March 20, 1992
Review/Film; Dissension in the Ranks of a Household’s 4 Wives
By Janet Maslin, New York Times
Songlian (Gong Li), the college-educated beauty who arrives at a feudal manor house at the outset of
Zhang Yimou’s “Raise the Red Lantern,” insists on carrying her own suitcase, which is virtually the
last act of independence she will be permitted during the course of the story. Forced by her stepmother
into what is essentially the life of a concubine, Songlian has agreed to become the fourth wife of a
feudal patriarch, a man so regal that each of his wives presides over her own separate home.Read More »