JU DOU Movie Review

In 1920s China, the elderly owner of a textile factory buys a young, beautiful bride for himself, though he proves to be both impotent and abusive. In despair, she takes the young man who is the factory's only employee as her lover, and together they have the son the old man could not give her. The unforeseen yet inevitably violent twists and turns that follow are more reminiscent of James M. Cain than of any other Chinese films of its day, and this fact—together with Ju Dou's steamy sex scenes—did not go unnoticed by government censors. Banned domestically but widely seen internationally, it became the breakthrough film for the great Chinese director Zhang Yimou, whose previous and equally extraordinary Red Sorghum had not been seen very widely in America (primarily at film festivals) Ju Dou was another matter, and after its successful New York Film Festival showings, it went on to play at art houses in every major American city, ultimately receiving (over Chinese authorities' objections) an Oscar nomination as Best Foreign Language Film of 1989. This was the second of the six remarkable films that Zhang would make with actress Gong Li; their partnership—both personally and professionally—was dissolved after the 1995 Shanghai Triad. (If you're looking at it on video, try to see Ju Dou—which features exceptional color cinematography—on a carefully adjusted, high-resolution TV, ideally on laserdisc or DVD.)

NEXT STOP … Red Sorghum, Raise the Red Lantern, The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946)

1990 (PG-13) 98m/C CH Gong Li, Li Bao-Tian, Li Wei, Zhang Yi, Zheng Jian; D: Zhang Yimou; W: Liu Heng; C: Gu Changwei, Yang Lun; M: Xia Ru-jin, Jiping Zhao. Nominations: Academy Awards '90: Best Foreign-Language Film. VHS, LV ART, BTV