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Memoirs of a Geisha (DVD)


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Memoirs of a Geisha (DVD)

 
Description: Genre: Drama / Theatrical Release: 2005 / Director: Rob Marshall / Actors: Ziyi Zhang, Ken Watanabe ... / DVD released ... more
Memoirs of a Geisha (DVD) ... 05 June, 2006 at Buena Vista Home Entertainment / Features of the DVD: PAL, Widescreen / Chicago director Rob Marshall's pretty but empty (or pretty empty) film has all the elements of an Oscar contender: solid adaptation (from Arthur Golden's bestseller), beautiful locale, good acting, lush cinematography. But there's something missing at the heart, which leaves the viewer sucked in, then left completely detached from what's going on. It's hard to find fault with the fascinating story, which traces a young girl's determination to free herself from the imprisonment of scullery maid to geisha, then from the imprisonment of geisha to a woman allowed to love. Chiyo (Suzuka Ohgo), a young girl with curious blue eyes, is sold to a geisha house and doomed to pay off her debt as a cleaning girl until a stranger named The Chairman (Ken Watanabe) shows her kindness. She is inspired to work hard and become a geisha in order to be near the Chairman, with whom she has fallen in love. An experienced geisha (Michelle Yeoh) chooses to adopt her as an apprentice and to use as a pawn against her rival, the wicked, legendary Hatsumomo (Gong Li). Chiyo (played as an older woman by Ziyi Zhang), now renamed Sayuri, becomes the talk of the town, but as her path crosses again and again with the Chairman's, she finds the closer she gets to him the further away he seems. Her newfound "freedom" turns out to be trapping, as men are allowed to bid on everything from her time to her virginity. Some controversy swirled around casting Chinese actresses in the three main Japanese roles, but Zhang, Yeoh and Gong in particular ably prove they're the best for the part. It's admirable that all the actors attempted to speak Japanese-accented English, but some of the dialogue will still prove difficult to understand; perhaps it contributes to some of the emotion feeling stilted. Geisha has all the ingredients of a sweeping, heartbreaking epic and follows the recipe to a T, but in the end it's all dressed up with no place to go.--Ellen A. Kim

Newest Review: ... was also very focused on the "art" of being a Geisha as an entertainer, rather than as a prostitute. Plot: On ... more

 ... one stormy night, Chiyo is brutally uprooted from her home and sent to an Okiya to learn the art of becoming a Geisha. There, she immediately becomes bullied by Hatsumomo, one of the most celebrated Geishas of that time. After a series of circumstances, it is decided that Chiyo will eventually stop her Geisha training to become a maid, the latter has to watch as her friend Pumpkin takes her first steps into the world of entertainment. Chiyo is struck by a deep longing to become a Geisha too, so that she may be in the ...more

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Memoirs of a Geisha [DVD] [2005]
Chicago director Rob Marshall's pretty but empty (or pretty empty ...
Last Update 10.12.2009 06:10
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janharper
Premium Review Memoirs of a Geisha (DVD): A Glimpse Of A Secret World (420 words)
by - written on 09/03/08 (Very useful, 108 readings)
Rating:

Memoirs of a Geisha was released in 2005. It won three Oscars and awards for costume design, art direction and cinematography. Rightly so! This is a captivating and intriguing story, based on the novel of the same name by Arthur Golden. This historical epic was directed by Rob Marshall, award winning director of 'Chicago' and produced by Lucy Fisher, Douglas Wick and Steven Spielberg. It tells the story of a child taken away from her poor family and sent to work in a Geisha house. The child is selected to train as a Geisha and blossoms into the very popular and respected Geisha, Sayuri. She is beautiful and accomplished in the arts, but also ...  Read the complete review

eylem26
Premium Review Memories of a geisha (410 words)
by - written on 10/02/08 (Useful, 18 readings)
Rating:

I brought this DVD from ebay for 3.99 it was a bargain , the film arrived and when I inserted on my I mac, I realised it had great sound effects and pictures, The film is about a girl who has being taken away by a trader from her tent home , the treads men takes her and her sister, the sister is given to another gaisha house and her other sister is given to another geisha house. the girl has beatiful blue eyes and they name her as water , when she is at the house they use her like a slave and make her do all the cleanning and house work, at the age of nine she sees a man in town who buys her a candy , she fells in love with him and to see him again she decides ...  Read the complete review

Praskipark
Crowned Review Memoirs of a Geisha (DVD): The Girl with the Grey - Blue Eyes (1233 words)
by - written on 04/01/09 (Very useful, 210 readings)
Rating:

Chiyo's(Suzuka Ohgo) pale grey eyes have seen much sadness: a dying mother, a father who is impoverished, grieving and forced to sell his children and her sister screaming as she is taken away from her side. All this tragedy before her tenth birthday. Despite the tears and the trauma, these eyes with their clear intensity, are her major asset and her only hope of freedom. These eyes, which change from slate grey to an electrifying blue give her an extraordinary, stunning beauty that is soon recognised by two women who run one of the many okiyas (homes for geishas) in Kyoto. They look upon Chiyo's beauty as an opportunity for making money for their okiya. With training, ...  Read the complete review

thingywhatsit
Crowned Review BUTTERFLY ROMANCE (890 words)
by - written on 14/02/07 (Very useful, 335 readings)
Rating:

I bought both the book and the film at the same time and decided that I would read the book first. However, having read it, cover to cover, found it hard to try and imagine how a film could better the achievement of the book itself, since the pictures conjured up by the written word in this edition were astoundingly detailed, and left the reader with set ideas about the landscape, the characters, and the era covered in the original story by Arthur Golden. I was unsure of how the adaptation by Robin Swicord would work, since the original writer left nothing out. The picture that he painted of the history of a Geisha in the city of Gion was so detailed that before I even ...  Read the complete review

diamond_sparkles
Premium Review Memoirs of a Geisha (DVD): "These are Memoirs of another kind..." (736 words)
by - written on 05/11/09 (Very useful, 39 readings)
Rating:

Memoirs of a Geisha ranks quite easily among the most intense and poignant movie that I have ever watched. I read the book prior to watching the film and as in every film adaptations; there are quite a few differences. But I have to say that the depiction of the story was really really realistic in the film. Many of my friends who watched the film with me claimed that it was a harsh attack on feminism and some of them told me that they were quite disgusted by the anti-feminist issues that are depicted all through the film. But in my opinion, Memoirs of a Geisha is more of a cultural, rather than a feminist (or anti-feminist) piece of work. The concept ...  Read the complete review

 
Memoirs of a Geisha (DVD)