Memoirs of a Geisha
A film by Rob Marshall
(Sony Pictures)
Memoirs of a Geisha is a breathtakingly gorgeous film. Pulling out all the stops in the production values book, director Rob Marshall and cinematographer Dion Beebe have crafted a shimmering, dreamlike adaptation of Arthur Golden's bestselling novel which rivals - no, surpasses - their previous collaboration, 2002's Chicago, for sheer sumptuous visuals. A more perfect frame for a story about geisha - those strange, semi-historical curiousities, whose mix of otherwordly surface beauty and refined, sensual mystery would make them seem unreal even if they were still prevalent - is virtually unimaginable. Throw in more than a few well-placed references to Asia's contemporary masters of cinema aesthetic, Wong Kar Wai and Zhang Yimou, and already here is a movie worth seeing for imagery alone.
Yet there's more to Memoirs of a Geisha than literally meets the eye. Namely, beneath the white grease paint and the priceless silk kimono, there is the beating red heart of a rough-and-tumble, old-fashioned sports movie; complete with a scrappy underdog, a spiteful reigning champion, a high-stakes competition, and even a training montage which could have been yanked directly out of some great lost crossdressing Japanese sequel to Rocky. This dynamic - a kinetic soul all dressed up in purely aesthetic trappings - is at once Memoirs' greatest asset and its greatest flaw. On the one hand, it leaves screenwriter Robin Swicord (Little Women) free to delve into the frustrations, longings and petty rivalries of these "living pieces of art," while Marshall and Beebe do what they do best: serve up moment after moment of ornate spectacle. But at the same time, we all know that no sports movie is complete without a happy ending...and a happy ending is the one thing this geisha's memoir simply should not have.
Here, after all, is a main character (Chiyo, played by 12-year-old Suzuka Ohgo) who at an early age is sold by her poor family to a geisha house in Kyoto's pleasure district, Gion. Already, her destiny is laid out for her: she will either train to enter the geisha's glamorous but restrictive world, or she will fail and become a fallen woman. In either case, she is doomed to an existence without all those needs - freedom, autonomy, love - which to a 21st-century audience seem basic, to be taken for granted. But in pre-war Japan, there really were few options for women outside of marriage and prostitution - with the geisha's courtesan life neatly occupying the gray area in-between. So it goes without saying that Memoirs of a Geisha should be a sad movie; and frankly, until the very last sequence, it is. But what we are left with, instead, is an abrupt and completely improbable scene in which Chiyo - now going by the "stage name" of Sayuri and played by House of Flying Daggers' Zhang Ziyi - is granted almost everything she's been longing for since childhood. Sure, it's heartwarming, and the fault lies with Golden's source material more so than with the film itself. But it just doesn't ring true, and what's more, the sudden ignorance of historical context smacks of an opportunity missed. In a film with otherwise few faults, then, Memoirs' ending is a glaring one indeed.
There's still a lot in Memoirs of a Geisha to like, however, and probably a lot more than its more self-conscious critics would allow. Yes, this is a film about Japan, written and directed by Americans and starring three Chinese actresses; and while the controversy is more about nationalism than artistic integrity, its underlying cultural conflict of interests is an undeniable obstacle for Marshall, et. al. But he and Swicord navigate these difficult waters with ease, neatly sidestepping the usual Hollywood pitfall of selling Asia as exotica by creating an unabashedly dreamlike, impressionistic Asia of their own design; half studio set and half realm of the senses, as unreal and exotic as the "Chicago" of Marshall's last picture. In this world, it really doesn't matter that our "Japanese" protagonists are of Chinese descent and speaking sometimes-broken English: they're not just beautiful, they are fantastic and passionate performers, a trio for whom more "correct" replacements would be almost impossible to find.
Zhang as Sayuri may not be quite as startling as she was in 2046 (her real breakout role), but she handles her character's surface decorum with just the right amount of attention to the longing which bubbles underneath. Michelle Yeoh (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) plays the elder stateswoman - both her character, Sayuri's mentor Mameha, and the actress herself - with effortless charm, a pillar of understatement. And Gong Li, as always, steals scenes like they were meant for her in the first place: her bitterly jealous rival geisha, Hatsumomo, could be high-camp dragon lady pantomime if the master actress didn't anchor her performance with real pathos and emotion, making her not only the most fun character in Memoirs of a Geisha, but arguably the most sympathetic as well. Also a pleasure to watch was the young Suzuka: not only does she look startlingly like a 12-year-old Zhang Ziyi, her performance is easily the best by a child actor in recent memory. In the end, it doesn't matter that these actresses are not speaking Japanese; their performances are so priceless one hardly even notices the words, only their meanings.
Memoirs of a Geisha is not perfect: there is the Hollywood ending, as well as a few unintentionally hilarious stabs at "Asian" metaphor by Golden/Swicord (seriously, "eels" and "caves")? But for its stunning visuals and its equally stunning performances, it is absolutely worth seeing. And if this is a sign of the inevitable Hollywood visions of Asia to come, then count me in: they may not be there quite yet, but they've never come closer to getting it right.
