and every man wants to conquer. Underneath that flawless facade though, a plethora of secrets and discrepancies is lurking.
Lilico is actually an insecure, shallow, malicious and overall sad individual that permanently obeys the commands of her corrupt and emotionless manager, Hiroko Tada and is totally depended upon her assistant, Michiko Hada. The latter actually arranges everything in her daily life,...
- 10/9/2015
- by Panos Kotzathanasis
- AsianMoviePulse
The Japanese film site Cinema Today has posted a new, more succinct edit of the theatrical trailer for Bokutachi no Play Ball, a new Little League movie directed by Junichi Mimura and filmed largely on location in Williamsport, Pennsylvania, home of the Little League World Series.
13-year-old Yuki Kohara stars as Kyuji, the son of a professional baseball player named Tsuneo (Eisaku Yoshida). Because of his father being on a Major League team, Kyuji lives in the Us and plays Little League baseball with his best friend, Randy. However, Tsuneo injures his shoulder and is demoted to the minor leagues where he’s shuffled between teams. Instead of moving around the Us, Tsuneo’s wife Kanako (Michiko Hada) decides it would be best to take Kyuji home to Japan for the time-being. Before he leaves, he makes a pact with Randy to meet up at the Little League World Series the following year.
13-year-old Yuki Kohara stars as Kyuji, the son of a professional baseball player named Tsuneo (Eisaku Yoshida). Because of his father being on a Major League team, Kyuji lives in the Us and plays Little League baseball with his best friend, Randy. However, Tsuneo injures his shoulder and is demoted to the minor leagues where he’s shuffled between teams. Instead of moving around the Us, Tsuneo’s wife Kanako (Michiko Hada) decides it would be best to take Kyuji home to Japan for the time-being. Before he leaves, he makes a pact with Randy to meet up at the Little League World Series the following year.
- 4/17/2010
- Nippon Cinema
Film review: 'Flowers of Shanghai'
Based on an 1894 novel by Hai Shang Hua, "Flowers of Shanghai" is set in the plush, insular world of Shanghai brothels, where characters smoke prodigious amounts of opium and gather more for companionship and gossip than sex. Directed in his usual elegant style (which for Western audiences can be distancing), Taiwan filmmaker Hou Hsiao Hsien's beautiful production is visually poetic but the multiple storylines are not always easily digested. Interest for most non-Asian viewers is minimal.
A main competition entry, "Flowers" is headed toward more international festival exposure, but probably sans awards from Cannes. Chances of a U.S. release are almost nil, although aficionados of quality Asian cinema will get an opportunity to catch up with it through speciality video distribution.
Opening with an amazing nearly 10-minute shot, "Flowers" is an ensemble piece that more-or-less centers on handsome, moody Cantonese civil servant Wang (Tony Leung) and the two "flower girls" he is involved with. In their gaslit world of hookahs and gorgeous finery, the mistresses of "enclaves" entertain their wealthy visitors, with a sensitive soul like Wang searching for a love and possibly a wife in an intricate, time-is-not-important style of courtship.
At the outset, Wang is the subject of gossip for both his intefse relationship with Crimsof (Michiko Hada) and his recent dalliance with her rival Jasmin. While Crimson loses face, there is also the prospect that Wang will remove all his support and she will be vulnerable to creditors. She contends he is her only client and poignantly tells him that she was born with a body, but everything else she owns came from his patrofage.
In parallel plotlines: a regular's young nephew (Samon Chang) is introduced to recent brothel recruit Jade (Fang Hsuan) and they hit it off, with nearly tragic results; Wang's part-time emplgyee (Luo Tsai-erh) tries to help Pearl (Carina), who is the real daughter of the "auntie" who she works for, and resolve disputes between Jade and another new girl; and Emerald (Michele Monique Reis) in another enclave seeks to buy out her contract, stringing along her most ardeft admirer (Jack Kao).
The performers are uniformly attractive and believable. The costumes and decor are flawless. And the music is seductive.
A main competition entry, "Flowers" is headed toward more international festival exposure, but probably sans awards from Cannes. Chances of a U.S. release are almost nil, although aficionados of quality Asian cinema will get an opportunity to catch up with it through speciality video distribution.
Opening with an amazing nearly 10-minute shot, "Flowers" is an ensemble piece that more-or-less centers on handsome, moody Cantonese civil servant Wang (Tony Leung) and the two "flower girls" he is involved with. In their gaslit world of hookahs and gorgeous finery, the mistresses of "enclaves" entertain their wealthy visitors, with a sensitive soul like Wang searching for a love and possibly a wife in an intricate, time-is-not-important style of courtship.
At the outset, Wang is the subject of gossip for both his intefse relationship with Crimsof (Michiko Hada) and his recent dalliance with her rival Jasmin. While Crimson loses face, there is also the prospect that Wang will remove all his support and she will be vulnerable to creditors. She contends he is her only client and poignantly tells him that she was born with a body, but everything else she owns came from his patrofage.
In parallel plotlines: a regular's young nephew (Samon Chang) is introduced to recent brothel recruit Jade (Fang Hsuan) and they hit it off, with nearly tragic results; Wang's part-time emplgyee (Luo Tsai-erh) tries to help Pearl (Carina), who is the real daughter of the "auntie" who she works for, and resolve disputes between Jade and another new girl; and Emerald (Michele Monique Reis) in another enclave seeks to buy out her contract, stringing along her most ardeft admirer (Jack Kao).
The performers are uniformly attractive and believable. The costumes and decor are flawless. And the music is seductive.
- 5/21/1998
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
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