Memoirs of a Geisha - PG-13
Common Sense Note
Parents need to know that while this film is beautiful, it's slow-moving and occasionally scary, not designed for young children. The film includes some images of streets under siege (China and Japan are at war), as well as tensions inside the geisha house (one character sets fire to the house, leading to some frightening images). The film begins with the traumatic scene of a young girl sold to a geisha house by her poor parents, and shows her upset when she's forcibly separated from her sister, who works at another house.
Families can discuss the film's portrayal of geisha life: it is mysterious but also difficult. How does the film both "westernize" its characters and "exoticize" them, so they are both conventionally sympathetic and stereotypically "inscrutable"? How is Sayuri's love for the Chairman a function of romantic conventions more than a substantive relationship between the two characters? How is the idea of the geisha associated with "submissive" and servile women?
Common Sense Review
Reviewed By: Cynthia Fuchs
MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA is not so intriguing as it promises. "A story like mine should never be told," says the geisha Sayuri (played as an adult by Ziyi Zhang) at film's start. "For my world is as forbidden as it is fragile. Without its mysteries, it cannot survive." Unfortunately, this film leaves little to the imagination, insisting that you appreciate these "mysteries" with a series of heavyhanded set pieces.
Based on Arthur Golden's novel (renowned for its twisty, "literary" structure, whereby a male reader/writer purports to translate the geisha's story), the film is disappointingly straightforward. Directed by the dramatically unsubtle Rob Marshall, who brought Chicago pounding into theaters three years ago, the film is a series of set pieces, gorgeous certainly, but also predictable and unwieldy. This despite and because of the presence of the glorious women actors at its center, including Zhang as the youngest geisha, Michelle Yeoh as her mentor Mameha, and wondrous Gong Li as her rival Hatsumomo. The women are stunning (and some questions have been raised as to the casting of Chinese superstars as Japanese characters).
Sayuri is sold by her poor family to a geisha house, or okiya, when she's just nine (and played by Suzuka Ohgo); her blue eyes make her look "special" and Hatsumomo is immediately jealous, threatening the child. The film westerneizes Sayuri, in part by having her yearn endlessly for the wealthy Chairman (Ken Watanabe), whom she meets when she's nine. But it also preserves her "exotic" otherness, as if this constitutes characterization.
The geisha insist they are not prostitutes, as they do not sell sex except as illusion (the argument might be made that this is always the case). They do, however, sell their virginity, and pride themselves on being well paid for it. The fact of Sayuri's stunning blue eyes only underlines this refusal to engage with the hardships geishas endure as a matter of course. She is "special," she is treasured, she is property.
Sayuri's displays of artifice are lovely and a little daunting. They are also rather grimly exalted by the camera -- Memoirs never questions the overdetermination of beauty. Images of this lifelong process of objectification are framed by others that approximate "history," including the Sino-Japanese war (while omitting overt references to the Japanese occupation of China), which leaves the okiya, among other places, devastated, and Sayuri laboring in a field. She does find her way back into geisha-ness, which the film treats as a kind of triumph. The fantasy remains the most precious object, whether embodied by gorgeous women or imagined by them. So unexamined, so delicate, so mysterious: the geisha is not so much remembered here as she is conjured and undermined, repeatedly.
Families who like this movie might also like Marshall's previous movie, Chicago. Or you might want to consider thematically similar films, like the Japanese Gion bayashi (1953), the Chinese Raise the Red Lantern, which stars Gong Li as one of several competitive wives.
Rate It!
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Sexual ContentGeishas do not technically sell sex, but rather, the idea of it: their "exotic" displays are seductive; a young woman is assaulted by a wealthy man. |
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ViolenceYoung sisters are violently separated (leading to tears and loneliness); scenes of war and invasion; characters argue and fight (some slapping); a woman tries to burn down the geisha house. |
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Social BehaviorGeishas compete ruthlessly, by embarrassing rivals or ruining reputations; geishas are expected to sell their virginity. |
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Drug/Alcohol/TobaccoCharacters drink and smoke cigarettes. |
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