"Temptress Moon" (Feng Yue, directed by Chen Kaige, 1996) is a family saga that seems to be about the destruction of the Pang clan that appear to be the richest family in Suzhou. The head of the clan in the early years of the twentieth century is an opium addict, who introduces both his son Zhengda and daughter Ruyi to it.
His son and heir apparent marries Yu Xiuyi who brings her nine-year-old brother Zhongliang along. Rather than supporting his education, his sister and her debauched husband make him their personal servant. The extent of the personal service is not entirely clear, but it would certainly count as molestation here and now. The husband has an apparent stroke rendering him unable to speak and Zhongliang runs away.
When the old master dies, his incapacitated son cannot succeed to his position, and although there is an assembled multitude of male Pangs, his daughter Ruyi (now played by Lin Gong) takes the position. (A young opium addict woman becoming head of a powerful clan does not fit with what I know of traditional Chinese society, but...). A distant cousin Pang Duanwu (Kevin Lin) is assigned to assist her.
Meanwhile, in Shanghai, Yu Zhongliang (now played by Leslie Cheung) has grown up to be a ladykiller. His job is to seduce rich, bored wives whom his confederates then blackmail. Cheung does not simulate much passion, and it is a bit difficult to credit that so many rich women would become so enamored with so cold a fish... There is one, who lives on Heavenly Lane, whom he cares about. We know this because he tells his confederates that her husband is away, not because there is any noticeable difference in how he treats her. Why she is different is opaque to me (and not just to me, but to friends who understand Mandarin).
Yu Zhongliang is assigned to go back to Suzhou and seduce Ruyi (i.e., his sister's sister-in-law, who is unmarried and seemingly immune to blackmail). Zhongliang finds returning to the scene of his childhood abuse repugnant. Ruyi falls for Zhongliang and uses the extremely loyal Duanwu to practice sex with (on). Although she is oblivious of it, it is very obvious that Duanwu is in love with her and agonized at serving her as a live dildo and as a go-between to the man she wants
Xiuyi (Zhongliang's sister) is stewing and insinuating and they finally shoot it out verbally. The plots in both Suzhou and Shanghai thicken and intermix, and the general view is that "Temptress Moon" is a tragic romance of Zhongliang and Ruyi. Things indeed do not go well for them, and Xiuyi remains unhappily stranded in limbo, but I think the film has a happy ending: a happy ending in Chinese terms because the family persists with more effective leadership, a happy ending for western audiences in that the only sympathetic character survives the murk and comes out on top.
Although requiring some suspension of disbelief (on aspects already noted), I don't think that "Temptress Moon" is as difficult to follow as critics claimed. The very beginning provides a dramatis personae and the child actors resemble those who take the same parts as young adults.
The visuals — the art direction of Huang Quiagui as well as the fluid cinematography of Christopher Doyle (who shot The Quiet American and Liberty Heights as well as Hero and In the Mood for Love) — are very impressive. Gong Li's ability to play so innocent a young girl was impressive, especially since she was three years older than when she played the jaded woman in Chen Kaige's "Farewell, My Concubine." As handsome as Leslie Cheung was, he did not seem very seductive here. I thought that Kevin Lin was more impressive as the protective, jealous "younger brother" to Ruyi. He is impassive when being beaten for not supporting those who put him in his position, anguished about Ruyi's passion for Zhongliang, and unwaveringly loyal to her (even when she is using him to sharpen her erotic skills to use on Zhongliang).
Like most of Chen's movies, "Temptress Moon" was banned in the PRC, though any political content is hard to attribute to it. My guess is that it is too focused on sex. (Though not graphic in its depiction, there is a lot of nonmarital sex going on in Zhongliang's life.) The film is set in a time of tumultuous social change (but then any point of the 20th century in China would be that!). There are hints of the emancipation of urban women, akin to American flappers, but the only one with any power is Ruyi, who knows nothing of the wider world until she visits Shanghai to be disenchanted (this is another idea of Zhongliang's boss that does not work out as he planned).
Recommended:
Yes
Suitability For Children: Not suitable for Children of any age
This motion picture epic is the latest triumph from the critically acclaimed director of Farewell My Concubine. Praised as another masterpiece, Temptr...More at Buy.com Marketplaces
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