Official Site
IMDb Listing
See Also: Memoirs of a Geisha's secret inspiration
(Sony Pictures)
Memoirs of a Geisha is a breathtakingly gorgeous film. Pulling out all the stops in the production values book, director Rob Marshall and cinematographer Dion Beebe have crafted a shimmering, dreamlike adaptation of Arthur Golden's bestselling novel which rivals - no, surpasses - their previous collaboration, 2002's Chicago, for sheer sumptuous visuals. A more perfect frame for a story about geisha - those strange, semi-historical curiousities, whose mix of otherwordly surface beauty and refined, sensual mystery would make them seem unreal even if they were still prevalent - is virtually unimaginable. Throw in more than a few well-placed references to Asia's contemporary masters of cinema aesthetic, Wong Kar Wai and Zhang Yimou, and already here is a movie worth seeing for imagery alone.Yet there's more to Memoirs of a Geisha than literally meets the eye. Namely, beneath the white grease paint and the priceless silk kimono, there is the beating red heart of a rough-and-tumble, old-fashioned sports movie; complete with a scrappy underdog, a spiteful reigning champion, a high-stakes competition, and even a training montage which could have been yanked directly out of some great lost crossdressing Japanese sequel to Rocky. This dynamic - a kinetic soul all dressed up in purely aesthetic trappings - is at once Memoirs' greatest asset and its greatest flaw. On the one hand, it leaves screenwriter Robin Swicord (Little Women) free to delve into the frustrations, longings and petty rivalries of these "living pieces of art," while Marshall and Beebe do what they do best: serve up moment after moment of ornate spectacle. But at the same time, we all know that no sports movie is complete without a happy ending...and a happy ending is the one thing this geisha's memoir simply should not have.
Here, after all, is a main character (Chiyo, played by 12-year-old Suzuka Ohgo) who at an early age is sold by her poor family to a geisha house in Kyoto's pleasure district, Gion. Already, her destiny is laid out for her: she will either train to enter the geisha's glamorous but restrictive world, or she will fail and become a fallen woman. In either case, she is doomed to an existence without all those needs - freedom, autonomy, love - which to a 21st-century audience seem basic, to be taken for granted. But in pre-war Japan, there really were few options for women outside of marriage and prostitution - with the geisha's courtesan life neatly occupying the gray area in-between. So it goes without saying that Memoirs of a Geisha should be a sad movie; and frankly, until the very last sequence, it is. But what we are left with, instead, is an abrupt and completely improbable scene in which Chiyo - now going by the "stage name" of Sayuri and played by House of Flying Daggers' Zhang Ziyi - is granted almost everything she's been longing for since childhood. Sure, it's heartwarming, and the fault lies with Golden's source material more so than with the film itself. But it just doesn't ring true, and what's more, the sudden ignorance of historical context smacks of an opportunity missed. In a film with otherwise few faults, then, Memoirs' ending is a glaring one indeed.
There's still a lot in Memoirs of a Geisha to like, however, and probably a lot more than its more self-conscious critics would allow. Yes, this is a film about Japan, written and directed by Americans and starring three Chinese actresses; and while the controversy is more about nationalism than artistic integrity, its underlying cultural conflict of interests is an undeniable obstacle for Marshall, et. al. But he and Swicord navigate these difficult waters with ease, neatly sidestepping the usual Hollywood pitfall of selling Asia as exotica by creating an unabashedly dreamlike, impressionistic Asia of their own design; half studio set and half realm of the senses, as unreal and exotic as the "Chicago" of Marshall's last picture. In this world, it really doesn't matter that our "Japanese" protagonists are of Chinese descent and speaking sometimes-broken English: they're not just beautiful, they are fantastic and passionate performers, a trio for whom more "correct" replacements would be almost impossible to find.
Zhang as Sayuri may not be quite as startling as she was in 2046 (her real breakout role), but she handles her character's surface decorum with just the right amount of attention to the longing which bubbles underneath. Michelle Yeoh (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon) plays the elder stateswoman - both her character, Sayuri's mentor Mameha, and the actress herself - with effortless charm, a pillar of understatement. And Gong Li, as always, steals scenes like they were meant for her in the first place: her bitterly jealous rival geisha, Hatsumomo, could be high-camp dragon lady pantomime if the master actress didn't anchor her performance with real pathos and emotion, making her not only the most fun character in Memoirs of a Geisha, but arguably the most sympathetic as well. Also a pleasure to watch was the young Suzuka: not only does she look startlingly like a 12-year-old Zhang Ziyi, her performance is easily the best by a child actor in recent memory. In the end, it doesn't matter that these actresses are not speaking Japanese; their performances are so priceless one hardly even notices the words, only their meanings.
Memoirs of a Geisha is not perfect: there is the Hollywood ending, as well as a few unintentionally hilarious stabs at "Asian" metaphor by Golden/Swicord (seriously, "eels" and "caves")? But for its stunning visuals and its equally stunning performances, it is absolutely worth seeing. And if this is a sign of the inevitable Hollywood visions of Asia to come, then count me in: they may not be there quite yet, but they've never come closer to getting it right.
Official Site
IMDb Listing
See Also: Memoirs of a Geisha's secret inspiration
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