Review by brogmiller

Despite poor health Kenji Mizoguchi mangaged to make about eighty films over a thirty-four year period. Thanks to International Film Festivals it was the works of his final decade that brought him deserved recognition in the West.

This is the first of his two colour films made the year before his death and perhaps because of its lack of natural background and its formalised setting, it has been unjustly overlooked.

It could hardly be said to be teeming with life but captures brilliantly the enclosed and stifling nature of the eighth century Chinese court with its rules, rituals and the rigid protocol that would ultimately lead to the sacrifice of its title character. As a child Mizoguchi had witnessed his sister being sold as a Geisha and it is hardly surprising that the social condition of women was to become his overriding theme.

The attention to detail here is stunning thanks to exquisite art design by Hiroshi Mizatini and costumes by Tsugio Togo whilst cinematographer Kohei Sugiyama shoots in glorious Daiecolor. Not for nothing has Mizoguchi been described as having 'the eye of a painter and the soul of a poet'.

The superlative cast is headed by a sensitive Masayuki Mori as Emperor Xuan, a bravura So Yamamura as Anshan and of course the magical Machiko Kyo as the ill-fated Princess Kwei Fei.

Coincidentally this film was released the same year as Max Ophuls' 'Lola Montes', his only film in colour, and his last. Lola of course flees the country so as to spare Ludwig's monarchy. Film historian David Thomson has observed that both films depict 'the impossible balance between authority and despair, beauty and prison.'