Rating: 
Summary: So bad...it's good!
Review: 'Pavilion of Women' is an unintentionally hilarious film. The movie is set in China, all the dialogue is in English - stilted English at that (including Willem Dafoe's as a matter of fact) - though it is meant to be in Chinese. The characters are incredibly broadly drawn - husband's a sex-addicted lying cheat, wife's a saint, son's a rebel, etc. Watching this film, we turned to each halfway through and wondered "Why haven't we turned this off yet?" The answer: the movie was so bad that watching it had become fun - just *how bad* could it get? Well, when the son and his girlfriend come over the hill wearing their new Communist attire...Aahhh! We knew the filmmakers had attained camp nirvana. You can't invent a moment that goofy. Simply wonderfully bad moviemaking! Excellent!!
Rating:
Summary: So bad...it's good!
Review: 'Pavilion of Women' is an unintentionally hilarious film. The movie is set in China, all the dialogue is in English - stilted English at that (including Willem Dafoe's as a matter of fact) - though it is meant to be in Chinese. The characters are incredibly broadly drawn - husband's a sex-addicted lying cheat, wife's a saint, son's a rebel, etc. Watching this film, we turned to each halfway through and wondered "Why haven't we turned this off yet?" The answer: the movie was so bad that watching it had become fun - just *how bad* could it get? Well, when the son and his girlfriend come over the hill wearing their new Communist attire...Aahhh! We knew the filmmakers had attained camp nirvana. You can't invent a moment that goofy. Simply wonderfully bad moviemaking! Excellent!!
Rating: 
Summary: A Powerful love story
Review: A sweeping love story set against the Chinese war with Japan. Great acting and cinematograpy.
Rating: 
Summary: Chinese and Western cultures collide in '30s romance
Review: Anyone who liked Zhang Yimou's "Raise The Red Lantern" is a prospect for "Pavilion Of Women". Whereas "Raise The Red Lantern" explores merely Chinese taboos about marriage and concubinage, "Pavilion Of Women" centres on a romance between leading characters in whom both Chinese and Western mores collide. This is a cross-cultural romantic story adapted from a book by the prolific American writer on China, Pearl S. Buck, set in the late 1930s. It is a cross-cultural challenge to the audience, as much as to its characters. Many Chinese would say that its romantic plot was unthinkable or impossible in the 1930s--which is, of course, part of the point of the story. Western fans of Pearl S. Buck might be irritated by deviation from her book. However, this film has first class cross-cultural direction and acting, and was beautifully photographed on location in elegant settings of old Suzhou. It is a fine example of what the Chinese film industry can achieve in co-production. The DVD has high quality picture and audio, but could be improved with special features such as biographical and production notes.
Rating:
Summary: Chinese and Western cultures collide in '30s romance
Review: Anyone who liked Zhang Yimou's "Raise The Red Lantern" is a prospect for "Pavilion Of Women". Whereas "Raise The Red Lantern" explores merely Chinese taboos about marriage and concubinage, "Pavilion Of Women" centres on a romance between leading characters in whom both Chinese and Western mores collide. This is a cross-cultural romantic story adapted from a book by the prolific American writer on China, Pearl S. Buck, set in the late 1930s. It is a cross-cultural challenge to the audience, as much as to its characters. Many Chinese would say that its romantic plot was unthinkable or impossible in the 1930s--which is, of course, part of the point of the story. Western fans of Pearl S. Buck might be irritated by deviation from her book. However, this film has first class cross-cultural direction and acting, and was beautifully photographed on location in elegant settings of old Suzhou. It is a fine example of what the Chinese film industry can achieve in co-production. The DVD has high quality picture and audio, but could be improved with special features such as biographical and production notes.
Rating:
Summary: Chinese and Western cultures collide in '30s romance
Review: Anyone who liked Zhang Yimou's "Raise The Red Lantern" is a prospect for "Pavilion Of Women". Whereas "Raise The Red Lantern" explores merely Chinese taboos about marriage and concubinage, "Pavilion Of Women" centres on a romance between leading characters in whom both Chinese and Western mores collide. This is a cross-cultural romantic story adapted from a book by the prolific American writer on China, Pearl S. Buck, set in the late 1930s. It is a cross-cultural challenge to the audience, as much as to its characters. Many Chinese would say that its romantic plot was unthinkable or impossible in the 1930s--which is, of course, part of the point of the story. Western fans of Pearl S. Buck might be irritated by deviation from her book. However, this film has first class cross-cultural direction and acting, and was beautifully photographed on location in elegant settings of old Suzhou. It is a fine example of what the Chinese film industry can achieve in co-production. The DVD has high quality picture and audio, but could be improved with special features such as biographical and production notes.
