Die Prinzessin Yang

PRINCESS YANG KWI FEI is an early collaboration betwene Japan's Daiei studio and Hong Kong's Shaw Brothers, and it's very much a sumptuous-looking historical drama. I'm not sure if it's based on a true story but it certainly feels like it is. The story is about an ageing Chinese emperor and a family who gradually insinuate themselves into his court, causing a popular revolt as a result. The film looks Chinese but feels Japanese with a mainly Japanese cast and the usual quietly mannered performances you tend to find in Japanese cinema. It's not the most engrossing out there, but a good example of this genre.

The Empress is dead, and Chinese Emperor Masayuki Mori mourns endlessly. Scullery maid Machiko Kyô is chosen by her relatives and trained to please the Emperor, but it is her frankness as much as her beauty which pleases him. When she is made his consort, however, her relatives call in favors for wealth and position, until the populace demand their deaths, and hers.

It's another of Kenji Mizoguchi's beautifully made and exquisite dramas, full of long, slow moving shots, and actors who move silently, but movingly. Mizoguchi had started as a performer of women's roles. When he began to direct in the early 1920s, he directed these pictures, because, as he later said, "When I was working for Nikkatsu, the company already had Murata Minoru making films featuring heroes, so for balance they made me do films featuring heroines. Also, I am very quarrelsome and so when I work there is always the possibility of a fight, but I can't very well slug an actress." He was another of those tough, artistic directors who feigned a low-brow attitude, like John Ford.

I thought there was much that was ambiguous about Miss Kyô's character here. Is she being honest, or frank? Are her actions in returning to her humble origins honest, or a miscalculated power play? Is my uncertainty because I am a cynical westerner, not the intended audience, or because that is how Mizoguchi intended me to think?

Regardless of how I react to the story raised to the level of fantastic legend of this movie, it certainly is a beautiful thing to look at. For the moment, that's enough.

Princess Yang Kwei Fei is an absolutely wonderfully and touching movie, which features Mizoguchi's astoundingly beautifully storytelling and direction. The Cinderella style story of a peasant step sister who is suddenly made the bride of the emporer and their ultimate love is totally spellbinding. This is not a film to watch lightly, it requires concentration and appreciation of the beauty of the film. If you've never seen anything by Mizoguchi watch Ugetsu as well. It's beautiful and only 90 minutes long for those who can't take subtitles (losers). 10 out of 10.

Like with 'Zangiku monogatari', Mizoguchi has made a very beautiful film. The long tracking shots, deep focus editing, and vibrant colors are gorgeous. Yet the story in 'Yang Kwei fei", just like in Mizo's 'Zangiku monogatari' and 'The Crucified Lovers', is very typical and unexceptional. Be prepared to see ideal archetypes of perfectly virtous self-sacrificing women, stupid greedy and cruel men, and did I mention?...the cruelties of feudalism. I think such a simple story set during feudalism is a weakness in this film. It leaves a viewer commonly thinking: feudalism sucks (boy that's new), it's good it's over,...what's next? This is a perfectly valid critique. Mizoguchi's vastly better films are his realistic masterworks from 1036: 'Osaka Elegy' and 'Sisters of the Gion', as well as his late more retrained masterpieces 'Ugetsu', 'Sansho Dayu', and 'Life of Oharu'.

Sometimes its a good idea not to read up on a movie before watching it, it can set up an expectation (or lack of it) that interferes with viewing pleasure. In the newly released Masters of Cinema version the critic Tony Raines is highly dismissive in the introduction - calling it dramatically inert and making a few rather pompous and pedantic points about the translation. Donald Richie in his 'Hundred Years of Japanese Film' is similarly dismissive. It is certainly not Mizoguchi's best, it lacks the flair of Ugetsu and the character development of his more contemporary dramas, but I think this movie is far better than the dismissive comments suggest. Maybe its just that Japanese cinema of the period is so fabulously rich that even very good movies can be discounted.

The story is taken from an ancient Chinese legend - of the beautiful concubine of a great emperor, sacrificed for the sins of her family. No doubt the Chinese setting looks rather ludicrous to Chinese viewers (it was originally a co-production with HK based company, but they seem to have had no artistic input), but thats hardly new - even Crouching Dragon, Hidden Tiger was hated by most mandarin speakers I know. And its probably no worse that the Last Samurai or Memoirs of a Geisha appears to the Japanese.

It was Mizuguchi's first colour film - while some commentators have praised the beauty of the camera-work, I must admit I was left a big cold by it - not a patch on (for example) Ozu's first colour experiments. It may be that the blame is the digital colour transfer or just my poor quality screen, but I think its more than that - I get the strong impression the movie was shot on a very tight budget - some of the sets look very fake compared to most Mizoguchi' films I've seen. I don't think the film makers were totally aware of how colour can show up fakery in a way they could get away with using black and white. In fact, the whole movie has a slightly throw away feel, as if Mizoguchi didn't fully have his heart in it. There are lots of opportunities for the sort of big sweeping scene he specialised in, but which aren't taken up here - I would guess that he simply didn't have the time and budget for it.

But I don't mean to criticise this too much - while the script is occasionally clunky, it is usually very moving and beautifully acted. The characters are vivid and while its a little bit much to believe that a great Emperor could be quite such a sappy soul, Mori and Kyo do a reasonable job in making their characters believable - or as believable as possible when translating such an ancient story. Kyo as always is wonderfully watchable. Mori is slightly less successful - he doesn't quite show the steel that much have existed under the cultured exterior of a man who ran an empire.

So while this film is certainly not a masterpiece by Mizoguchi, or one of the best movies of the period, its certainly superior to most contemporary costume dramas and well worth having to while away a rainy Sunday afternoon.