Pólvora roja, pólvora verde

A strange love story between a rich woman and a poor man, especially for one not familiar with Chinese culture. It will give you a few laughs (a few dirty ones too), the characters will curse all throughout, but don't be distracted, it is a serious and rather depressing drama. The settings include falling apart houses and going on boats across a dirty river, and most characters' clothes look like they took them from homeless people, which all adds to the mood. Don't expect any beautiful shots like in "Hero", or any martial arts. All thought-out heroes behaved strangely and unrealistically bringing the ending to top it off and kill whatever impression of the movie I had. For instance, twenty armed men getting scared of a few kids throwing firecrackers is very unconvincing. But go ahead, if you like this sort of depressing love stories, you'll have a blast.

A brief conversation, together with an interesting inversion of traditional roles, keeps "Red Firecracker, Green Firecracker" (1994) timely. When the female Boss (who habitually wears men's clothes) speaks privately with an itinerant male artisan who is newly-arrived to her family's company town, the entire Confucian system is undermined in a single sentence. Yet, in another scene, the Boss is concerned that traditional rules be followed when paying workers – and again, that traditional punishment be meted out to a worker who caused a fire in the factory. No one questions this 30-something woman, not even male elders in their 70s. She is accepted in her role as The Boss. However, as the story continues, and the boss falls in love with the artisan, all bets are off. She changes her hair (watch out!) and dons traditional female garb. Then she announces to everyone that she is tired of being the boss, and that she wants to be a woman. What?! No one, absolutely no one, accepts her statement of wishes. So, everyone plots… Hmm. It's an interesting inversion, but perhaps one should not make too much of it.

NB. A revision of earlier (nearly incomprehensible) English subtitles has been uploaded to opensubtitles.com – not perfect, but an improvement. At a minimum, the revision is more coherent.

People may be compelled to think that just because this is a foreign film, it is a good film. This is in fact, a terrible movie, and don't be fooled by the "noble" subject matter. The love story is ridiculous and badly contrived, the acting is next to terrible, and the dramatic scenes are nothing short of raunchy. The only good thing I can say about this is that there are a few beautifully shot scenes, but there is usually something stupid happening in that scene, so you don't notice the background. I wondered to myself as I watched it how it could possibly have been successful enough to come to the United States.

I enjoyed this film as I do most foreign films. Subtitled rather than dubbed into English, the speech conveys the feelings of the characters. The era of the movie and the foreign setting and mores made me feel as if I were watching a film

made by aliens. The actions and reactions of the characters were either below my expectations of a given situation or completely over the top. Rarely did I see any character act in a manner that I expected. I find this very refreshing in a movie if a bit confusing. I liked the story and sympathized with the characters. I found the film style and quality to be good or above average. I give it a 7 out of 10.

I didn't find the other reviews helpful so thought I'd post my own.

I'd be the first one to shout "who cares if it's a foreign film, this movie sucks" but it doesn't. The characters are fascinating and the storyline is smooth and keeps you interested. It's slow in the sense that the director isn't afraid to leave in long shots, and let the plot points develop in a subtle manner. It's not slow in the sense that the longer shots are boring. This is not a case of a director falling in love with his footage and neglecting to make necessary cuts (with one exception near the end, perhaps). It's not the drama of Farewell my Concubine or Emperor and the Assassin, nor anything along the lines of Chungking Express or any kind of action fighting films. It's not a crushingly tragic film either, btw, as one might worry from the poster of the girl with the pained look. It's a simple story, and it works well.