Rating:
Summary: A wonderful story of love...
Review: Based on a novel of the same name by Pearl S. Buck Father Andre is a missionary in 19th century China. He is everything a missionary should be. Ms. Wu is the wife of a very wealthy man. She heads a typical, large multi-generational household with plenty of servants and maids. Her husband is usually drunk or opium when he comes home at nigh, and his treatment of her is beyond crude. Ms. Wu fetches a young girl from the country side to be a 2nd wife for her husband, so he will keep his hands and body off her.
It seems that Father Andre loves Ms. Wu, and it seems she grows to crave the attentions of Fr. Andre, the likes of which she has never experienced before. Late in the film, they go for a walk and end up making love in a touching cathartic scene.. Ms Wu, in her forties, had never been touched in a loving or caring way by a man before. A conservative may think it is bad to portray a priest this way, but in the context of the story, you want to cheer for the both of them.
Much of what is portrayed in the film is very authentic. It does a very good job in showing some of the differences between ancient China and the west.
The Missus didn't like the film that much. She says no Chinese man could possibly be as despicable as Ms. Wu's husband was depicted in the film. She excuses the husband by saying that back then in China no one knew anything about sex or love. Also, Lindy claims that in China at that time, if Fr. Andre and Ms Wu had made love together, they would have been trussed up like pigs and thrown into the river! Thanks for puncturing my fantasies...Needless to say, no of this happened in the book version.
Rating:
Summary: A wonderful story of love...
Review: Based on a novel of the same name by Pearl S. Buck Father Andre is a missionary in 19th century China. He is everything a missionary should be. Ms. Wu is the wife of a very wealthy man. She heads a typical, large multi-generational household with plenty of servants and maids. Her husband is usually drunk or opium when he comes home at nigh, and his treatment of her is beyond crude. Ms. Wu fetches a young girl from the country side to be a 2nd wife for her husband, so he will keep his hands and body off her.
It seems that Father Andre loves Ms. Wu, and it seems she grows to crave the attentions of Fr. Andre, the likes of which she has never experienced before. Late in the film, they go for a walk and end up making love in a touching cathartic scene.. Ms Wu, in her forties, had never been touched in a loving or caring way by a man before. A conservative may think it is bad to portray a priest this way, but in the context of the story, you want to cheer for the both of them.
Much of what is portrayed in the film is very authentic. It does a very good job in showing some of the differences between ancient China and the west.
The Missus didn't like the film that much. She says no Chinese man could possibly be as despicable as Ms. Wu's husband was depicted in the film. She excuses the husband by saying that back then in China no one knew anything about sex or love. Also, Lindy claims that in China at that time, if Fr. Andre and Ms Wu had made love together, they would have been trussed up like pigs and thrown into the river! Thanks for puncturing my fantasies...Needless to say, no of this happened in the book version.
Rating:
Summary: Miss Buck would be rolling in her grave (if possible) ...
Review: Do I have to give it a star? Awful, just awful. No other words could describe this terrible adaptation of the book it is named after. It is so far removed from the original that one can't help wonder what Pearl Buck would be thinking if she were alive today. The characters are the same in name, only. I don't understand why the screenplay had to deviate so greatly. Mr. Wu went from being a happily married man (who, by the way, did not want a concubine to begin with) to an opium depraved sex-aholic bent on receiving as much oral sex as possible by whatever means possible. Why was there a need to color this man with such depravity? The beauty of the book lies in the richness of the allegories that Pearl Buck so intricately wove into the story. Mrs. Wu's love for Father Andre was the love of his spirit and being. It was who the man was and not what he was physically made of. Father Andre was Christ-like in his devotion to his calling in China. There was never any hint of a sexual attraction to Mrs. Wu. The recent adaptation of "Mansfield Park" came to mind when I watched this movie. Another disastrous attempt to adapt a classic and beloved book to today's morally vacant mind-set. After watching both of these movies I felt violated and betrayed. Shame. Shame.
Rating: 
Summary: A period picture that looks like it was made in the fifties
Review: Don't buy this because you like Willem Dafoe, or because you loved Crouching Tiger. I couldn't believe how blatantly they exploited Dafoe's famous scene from Platoon, or how cartoon-exaggerated the characters were. The acting is inexcusably awful. It all sounded like a parody of a dubbed Asian film. Believe me, I've enjoyed some great Chinese movies, but this tries so hard to be Hollywood... it's 50's Hollywood, especially the music which telegraphs emotions like the pianist at a silent flick.
| 
