Forever Enthralled

Mei Lanfang is a male performer who plays women's roles in Peking opera, and while still young he leaves his master's generation behind. As he rises on stage his life passes into other people's hands: his manager, his family, his audience. His closeness to Meng Xiaodong, an opera performer like himself, carries a price for both of them. When the Japanese occupation comes he refuses to go on stage. Chen Kaige's film competed at the Berlin Film Festival in 2009. Leon Lai plays Mei Lanfang and Zhang Ziyi plays Meng Xiaodong; Yu Shaoqun plays the young Mei. Chen had told the same world before in Farewell My Concubine, and this film was judged in that one's shadow. The telling does not come very close to Mei's private life, and some critics found its respectful tone too cautious.