"Shanghai Triad" A Film Review by Linda Lopez McAlister on "The Women's Show" WMNF-FM 88.5, Tampa, FL January 27, 1996 It's always a disappointment to see a film you don't much care for, but even more so when it's by filmmakers whose past work you have consistently liked a lot. It was due to my admiration of such films as "Ju Dou," "Raise the Red Lantern," "The Story of Qui Ju," and "To Live" that I decided to go to the Tampa Theater (it was great to be back in that wonderful, magical place!) to see the latest effort by the team of director Zhang Yi-mou and star Gong Li. This time, however, I found myself (and the rest of the audience, too, I think) fidgeting in my chair and left with a sense of dissatisfaction at the end of the film. It's not that there's nothing to like about this film. In Zhang Yi-mou's films there is always Gong Li who is unfailingly interesting to watch and such a fine actor that you would quite literally have a hard time recognizing her in this current role of the mistress/showgirl Bijou as the same woman who played Ju Dou or the despairing youngest wife in "Raise the Red Lantern." Here she does a turn as a 1930s chanteuse who is the mistress of the richest man in Shanghai ("the Boss") because he heads the most powerful criminal gang in Shanghai. The early parts of the film are interesting to see a contemporary Chinese representation of a 1930s Chinese emulation of 1930's Western nightclub entertainers. What emerges is a kind of slicker version (because of the color and fancy use of lighting and filters) of a scene right out of a Marlene Dietrich film complete with showgirls in tuxes and shots of chorus line dancing legs a la the Rockettes. That later portions of the film reminded me more of Antonioni's "Red Desert" or something, where, exiled to a desolate location the boredom of the leading character is expressed by boring the audience. Actually Bijou is not the leading character in this film. For it is about a fourteen year old boy from the country brought to Shanghai by an uncle in the employ of "the Boss" to work as a servant to Bijou. The entire film is shot from his point of view, quite literally in many instances with lots of the camera angles from his point of view. The kid is totally clueless when he arrives and not terribly adept at learning what he needs to know to do his job. When rival gangs attack the Boss's house and kill several of his men, including the uncle, the Boss, Bijou, the boy and several body guards take refuge on a nearly deserted island, occupied only by a young widow and her young daughter. We learn some things about Bijou during this interlude on the island, most importantly that she was herself once a country girl like the child on the island whom she wants to adopt. One of the most depressing aspects of the narrative of this very depressing story is that we're left with the impression that Bijou's fate will be reproduced in a few years by the little girl and the boy will probably live his life just as his uncle did. Like all of Zhang Yi-mou's films this one is visually gorgeous. He and his cinematographers and art directors compose feasts for the eye, whether they consist of the architectural elements of the buildings they choose to use for their locations, or in the loving way that they capture the swaying of the tall marsh grasses in the afternoon sunlight. It's truly beautiful to look at. But by their absence you realize once again that most feature films have a narrative structure that creates dramatic tension and resolves to closure. These elements are muted in this film, which is what makes it seem so unsatisfying. Some feminist film theorists might applaud this getting away from established narrative structures, but something has to take their place and in "Shanghai Triad" nothing much seems to do so. For the WMNF Women's Show this is Linda Lopez McAlister on Women and Film. Copyright 1996 by Linda Lopez McAlister. All rights reserved. Please do not repost, reprint, or reproduce this review without permission of the author. Thank you.