Raise the Red Lantern and SHang Hai Triad

Last night I watched Raise the Red Lantern directed by Yimou Zhang and was based on the novel written by Su Tong. I feel like this movie slightly reminds me of the modern polygamist HBO series Big Love. However it takes place in China during the early 1920's. This story is about a young 19 year old women named Songlian, who recently lost her father. She immediately chose the life of being a fourth wife, or concubine to a man they refer to as Master. When she arrives at the house she is quickly shown to her living quarters and introduced to the wives by the housekeeper. It took some time for Songlian to get acquainted to her new life style. It is filled with deceit from the other wives in order to gain the masters attention. Every evening the women would come out to a common area where it would be announced who the master was going to sleep with that night. The housekeeper would go out by the women and have a Red Lantern placed next to the women and her servant with the one he choose. After that, Red Lanterns would be lit inside and outside of that wife's living quarters. The women of the night also had certain perks if you would call it that, they would have their feet massaged and were able to choose the meal for the next morning.  Songlian wanted this kind of treatment all the time so in order to do so she claimed to be pregnant.  She eventually was caught lying by her servant, who told the second wife about blood she found on Songlians pants. The second wife had a doctor called which led to the truth. Her Red Lanterns were covered up by black shades, that had years of dust collected on them seeming as they weren't used for centuries. She went from favorite to least.   Songlian was so livid with her maid that she ransacked her room and burned old red laterns the maid had collected in her room.  Because the Red Lanterns were strictly for the wives, Songlian made a fool of the maid by taking the lanterns, throwing them out side in a courtyard and burned them.  The first wife told the maid that she had to kneel before the fire and until she apologized to the fourth wife she could not get up, she spent all night in the snow and cold and did not apologize to her, leading to her death.  So distraught over the turn of events, on Songlian's birthday, the day she found out her maid died, she got drunk, revealing secrets of the third wife of an affair she was having with the Doctor to the second wife. This out burst of drunken secret telling resulted in the killing of the third wife because it was custom to kill an adulter of their marriage.  After all of the pain, brought on by herself, the last scene of the movie shows a fifth wife entering into the picture, asking who the women was wandering back and fourth. The last scene is shown of her stir crazy and out of her mind. 

Concubines  were apart of ancient chinese that no longer exist. In the Chinese emperors Qing dynasty they kept about 20,000 concubines. Who were actually only able to be guarded by castrated men so the only way they would get pregnant would be by the emperor. The reason for so many was to ensure an heir to the emperor and also to endulge in the promiscuity. By 1971, Hong Kong abolished concubines.   Today they have a "modern day concubine" which is called a  Er Nai, which is a second wife. Women see this as a career or a lifestyle because they are made to look good. Most of them are in it for the money, they are showered with the apartment, the gifts, and spending money, when in turn they will sleep with there "husband" and go on business trips with him to make him look good. The modern concubine is usually younger and pretty then then first wife. 

I personally feel like the life style of the concubine is highly degrading, and it seems like they are glorified prostitutes.  However people have different customs and I understand that my way of life and upbringing are not comparable. 

Shang Hai Triad

The story begins with a young boy Shui Sheng Tang arrives in town from a village and waits for his uncle to pick him up.  When His uncle finally gets him, he quickly is exposed to a murder and the new lifestyle he will be sunjected too. He is given a job by his Uncle to become a servant for a Singer who is also the boss who is a gangsters, Mistress.  Jinbao the singer, is introduced as a  very heartless and cold  person.  Being the bosses Mistress she is in a seat of power which allows her to be as she is.

After a murder ordered by the boss, the gangsters, jinbao and servant tang are taken to a secluded island for protection.  This is where the viewer sees a different side of Jinbao. After being on the island for awhile she loosens up and takes interest in the her servant Tang. She went from not treating him great to actually conversing with him as a big sister would.

 

One day Tang is going to the bathroom in the field and hears two gentlemen talking about killing  the boss and Jinbao. He immediately goes to tell them. The boss then finds these men and kills them, also killing Jinbao because she was having an affair with the man who plotted to kill the boss.  He thought Jin Bao was apart of the conspiracy.  

Tang tried to save JInbao but failed. The closing scene was of him hanging upside down tied to a ship. High end lifestyle and how they treated there people. The story was also about loyalty and friend ship. Even though Jinbao treated him wrongly at first, she eventually grew to like him and treated him as family. I was upset that in the end she was killed because I feel that she was just beginning to learn how to treat others and actually cared about what others were feeling. I was hoping that there was goin to be a happy ending but of course there wasn’t. I really did not Expect them to Kill her.

This movie was nominated for a Golden globe for best foreign film and for best cinematography in the Oscars