MemoirsOfAGeisha Tagged Articles at Cinematical

After going back and forth with the idea, the Chinese government has officially decided not to release Memoirs of a Geisha into its theaters. The film was supposed to debut on February 9th (already pushed back from January 9th), but a U.S film industry official (I wonder if they get to wear badges?) claims that the State Administration of Film, TV and Radio reversed its decision over the weekend.

Obviously fearing for his life (or job...but life sounds cooler), the supposed official spoke on condition of anonymity. Contrary to reports that a certain sex scene was exciting too many people on the country's censorship board, it seems the main reason the film was pulled is because officials were worried that the sight of Chinese actresses playing Japanese geishas would just be too damn nuts for anyone to handle. And yet, (May I suggest inserting Rob Schneider's name here) continues to show up on American screens every year with little to no backlash. Damn it, stand up for yourselves people!

For those of you looking for a juicy "Screw them Chinese!" quote, I'm sorry to say that all you will get are the following unbelievably underwhelming remarks from Sony Pictures Entertainment spokesman, Jim Kennedy: "We were pleased by their acceptance of the film in November and were disappointed by this decision." Jeez Jim, you think you can maybe say that again, only this time we want to make sure you still have a pulse?

 

 

After I returned home from seeing Memoirs of a Geisha, something made me pick Charles Frazier's 1997 novel Cold Mountain off the shelf. The book is memorable for the way it overwhelms the reader with new information through its mining of an obsolete dictionary of retired words from the Civil War era - tools that are no longer in existence, flowers that aren't common, songs that aren't sung, and so on (I'm still not sure that I know what a tompion or an offscouring is). The point of drowning the reader in detail is to put the author's credibility as a narrator beyond question, and it works. It wasn't until I saw the film version of Cold Mountain a couple of years ago that my opinion of the work was brought down a peg or two. Aside from a crackerjack performance by Nicole Kidman, the story had little to recommend it; there was no real dramatic heft or resonance. I've never picked up Arthur Golden's Memoirs, but after seeing the film I'm convinced that the book must be in the mold of Cold Mountain.

If Memoirs of a Geisha is not about the fine points of time and place in Imperial Japan, then it must be about what it's about. And what it's about-about is the pageantry and romance that awaits a woman who sells her vagina at auction. The film goes out of its way to remind us that geishas are not prostitutes, but so do the escort ads in the Manhattan yellow pages. Pay no attention. A girl who is 'selected' to become a geisha will spend the better part of her reproductive life learning how to please a man. She brings him a tablecloth if he needs a tablecloth, laughs at his jokes whether or not they are funny, makes with cheap entertainments like fan-dances on command, and is always within ear-shot to dispense fortune-cookie aphorisms that do not betray any personal thoughts or opinions or desires. She offers more or less the same kind of companionship as the talking robot from Rocky IV. At the climax of a geisha's geishahood, a bidding war between powerful men erupts, and her virginity is put on the block. If she's lucky.